Privatizing the air space and ATC

"All people, however fanatical they may be in their zeal to disparage and to fight capitalism, implicitly pay homage to it by passionately clamoring for the products it turns out."-- Ludwig von Mises

The FAA, Federal Aviation Administration, has been criticized for not updating the ATC, (Air Traffic Control) of the American skies. Outdated computer equipment has impeded the growth of the air transportation and caused billions of dollars in cost to airlines and other businesses due to delays and poor routing. Billions of hours have been lost by consumers.

In the current air traffic system, a jumbo jet carrying 400 passengers uses a block of airspace in cruising altitude that is about 10 miles square and 2000 feet thick. A small business jet carrying only one person, a company executive, or a dog, takes up the same amount of airspace as the fully loaded jumbo jet. On arrival and landing they both take up equal space, though the small jet has to fly with greater separation if behind a jumbo jet due to wake turbulence. They both pay different amounts for the use of that airspace, that is, the government does not charge them directly for using the space. The FAA operates on a budget that includes user fees, fuel excise taxes, and ticket taxes, etc., which all are political in nature to say the least. http://www.library.unt.edu/gpo/NCARC/testimony/swa-te.htm

The General Aviation lobby in April 2008 defeated a proposal that would charge $25 per trip fee for small airplanes. http://www.eaa.org/news/2008/2008-06-12_user_fees.asp

All the users of the ATC system fight over user fees and airport slots. It's time to look after the passengers and the real owners of American airspace, the citizens.
It's time to privatize the American airspace. It's time to create a for profit corporation that charges users for the airspace based on the value at that time and place. The corporation will be The ATC Corporation, owned by each American citizen with an equal number of shares. Dividends will be paid to share holders who are over 70 years old.

Make the users pay for the block of space they are using based on the scarcity of the airspace. On a noon arrival at Chicago's O'Hare airport the skies are crowded and therefore the space is more valuable. Charge a fee to the users of that space. The market would make it more efficient for a jumbo jet full of passengers to pay for that value than it would for a corporate jet with a CEO on board. The company whose only passenger was a CEO might be willing to pay the same fee as the jumbo jet with 400 passengers. That would increase the profits to the ATC Corporation. Charging based on value would reduce peak traffic times and reduce delays.

The cost to the company with the jet carrying only the CEO would be passed on to the consumers and shareholders eventually. But uncontrolled costs in a free market drives corporations out of business.

In uncrowded airspace and times, the costs for the use of that airspace would be minimum.

The FAA would still function, but now it would function mostly for safety, not the conflict it currently has about trying to promote aviation AND safety.

The (AOPA) Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association would lobby vehemently against this privatization proposal. So would most other users. The beneficiaries would be 300 million US citizens who would reap the profits from the market.

The free market works.

Charles Tolleson

Louisiana to allow teaching other theories

The State legislature of Louisiana has passed a law, and the Christian Governor, Bobby Jindal, is expected to sign the law that would allow the teaching of intelligent design and other "theories". The law gives local school boards wide discretion in what will be taught.

http://www.legis.state.la.us/billdata/streamdocument.asp?did=498719
B.(1) The State Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, upon request of a city, parish, or other local public school board, shall allow and assist teachers, principals, and other school administrators to create and foster an environment within public elementary and secondary schools that promotes critical thinking skills, logical analysis, and open and objective discussion of scientific theories being studied including, but not limited to, evolution, the origins of life, global warming, and human cloning.

That's why, as a libertarian, I think the government should not be involved in the education industry. If the education monopoly was disbanded there would be plenty of private providers. They could teach what the market wants. Sooner or later the market will decide which "theory" has merit.

Government schools, where one is forced to pay for teachings that one does not believe in, or prohibited from teaching what one believes in, only creates conflict and strife. Without government schools we would not be having the ongoing debate about what should or should not be taught in school. Nor would we be fighting in the courts about what can and cannot be taught.

The government schools were created to compete with the Catholic private schools. The creators of the government schools wanted the schools to teach the protestant religion. The creators of the government schools wanted to control the malleable mind of the youth, as did Marx and other witchdoctors and tyrants throughout history.

The creators of the government schools promoted education of the poor. Poor parents fell for this sales pitch. Like all organizations that start out with a principle to provide and protect their members, organizations grow and become a means to provide and protect the ones running the organization. The government schools now have so many people in the industry that the students' interest are secondary to; administrators, nurses, counselors, teachers, bus drivers, janitors, book publishers, and those who want to mold the young minds to; socialism, Islam, Christianity, feminism, or environmentalism.

Therefore we libertarians believe in a free market for education. Of course, if the U.S. was a desert, without navigable waterways, forests, coal, and fertile plains, we might still be ruled by the cleric, like the cleric rules Iran. Creationism would probable be the most favored subject, even in a free market.

But, we have become prosperous, not just because of our politics, and certainly not because of government schools, but, because our natural resources, using science and technology, the destroyer of myths, has allowed us to blossom and flower.

Charles Tolleson

Teen Pregncies at Gloucester High School

The story about 17 teenagers at Gloucester High School becoming pregnant
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1815845,00.html has many people wondering why.

I suspect some maternal instinct is at work here. Teenagers have gotten pregnant throughout human history. They had tribes and large families to support them. This tribal thinking had the teens at Gloucester High say, "We will raise our babies together". They had a need for a tribal support group. Actually, the rest of society will help raise the babies.

Now we suddenly think it is wrong for teens to become pregnant. The reason we think it is wrong is because we know we will have to bare the brunt of teenagers having babies. We are their tribe. We also think there are too many humans in the world.

The only thing wrong about this is the government's involvement. The government schools will provide day care for the teens' babies. The government will demand the fathers pay for babies they did not want. If the fathers cannot pay, the rest of us will.

The government will provide free counseling for the teens. The counselors will tell the teens they are victims of the men who are the babies' fathers.

The tabloids will pay for interviews with the girls. They will get their appearances on talk shows. Along with their ovum, their self love and overrated importance will also be fertilized.

When reality sets in the teens will likely be disappointed at being a parent. Like most of our choices, they will second guess theirs.

The whole message is that we reward negative behavior. We send a message that we will take care of those who make selfish decisions, or foolish decisions. There are little negative consequences, and learning, from making bad choices.

The government has become the father/provider for these teens. Because of divorce and single moms, I suspect most of the pregnant teens do not have a biological father in their lives. The government father/provider, like a father kicked out of the house, does not form an attachment and affection for its offspring. The government has failed at being a father/husband, and will continue to fail, like most government programs fail.

And Barrack Obama has the audaticity to lecture to fathers on Fathers Day about responsibility when women are chosing to have babies without fathers around.


Charles Tolleson

After 6 years, the Taliban are still fighting

The problem in defense is how far you can go without destroying from within what you are trying to defend from without. ~Dwight D. Eisenhower

"Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is TELL THEM THEY ARE BEING ATTACKED, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. IT WORKS THE SAME IN ANY COUNTRY."   Herman Goering

The United States has the world's best and most powerful military. They can sit in an air conditioned office a thousand miles from the battlefield and kill with impunity. The United States spends more on their military than does the next highest 10 countries in the world. The U.S. has 40% of the world's spending on military operations! That's 40% of all the military spending in the world.  The U.S. has two oceans and two friendly countries on its borders.   Every police departments has a large arsenal.   Millions of private citizens have guns.   The U.S. has the largest nuclear arsenal in the world.   Who would be crazy enough to declare war on the U.S.?    One terrorists will keep the sheep frightened enough so they will follow any shepherd.

So what is America afraid of? Despite this vast military/industrial/congressional complex the United States is paralyzed with fear. Somehow the people in this country are afraid they will be killed by a terrorist. The odds are more likely they will be killed by their own spouse. Over 4000 people have been killed by their spouses during the past ten years in America. This is more than have been killed by terrorists.

And despite the world's largest military fighting a small band of freedom fighters in Afghanistan called the Taliban, fighting for over six years, the Taliban are still fighting. This small group, without an air force or navy, and fighting with small weapons, must have some morals and principals that are worth fighting for.

If a Muslim army invaded and occupied the U.S. and tried to spread Islam by kicking down our doors and terrifying our families, I suspect many Americans would be fighting just as tenaciously as are the Taliban.

The longer a Goliath fights without a cause or passion against a David with a cause and passion, the greater chance Goliath will fall.

Charles Tolleson

Pro lifers are pro war

I can't argue with one's views of morality. It's a complex subject. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morality

I think if we can afford to be moral, we will. Take the vegetarians view that it is immoral to eat meat. They can afford that view because there are plenty of vegetables available. Take away their vegetables in a drought and they would lose their moral view about eating meat, or at least ignore their views.

The same with infanticide. In a famine, or overpopulation, the desire for survival means the weak will die. Morals be dammed.

In the opposite view, if the population declines to a dangerous level for the group's survival, abortions will decline, and the birth rate will increase.

Morals are always changing. Slavery and human sacrifice used to be moral. Burning atheists at the stake used to be moral.

Some libertarians view an unplanned pregnancy as an invasion of one's body. Libertarians believe we own our bodies and no one has the right to invade them.

The pro choice people do have a conflict in promoting the right to kill a fetus and trying to save the lives of adults. But, the Christians who are passionate about saving a fetus are just as passionate about taking the lives of adults in war, when Christianity is supposed to be anti war. http://www.lewrockwell.com/vance/vance143.html

Charles Tolleson

P.S. Tim Russert seemed like a guy I would like to hang out with. He was a professional journalist, not a head of state, so why all the media coverage? Maybe the media should have their FCC license revoked for not be fair and unbalanced. I guess each journalist, like cops and other professions, like to overvalue themselves.

Crandall wants to re-regulate airlines

"We have failed to confront the reality that unfettered competition just doesn't work very well in certain industries,"- Robertt Crandall, Former CEO of American Airlines.

"Unfettered" - To set free or keep free from restrictions or bonds.

People have a right to advocate for government run industries. Just please do not blame an industry's problems on the "unfettered" free market where a free market does not exist.

Sounds like Mr. Crandall is another closet Marxist who has gotten rich from capitalism. Again, even smart people like Crandall claim American industries are free markets. It just ain't so! Who owns the ATC system that allows a small jet to fly empty, use up the same ATC space, and pay the same cost as a jumbo jet full of passengers using the same amount of ATC space? The government owns and operates the airspace, inefficiently.

One way to improve and go to a free market use of the airspace would be to have each user of their block of airspace be charged the rate for the demand at the time of usage. This would make peak times more valuable. The government owns and runs the ATC system, inefficiently, and now Crandall wants more government involvement in air transportation??

If Crandall's Marxist/socialist/fascist plan, or whatever you want to call it happens, it will be good for the bankers, employees, and airline executives, but not for the consumers. There are more of the latter than the former. We are all consumers, or potential consumers in a free market.

Remember before deregulation if you worked for United Airlines there were no promotions because the central planners denied United Airlines new routes. It paid to have connections with members of the transportation committees in congress. Deregulation created thousands of jobs and new services to hundreds of small communities.

Under regulation, Senator Howard Cannon of Nevada made sure the small towns of Nevada, Elko and Ely, were served by United Airlines, with subsidies. These flights from San Francisco never carried enough passengers to pay the cost, but under regulation Howard Cannon forced taxpayers and United Airlines to provide service to small communities that would not support service.

Since deregulation, air travelers have saved billions on ticket costs. Businesses have expanded. The cost and inconvenience of air travel may mean consumers will change their lifestyles and businesses will do more teleconferences and centralizing their activities to avoid travel. The market works, if allowed.

Crandall's plan sounds like a utopian's dream. - "the industry's goal should be to harness competition and regulation to create a system responsive to both the imperative of efficiency and the desirability of decent service" - Now Crandall wants the government to regulate service. Gads! Will the dreamers ever wake up? I'm afraid not.

If we lose all our petroleum and have to give up traveling by modern means and go back to traveling by stagecoach, you can rest assured there will be a FSA, Federal Stagecoach Administration, that licenses stagecoach drivers! OSHA will make sure the stagecoach passengers and employees are safe. The horses will be shod by a blacksmith that must spend two years as an apprentice.-And there will be a Stageway Labor Act to see that the employees have bargaining rights.

Charles Tolleson

Robert Crandall Calls For Re-Regulation Jun 11, 2008

By Anthony L. Velocci, Jr./Aviation Daily (see http://tinyurl.com/4vqgdq for article and comments from readers)

Decrying the "sad state" of U.S. commercial aviation, former American Chairman and CEO Robert Crandall yesterday declared three decades of deregulation a failure and said that treating airlines like a regulated utility must be a part of a broad solution to their current financial crisis."We have failed to confront the reality that unfettered competition just doesn't work very well in certain industries, as aptly demonstrated by our airline experience and by the adverse outcomes associated with various state efforts to deregulate electricity rates," Crandall told aviation and financial industry professionals gathered at the Wings Club in New York City. "It's time to acknowledge that airlines look and are more like utilities than ordinary businesses."While the rapid rise in jet fuel prices has complicated the job of airline managers, fuel prices are not at the core of the industry's precarious financial state. Inadequate scale isn't to blame either, he added."The arguments in favor of consolidation are unpersuasive," he said."Mergers will not lower fuel prices, and they will not increase economies of scale for already sizable major airlines. If consolidation were really the answer, it is conceivable the system could be run by a single efficient operator."Instead, Crandall continued, the industry's goal should be to harness competition and regulation to create a system responsive to both the imperative of efficiency and the desirability of decent service — now unacceptable "by any standard."In addition to re regulation, Crandall called for:• Overhauling price structures to "recapture" full costs and earn the profits needed to sustain the huge investments essential to the industry's future.• Amending the Railway Labor Act to require binding arbitration to encourage both labor and management to adopt more moderate positions than has been true in the past while simultaneously moving all airlines closer to labor-cost parity.• Revising U.S. bankruptcy laws to deprive failed carriers of the right to use lower costs to undercut the fares offered by "their more prudent rivals."• Regulating the number of flights scheduled to what runways,terminals and air traffic control facilities at airports can handle.• Shrinking schedules proportionately to each airline's current frequency share as a way to pressure carriers to use the largest feasible aircraft in each slot.• Imposing more stringent financial standards that new airlines must meet to eliminate or discourage "short-term antics" by start-ups that have destabilized the pricing structure required by a healthy industry.• A more accommodating stance by Washington towards industry collaboration to achieve more intensive asset utilization and more efficient operations. Crandall also noted, however, that industry regulation will be insufficient to rescue the commercial air transportation industry. Also needed is a national transportation plan of U.S. aviation goals,including a comprehensive redesign of the air traffic control system."Unhappily," he added, "such a plan does not exist."

Cohabitation more acceptable

"Marriage is an adventure, like going to war.” G. K. Chesterton

A story in USA Today on June 9, 2008 is about cohabitation becoming a more acceptable lifestyle in the United States. Cohabitation in the U. S. is around 10%, higher in other western countries, from 20% to 30%.

Why now? Why was this lifestyle not "acceptable" a hundred years ago? Does this mean that something that is unacceptable today, like drug use and prostitution, will be acceptable in the future?

Technology is the driving force behind change. People live longer and are exposed to more choices through technology that spreads ideas. Generation after generation used to live and die in the small village they were born, having never heard any different opinions than the ones they were taught by their family, priest, and neighbors. Technology increases the pace of change so that children and grandchildren are able to escape the psychological constraints that held their parents.

People like to say it is traditional to do this or that. But not all traditions make sense. For many generations slavery and human sacrifices were traditional. Atheism was unacceptable. Atheists were burned at the stake. We are in an era where traditions that are not in our best interest are quickly discarded.

I cohabited with a young woman in 1976. It was not accepted by my parents and many of my friends. It was frowned on by men my age group who were married, and some who had even been divorced. Why?

Marriage has been with humans only a brief time in humans' existence. A legal marriage is not a natural state between human animals. It is a business and religious arrangement.

One woman told me I was getting "it" for free. I wanted to ask her how much she charged her husband for "it", and if she thought of herself as a sex object since her sex was for sale.

I think some of the resistance to cohabitation was the religious aspect of marriage. I also think some of my male peers resented my good fortune, getting female companionship without having to give her half my wages and risking alimony and community property in a divorce.

Since men are staying single longer, look for states to enact legislation that will make property acquired during cohabitation as community property.

I think some resistance to any social change that benefits men is from what Pradeep Ramanathan calls Masculophobia. Ramanathan describes masculophobia as the fear, suspicion, and rejection, of maleness, of masculinity. It encompasses everything from the male-bashing that is so prevalent in today's society, to the feelings of being ashamed of one's maleness that many men have. http://www.ncfm.org/pradeep.html

Bilbo Baggins, single

More view cohabitation as acceptable choice By Sharon Jayson, USA TODAY June 9 2008

An analysis of cohabitation, marriage and divorce data from 13 countries, including the USA, shows that living together has become so mainstream that growing numbers of Americans view it as an alternative to marriage. The National Marriage Project study of a sampling of Western European and Scandinavian nations, Australia, Canada and New Zealand found that cohabitation elsewhere is far more common and indeed viewed as an option to matrimony. The study found that anywhere from 15% to 30% of all couples identified themselves as living together, compared with about 10% right now in the USA. http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-06-08-cohabitation-study_N.htm?csp=1

Bashing Fathers on Father's Day

As father's day approaches this weekend, the columnists have already started lecturing fathers on how they should improve and carry out their responsibility. See the appended column below. Can you imagine someone writing such columns demeaning Mothers on Mother's Day?

The American society is infected with what Pradeep Ramanathan called masculophobia. Ramanathan defines masculophobia as the fear, suspicion, and rejection, of maleness, of masculinity. It encompasses everything from the male-bashing that is so prevalent in today's society, to the feelings of being ashamed of one's maleness that many men have. http://www.ncfm.org/pradeep.html

If one wants fathers to assume more responsibility, they should remove the government from the family structure and allow the father to have some authority. As it stands in our current family structure, the father only has responsibility, no authority. All the authority rests with the mother or the State.
If the father has any authority it is de facto authority granted by the mother, or the state. Responsibility without authority makes one a slave.

Patriarchy used to be a respectful word. Now it is a dirty word.

"In a patriarchal society all heterosexual intercourse is rape because women, as a group, are not strong enough to give meaningful consent." Catherine MacKinnon

"Under patriarchy, no woman is safe to live her life, or to love, or to mother children. Under patriarchy, every woman is a victim, past, present, and future. Under patriarchy, every woman's daughter is a victim, past, present, and future. Under patriarchy, every woman's son is her potential betrayer and also the inevitable rapist or exploiter of another woman," Andrea Dworkin, Liberty, p.58.

More hateful quotes about men here; http://www.deltabravo.net/custody/quotes.php

It's time for men to stop cooperating. It's time for men to withdraw. It's time for men to withdraw more than their dick. It's time for men to withdraw their enthusiasm. It's time for men to have a WOE (Whoa) program, a "Withdrawal of Enthusiasm". When men are treated as equals to women by the courts then men will call off their WOE program. Let the courts operate without men's production, if it can.

Charles Tolleson

http://news.yahoo.com/s/usatoday/20080609/cm_usatoday/aministersfathersdaywisdom;_ylt=AlM_BUyhDblhh5iSyJuebsus0NUE

A minister's Father's Day wisdom
Mon Jun 9,
By Oliver "Buzz" Thomas

What do Sigmund Freud, Jesus and Moses have in common? They each believed in the importance of fathers. Freud said that nothing in a child's life is more important than the security and protection afforded to it by a father. Moses listed honoring our fathers as one of God's Big Ten, and Jesus used the concept of a loving father as his central metaphor for understanding God. Be they good or bad, dads mark us for life. Most men, to their credit, set out to be good fathers, but the distance between intentions and results is considerable. Along the way, lots of us get lost, give up or simply run out of gas.

As a minister, I'm sorry to report that the Bible has little to offer in the way of positive role models for fathering.

Oliver "Buzz" Thomas is a minister, lawyer and author of 10 Things Your Minister Wants to Tell You (But Can't Because He Needs the Job).

Susan B Anthony, Feminist, and Black Men

"I beg you to speak of Woman as you do of the Negro, speak of her as a human being, as a citizen of the United States, as a half of the people in whose hands lies the destiny of this Nation." Susan B Anthony 1820 - 1906

Susan B. Anthony was an advocate for women's suffrage. In the last half of the 19th century, Anthony thought white women were more oppressed than African Americans. She was disappointed when the 15th Amendment was passed that gave black men the right to vote, but did not give women the right to vote.

Anthony had a disdain for men as indicated by this quote, "White men have always controlled their wives' wages. Colored men were not able to do so until they themselves became free. Then they owned both their wives and their wages."

Anthony would be further disappointed to see that a black man in the 21st century won the democratic presidential primary race over a white woman. Anthony would most likely feel a woman should be the first minority/non white male to hold such an honor.

Modern American feminists, who advocate for equal rights, must be conflicted about a black man winning the democratic nomination of 2008, before a white woman won. The feminists thought it was time for a woman to be president of the United States.

More women and minorities belong to the democrat party than any other party. It is a party for plunder, plunder the rich and give to the minorities. Only about 10% of the Libertarian party, a party of self reliance, is female.

The democrat party has long been an advocate for women and minorities. Senator Hillary Clinton was one of the proponents for the rights of women and minorities. Like Susan Anthony, Hillary Clinton has advocated for women's rights. In a speech in China in 1995 she said, "women's rights are human rights". Hillary Clinton said nothing about men's rights being human rights.

It must be very confusing for Hillary Clinton to realize a black male with a name like, Barack Hussein Obama, has won the nomination of her party to be president, and denied her the chance of being the first female president of the United States.

Charles Tolleson

Money, contributors, and politics

It has been said that money is the driving force behind politics. It does not mean the right things gets done. It just means money can get things done. "Money is the mothers' milk of politics." Jesse Unruh 1922-1987

"While Jews account for only three percent of the population, they are concentrated in such key swing states as Florida, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and California. Financial contributions from Jewish donors account for as much as 20 percent of Republican campaign funds and as much as 40 percent of Democratic funds, according to a recent article by the Forward, the largest nationally circulated Jewish newspaper in the US." http://www.antiwar.com/ips/akhavi.php?articleid=12947

If 3% of the U.S. population is Jewish, that means there are about 9 million Jews in the U.S. Jews are politically active because of how they were treated in the past. It may be important to a small segment of the U.S. population to force the rest of the U.S. to support Israel, but it only harms the United States. (Osama Bin Laden said the attacks of 9/11 were due to the U.S. support for Israel.) A small group of people have contributed to the continued tensions in the world by influencing U.S. foreign policy. By using force to confiscate funds and resources of the majority of U.S. citizens in order to do the bidding of one of the smallest countries in the world, a military theocracy, Middle East peace is only a dream.

Presidential candidate Barrack Obama said at a speech on June 4, 2008 in front of AIPAC that he would pledge 3 billion dollars each year for the next ten years to Israel. It's not your money Mr. Obama. It's our money.

If 2 million Jews contribute $100 each to political candidates, that would be 200 million dollars! If they contribute $1000 each that would be TWO BILLION dollars! One can see why no political candidate, not one, has ever won an election, unless they support Israel.

This means the United States will always be fighting Israel's wars, even if it is not in the best interest of the United States.

Charles Tolleson

Do not create more veterans

What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy? Mahatma Gandhi (1869 - 1948), "Non-Violence in Peace and War"

On another forum I received a notice to go here http://www.hireahero.org/?page=PostAThankYou and "Thank our veterans".

The best way to thank our veterans is to create fewer veterans. This would allow more resources per veteran. The more veterans, the less resources per veteran.

There are many people who want to have parades for veterans. There are web sites that want to thank our veterans.
http://www.hireahero.org/?page=PostAThankYou
http://www.bluestarmoms.org/national.html

There is nothing wrong with being compassionate and charitable. However, much of this adulation of the military is done by the war enablers.

When these war lovers call all personnel who wear a military uniform, "heroes", they are only encouraging more young men and women to join and fight in some unnecessary war. Our men and women who died in Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq did not sacrifice their lives, the war enablers killed them.

In a just and necessary war you would not have to reward men and women with false praise, or the GI Bill. In a just and necessary war you would see all of them manning the ramparts.

When one ages, passion should be replaced with reason, and knowledge with wisdom. To hear some of the elder members of the tribe talk about patriotism, war, honor and sacrifice, it makes me think they have learned nothing in their long lives.

There are Vietnam veterans who are filled with anger towards liberals. These old vets think if the liberals of the Vietnam war had kept quiet and not resisted the war, the United States could have won the war. This would have created a glorious victory parade and the vets could have garnered praise thereafter with how they protected and saved the United States. As it stands now, there is no glorious victory and the United States still stands. The Vietnam war was unnecessary, and the liberals caused the illusion of a glorious victory to evaporate.

As long as there is pride and patriotism, the world will be a dangerous place.

Charles Tolleson

Women Shaming Men Into War

This pamphlet shamed young men of England into signing up to fight in WW I. A war that was unnecessary.

Most young men get pressured this way. War is a tribal initiation, a rite of passage for young men. Throughout history young men have been required to take this passage. It had nothing to do with freedom.

Russians fought for Stalin. Germans fought for Hitler. Chinese men fought for Mao. Young Aztec and Zulu warriors fought, but it was not for freedom. The Japanese fought for their emperor, not for freedom.

American males in the early colonies fought long before the Declaration of Independence. American males fought before they all had the right to vote. Early American voting restrictions prohibited males from voting who did not own land.

If America had never become a Republic and instead had become a totalitarian government, American males would have still fought for their country.

It's all a test. The young men must prove themselves. If they are cowards, they will not get to mate. The tribe needs brave warriors.

Today's American military has career personnel. They have passed their youthful naivete, but now they are looking for a retirement check. A military person today can serve 20 years and retire at the age of 38 and collect a pension for 40 years, twice as long as he/she served.

Charles Tolleson

http://www.warandgender.com/wgwomwwi.htm Women shaming men into war

Women are often active participants in shaming men to try to goad them into fighting wars. Recall the Russian women in World War I who went "over the top" to try to shame exhausted Russian soldiers into fighting again (see pp. 73-75). In Britain and America during that war, women organized a large-scale campaign to hand out white feathers to able-bodied men found on the streets, to shame the men for failing to serve in combat. Not all women supported it: "Dealer in white feathers / . Can't you see it isn't decent, / To flout and goad men into doing, / What isn't asked of you?" However, the Women of England's Active Service League pledged never to be seen in public with an able-bodied man not serving in the military, and British recruiting posters told young men their women would reject them if they were "not in khaki" and meanwhile told the young women that men who refused to fight and die for them were not worthy of their affections. (The white feather campaign was briefly resurrected in World War II, and the British government had to issue badges for men exempt on medical grounds.) Some scholars object to blaming women for goading men into World War I. They argue that the poster claiming "Women of Britain Say, 'Go!'" (see Figure 5.3) was propaganda devised by men to affect other men. "[M]any women tried to get their sons out of the army. Others were agitating to prevent conscription."58 http://www.warandgender.com/wgwomwwi.htm