I was recently criticized (on Facebook by a “Useful Idiot” that I was arguing with) that the problem with my posts here at MaverickVoice.com is that there are “too many I’s and Me’s” and that I don’t present alternative points of view in my comments. My response to him was simple: “I’m sorry…were you under [...]
Following the East Coast Earthquake on Tuesday, August 23, I posted a comment on Facebook: “Residents of Washington, DC – Don’t be Alarmed: That Shaking You Feel is the Entire Country Moving to the Right!” (For the record, I did not come up with this humorous statement: I “borrowed” it from someone else…laughing the entire [...]
There is an important difference between “Giving” and “Giving Back,” and it is the same difference found between “Charity” and “Redistribution of Wealth.”
Being a Conservative doesn’t mean that we’re “Anti-Government.” It means that we’re Pro-LIMITED Government. What’s the difference? Anarchy, Liberty or Oligarchy!
About a month ago, I published the Five-Part Series on the Principles of Conservatism, an overview of exactly WHAT makes a person a Conservative, but what are the alternatives? If being a Conservative is a Lifestyle Choice, as I contend that it is, what makes it different from being, say, a Progressive? That’s a great question, and one I’m going to try to answer today.
I recently posted some Conservative Advice for Politicians claiming to be Conservatives, boiling down to, essentially, “Don’t quote Teddy Roosevelt!” It occurred to me that we need examples to emulate: Conservatives worth having as a Hero from History that basically exemplify their beliefs. The simplest and most recent choice for most of us is Ronald Reagan, but by studying Reagan, we can learn about who HE emulated, the Conservative figure from history that inspired HIM. For Reagan, one source of that inspiration was Calvin Coolidge.
Samuel Adams said, “He who is void of virtuous attachments in private life is, or very soon will be, void of all regard for his country. There is seldom an instance of a man guilty of betraying his country, who had not before lost the feeling of moral obligations in his private connections.” Our HONEST Beliefs form the foundations of our Morality and our Ethics, and, in many ways, define how we treat one another.
I tend to describe Freedom and Liberty like this: FREEDOM is the right to choose, and LIBERTIES are the choices we are able to make. Having the right to choose is important, but if you have no choices, no options to select from, then it really isn’t much of a right. For example, during the 1980’s in Soviet Russia, ASSUMING you had the money, you could CHOOSE to buy a car; however, the only car you could buy was a Lada, and there was a 3-year waiting period, AND the car spent more time in the shop than on the road. That hardly qualifies as Freedom, and certainly doesn’t qualify as LIBERTY!
