What Is A Right: Part Two

I guess I couldn't ask for more perfect timing on this one.  I was listening to Inga Barks sitting in for Mark Levin. The show was from Monday or Tuesday before Thanksgiving, and the hot topic is the TSA screening.

At least a couple of callers made the statement that flying was not a right, but a privilege, similar to driving.  Inga is a smart lady with her own radio show in Fresno, but even she can't come up with correct responses on the spot like Levin can most of the time.  And I'll admit, unless you've already thought about this one, it would be easy to hear someone make that statement and think, "Yeah, that sounds right."  But it's not.  Why isn't it?  Let's start with driving.

For you to operate a motor vehicle out on the commonly held public roads, everybody else, including yourself would like to be reasonably sure that you know what you are doing.  We don't let young children or people with disabilities that are too severe operate motor vehicles as a right because doing so would unreasonably endanger other people.  Therefore society, and in America that means the State level, our elected legislatures come up with minimum standards for which you can obtain a license in order to operate this potentially fatal piece of machinery.  If you want to buy a large enough parcel of land and have a vehicle delivered there and then want to drive it all over your property without ever getting it registered or insured or getting yourself a license, go ahead.  It's your right.

It's pretty much understood that you have a right to travel in and among the several States. Freedom of movement is and ought to be a right.  If you can't or don't want to obtain a license to drive, you can get someone else to carry you, or you can walk or ride a bicycle or whatever.  If you take a cab or a bus, you've simply entered into a contract (also considered a right) with another private entity to take you where you want to go.  That entity's license to transportation in whatever medium has nothing to do with your right to travel.
However, (and it pains me that I have to state this because somebody reading this doesn't know any better) that private entity that has jumped through all the hoops for the license, is a private entity that has the right to refuse service to anyone for whatever reason.  If you call a cab and then want it to take you into a drug infested, dangerous part of town, the driver can say, "I'll take you this far and no farther."  If Greyhound won't sell you a ticket because you don't know how or won't bathe, I think the other passengers will be grateful.

This is why the American public screwed up royally when they didn't bombard their congress critters to put the kabosh on creating the TSA in the first place.  As well, what would have had a great effect would have been to tell the airlines that they had better lobby against turning over security to the Feds.  Travelers should have threatened a boycott of any airline that supported creating the TSA.  But I understand why they supported it. By transferring the responsibility to the Feds, they absolve themselves of any liability for security.

This whole TSA thing is simply more methods by the political ruling class to condition the populace to accept any and all intrusive and abusive destruction of our rights in the name of security.  My prediction is that before too long, the terrorists will carry out an assault on a large public venue.  Shopping mall, sports arena, concert, mega-church gathering, you name it.  Then expect to see metal detectors and other devices springing up in all those places where they aren't already in place, but then there will be more invasive search procedures.  Just a little bit more, and a little bit more.  All in the name of safety.  Then before too long, you won't be able to travel a single road for more than five miles without being asked, "Your papers, please."

For some other very enlightening commentary on the TSA scandal, I highly recommend reading what Daphne has to say on the matter.

Glad To Be Home

I have a good friend who lives in a nice suburb of the northern Atlanta area.  He was nice enough to call me to come move some stuff for him yesterday.  He's one of those guys who you know you would be comfortable in a foxhole with, watching your back.  Such friends are few and far between, which is why I really don't have very many friends.  Actually, I like it that way.  I'd rather have just two or three friends who would take a bullet for me and me for them, than to have an entourage of people who will drop me like an empty soda can the moment things get difficult or they don't like my opinion about something.

It was the trip in to the big city of Atlanta that prompted this post.  Now, for the benefit of all possible readers, I want to explain how I view Atlanta as a big city.  I've looked at Sitemeter and it tells me I've got visitors from California and even New Zealand. Wow.  The only thing I really know about New Zealand is that they produce some wonderful lamb, they tend to be a bit more on the liberty side of things as compared to Australia or the rest of the world, and they have some of the most stunning landscape on the planet (If you've seen Lord of The Rings, you know what I'm talking about.).

Yesterday, I left the suburb of Dunwoody and got onto the infamous GA (Georgia) 400 highway.  Four lanes going north, full of commuters at 18:00 EDT trying to get about 10 to 15 miles north to the next suburban area where maybe they have more trees and a lack of zero lot lines.  For my country readers, that is shorthand for describing subdivisions where they build houses so close together that you can open your window and shake hands with your neighbor.  I love good neighbors, but at a minimum they need to be far enough away that they could stand out in their yard and scream at the top of their lungs and I'd have a hard time hearing them.  Preferably, walking to their property would be something you'd have to plan for in advance, such as taking a bottle of water and even some food for the journey.

I've lived in Tampa, Florida for 13 years; Costa Mesa, California for about a year. I've driven through most of the Los Angeles area and even down to San Diego.  I've driven the well known Pacific Coast Highway of California, from Los Angeles up to Santa Barbara.   I've traveled on Interstate 10 from Jacksonville, Florida to Santa Monica, California.  I lived in Miami, Florida for 3 years.  I've been in 27 States on the mainland.

Atlanta might seem like a big city to someone from Rome, Georgia, Oxnard, California, or Bartow, Florida, or Gassaway, West Virginia; but compared to what I've seen in my life, Atlanta is a wannabe big city.  It's really a piece of crap that became the major hub of commerce due to the railroads and it's central location in the southeast after Mr. Lincoln's war.  The Chattahoochee river isn't even a navigable water way, it's only contribution being water for irrigation and drinking. Atlanta's only other major attribute is it's airport, which is one of the worst places you could ever need to pass through. Downtown Atlanta merely serves as a petri dish for cultivating and maintaining the bloated parasitic entities of city, county, state and federal government.  The city government especially is trying very hard to be a clone of Chicago.  They are so leftist and corrupt that a city council member actually spoke against refurbishing the sewage system that dates to the 19th century because it might allow white people's sewage to pass under "their" city.  That's just a mild example.
We should resurrect Sherman and let him raze it again.

I am grateful for the trip into the area because it reminds me to be so grateful for where I live.

Helen, Georgia

By the time I got to Helen, it was dark.  Helen likes to fancy itself as a small German tourist trap.  They have this ideal spot where three rivers converge at the base of the mountains.  They seriously screwed up when they let Hardcore Biker Gear and two tattoo parlors open up.  They lost whatever charm they used to have.

I'm a firm believer in freedom.  If the people of a town want to become a Helen, Georgia or a Daytona, Florida, it's fine by me.  Don't expect me to live there.  I could easily adapt to living in Key West, Florida, but I couldn't stand to live in Miami ever again.

Did I mention that I am extremely grateful for where I live?