Here are a few issues that have been on my mind, lately:

Social Security

Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel's plan would raise the age at which retirees could receive full benefits. "We are living longer. So when you look at the total universe of this, I think that makes some sense to extend the age."

Let me translate this for the average citizen:

“Social Security was never meant to be a trust fund; it was meant to be an extra revenue stream for the government, and as long as government paid out a little bit of it in so-called ‘benefits,’ no one ever really questioned it. Since people are living longer and collecting more of this money than they were intended to collect, we have to raise the age to put things back on track.”

Does that pretty much sum it up, Senator?

Rush Limbaugh

I called the Rush Limbaugh radio show, last week, because I had finally had enough of Rush talking about democracy and freedom, as if the two were the same.

Once I was finally able to make it through, this is basically what went down:

Screener: What’s your comment?

DK: I want to talk about all this democracy stuff.

Screener: Well, what do you want to say?

DK: Democracy is majority rule. When 50% +1 of the population can tell the other 49.99% of the population how they can live and what they can do, that’s not freedom.

Screener: (Quote) “I don’t do semantics.” (click).

Semantics? Does he not understand the difference between a democracy and a Republic (mandated by our Constitution)? If he’s going to be screening calls for a leading political talk radio show, he should be up to speed on basic government terminology—unless he’s part of what I call the Democracy Propaganda Agenda. If so, I completely understand why he cut me off.

NBC Nightly News broadcast its presidential election coverage from what they called “Democracy Plaza”; Rush claims to be the “Doctor of Democracy”; national newspapers and talk radio shows also continually attempt to convince US citizens that what we have in this country is a “democracy”; and President Bush wants to spread “freedom and democracy” (totally incompatible concepts) around the globe, so it doesn’t surprise me that talk show call screeners—especially Rush Limbaugh’s—would attempt some kind of “semantics” excuse to hang up on callers who know the truth and don’t buy into the propaganda.

Local Radio Show Outrage on Gun Rights

I was listening to “The Afternoon Drive with Keven Cohen” political talk radio show (Columbia, SC), a couple of days ago, as Mr. Cohen was discussing Homeland Security’s No-Fly List. While I listened, he explained that a bill has been introduced that would also make it illegal for anyone on the list to buy a firearm.

At first, he explained that he was “torn” on the issue, but as the day went on, and callers pushed him, he revealed his true feelings:

“There are some liberties that are worth giving up,” if it will make the country safer. He added, “Even if it means crossing the line, if we have to, with some people’s rights….”

Needless to say, I nearly fell out of my chair. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing! I am sure that people in nearby areas could hear me as I began to yell at the voice coming out of the radio.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised, because this is the same person who says that he supports “personal responsibility,” yet he was one of the most outspoken champions of changing the senate rules to make it easier for more legislation to be passed, and he was a strong advocate for a mandatory seatbelt law. Seems to me that this guy needs a libertarian to explain to him exactly what “personal responsibility” means, because he certainly doesn’t seem to have a firm grasp of the concept.

As for the No-Fly List, Mr. Cohen doesn’t seem to care that it has been shown that a number of innocent people are on the list because of data entry errors, or that some people are inconvenienced simply because they happen to have the exact same name of someone who is being watched by the Feds.

On top of it all, I know of a journalist who boldly criticized official White House policies, and, now, every time he goes to board a plane, he is pulled out of line and carted off for interrogation—even though he has never committed any crime and is not a terrorist. I get the feeling that his name was put on the list to “teach him a lesson” for daring to challenge the powers-that-be.

This country was founded on the idea that people are innocent until proven guilty, but the No-Fly List totally destroys that concept. Certain Republican authoritarians have been trying to deny rights to suspects, and now the liberal, anti-gun crowd is taking advantage of it.

What we have here is a bipartisan effort to destroy liberty, and if you keep electing Republicans and Democrats you’re going to get more of the same.

I hope you are as enraged as I am.

Copyright 2005 Doug Kendall. All Rights Reserved Worldwide. The statements made in this article are the opinions of this author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of The Common Voice.