20161113 Cellar Raid

Cracked open a 2015 Maillard's Odyssey from Sierra Nevada.
This is a Barrel Aged Ale we bought las Christmas at the brewery.

It is very mellow and has a ton of chocolate flavor mixed in with a surprisingly light texture.
Quite good.

5% for Public Funding is NOT Libertarian Hypocrisy

Time to make things clear for those who don't understand simple s**t:

Some people have bashed Libertarians as being hypocritical for wanting to get to 5% in order to get public financing. This is complete horses**t for the following 2 simple reasons:

1. 5% gets you guaranteed ballot access so you don't have to spend valuable campaign money just trying to navigate the barriers that the 2 major parties put in the way of getting on the ballot.

2. The "public" money, is actually PUBLIC! It's not involuntary taxes extorted out of your paycheck and spent for s**t you don't want just because Congress wants to pander for a few votes. It is the $3 that a few people VOLUNTARILY divert away from the Federal cesspool and SPECIFICALLY designate to be used by candidates for President.

Do some research. The parties have managed to subvert this fund to pay for their conventions, but they don't take the campaign money because it limits how much they can get from lobbyists and PACs - remember, Obama promised to take public financing and then backed out when he found out how much sleazy money it would cost him (gross oversimplification, but it highlights how campaigns are only paying lip service to getting money out of politics - what they mean is getting money out of their opponent's politics...but I digress.)

Ray on Brats

I feel as Americans have become a bunch of brats...

...disagree?

Almost every single political figure that had any traction throughout this general election cycle had given us only false promises, anger (both sides), status quo speeches, or entitlement laced decorative words that called to our inner spoiled child and that child said "yes, I deserve that."

Here we are with a social security system destined to fail a generation from now... our longest war(s) in history and a Keynsian mounting pile of debt with a currency that is valued on faith alone.

Faith in a system that continues to let us down.

A foreign policy that is foreign to the remnants of policy and we say just let us keep our wifi up.... let me hold on to my phone and things that I do not need.

Let me eat my over priced over saturated unhealthy frozen meal and tie my kids to their IPad parents.

We've taken so many steps ahead... we are actually falling behind.

Just let me have my Rangers and give me shit... and don't give any one else who I deem is less deserving.

So when we complain about our options know that we created them because no one wants to hear the goddam truth:

1. Work hard
2. Some people have higher barriers to overcome and they are instituted unfairly based on their religion, color, orientation, gender and socioeconomic class... the very fact that these institutions lay hidden in the shadows of society does not mean they do not exist... it means only that they are antithetical to the Constitution.
3. Earn your way brick by brick and call to attention when your countrymen is forced to carry more.
4. There is a God. But He is not at the seat of Government. Any attempt to place Him there will corrupt His message.
5. If you want freedom, share it.
6. Guns are your right, not your toy. Responsible and humble gun ownership is the way to preserve that right.
7. Illegal guns are not registered but there are far too many ways for guns to get in the hands of people who wish only to impede on people's right to live. Strict enforcement of laws already in existence is the first step to greater gun control.
8. No one should be forced to choose whether they should see a doctor or pay the electric bill.... however Obamacare sucks... and so does the whole American health industry.
9. The rich have a right to keep the spoils of their, or their parents, or their grandparents earned wealth. However... are you fucking serious that like 300 families own a good portion of the nation's wealth... what are we Rome?
10. Abortion. Tough one for me for I believe in the rights of Women. However I also believe that life begins at conception and that that person has a right to live. With that said... Planned Parenthood is not full of ghouls and monsters. We should reform standing abortion regulation and not make it an issue of a right... but an issue of the right thing to do.
11. OUR EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM IS A JOKE. Less 5 billion dollar jets that are way over budget and mor COMPREHENSIVE school funding.
12. Let people in. Let them in... get over it whitey. Let people have an easier path to citizenship.
13. Bombing doesn't solve problems...bombing punishes problem starters and sometimes we have got to Negan the barbarians because that is the only language they understand... but let's not kid ourselves...if we want to solve problems we better start offering solutions that don't end with swarms of a population dead.

14. Your memes don't convince anybody... they're just sound bytes that make you a little dumber every day.

15. I just want my country to allow me to be the best husband and father and son I can be. Don't give me opportunity...get out of the way and allow me to find it myself. I'll buy my own shit if I want it....

Yet, take care of those who are incapable. Help those who need it and deliver them unto a path that they too can say... get out of my way I'm going to try and be the best person I can.

Educate, empathize, lead, love and do not enable. Let those who are capable suffer their own inability to lay the smallest offering of sacrifice, selflessness and drive at the altar of freedom.