The Server has crashed- 9:35 pm 9/17/08

We’re working to get it restored. No Eta at this time.

Hopefully we’ll be back soon.

Sorry.

HW

 

EDIT-  We’re coming back up. Should be online as I type this- 10:10pm cdt

Looks like when Housewolf opened the doors to JQP – the rush crashed the servers.

I am unable to get on at 9:30PM CDT

Board hiccup 7-15-08

Looks like the server is spitting out a 403 Error 1AM CDT 7-15-08.

 

With all the econodoom news going on, let’s hope they get it back up and running soon.

 

I guess we can post comments here for now.

5-28 ‘Forbidden’ 403 Error Experienced at Forum

Encountered at 1:45 Am Wed.

Housewolf is out all week, and contact info with the Host is on the forum and I do not have it.

Hoping the DB is just updating or compiling.

 

Will keep you up to date as I get info in the morning.

 

Meanwhile, feel free to post here.

 

INVAR

SITE MAINTENANCE At the Tree 5-17-08

Hi Folks, just a note about the planned maintenance at the Tree of Liberty.com tomorrow.

Hopefully the site will only be down for an hour or so, between 7am and Noon Central.

If unforseen circumstances occur I’ll post an update here.

Thanks for your patience!

HW

 

 

Forum Down or hacked? 4-26

This error recevied when trying to log into the tree at 1:30 AM

Forbidden

You don’t have permission to access /vb/forumdisplay.php on this server.

Additionally, a 403 Forbidden error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.

Putting up this entry so both news and replies can be added in the comment section.

At least we will still be able to communicate.

The Song Remains The Same

John scores an excellent analysis in his latest essay. Indeed, this political obsession with ‘change’ bodes ill for the republic and the only change I can document with certaintly in the last 15 years is the further erosion the republic into a Socialist Democracy.

Our current crop of Presidential contenders promise more of the same “change”.

The Song Remains The Same…

By John Galt

Although government has its limits and cannot solve all our problems, we Americans reject the view that we must be reconciled to failures and mediocrity, or to an inferior quality of life. For I believe that we can come through this time of trouble stronger than ever. Like troops who have been in combat, we have been tempered in the fire; we have been disciplined, and we have been educated.

Guided by lasting and simple moral values, we have emerged idealists without illusions, realists who still know the old dreams of justice and liberty, of country and of community.

This year we have had thirty state primaries–more than ever before—making it possible to take our campaign directly to the people of America: to homes and shopping centers, to factory shift lines and colleges, to beauty parlors and barbershops, to farmers’ markets and union halls.

This has been a long and personal campaign—a humbling experience, reminding us that ultimate political influence rests not with the power brokers but with the people. This has been a time of tough debate on the important issues facing our country. This kind of debate is part of our tradition, and as Democrats we are heirs to a great tradition.

MORE…..

Our country has lived through a time of torment. It is now a time for healing. We want to have faith again. We want to be proud again. We just want the truth again.

It is time for the people to run the government, and not the other way around.

It is the time to honor and strengthen our families and our neighborhoods and our diverse cultures and customs.

We need a Democratic President and a Congress to work in harmony for a change, with mutual respect for a change. And next year we are going to have that new leadership. You can depend on it!

It is time for America to move and to speak not with boasting and belligerence but with a quiet strength, to depend in world affairs not merely on the size of an arsenal but on the nobility of ideas, and to govern at home not by confusion and crisis but with grace and imagination and common sense.

Too many have had to suffer at the hands of a political economic elite who have shaped decisions and never had to account for mistakes or to suffer from injustice. When unemployment prevails, they never stand in line looking for a job.

Yes, and even more from another speech….

Each and every time, a new generation has risen up and done what’s needed to be done. Today we are called once more – and it is time for our generation to answer that call.

For that is our unyielding faith – that in the face of impossible odds, people who love their country can change it.

And as people have looked away in disillusionment and frustration, we know what’s filled the void. The cynics, and the lobbyists, and the special interests who’ve turned our government into a game only they can afford to play. They write the checks and you get stuck with the bills, they get the access while you get to write a letter, they think they own this government, but we’re here today to take it back. The time for that politics is over. It’s time to turn the page.

This campaign must be the occasion, the vehicle, of your hopes, and your dreams. It will take your time, your energy, and your advice – to push us forward when we’re doing right, and to let us know when we’re not. This campaign has to be about reclaiming the meaning of citizenship, restoring our sense of common purpose, and realizing that few obstacles can withstand the power of millions of voices calling for change.

By ourselves, this change will not happen. Divided, we are bound to fail.

I find this particular political season both distasteful, as usual, dishonest, as usual, and quite annoying. Those who fail to fall into the marching orders of particular political parties are labeled as ‘nuts’ and ‘radicals’ while those who march in lockstep considered ‘pragmatic’ and ‘logical’; yet few see the futility we are engaged in. Ever since the FDR years, Americans have been trained like some sick, perverted, Pavlovian creature to respond to the dinner bell of government dominance in their lives and have abandoned the ideals of individualism and creative freedoms. The basic business concept of creative destruction which allowed our capitalist system to evolve and grow to incredible strength without the shackles or cooperation of government intervention have been forgotten ever since the days of Woodrow Wilson. Yet here we are again, almost one century later, willing to listen to and accept the mediocrity of the masses over the superiority of the individualism which made our nation great in an effort to stave off “suffering” and the necessary corrections of one half century of spending, waste and modified socialist Keynesian capitalism which would make Adam Smith spin in his grave like an out of control helicopter.

Yet once again, in the words above, we here echoes.

Echoes of a horrid era in American history where internationalism surpassed American idealism. Where nationalism was given the tag of “racism” and “isolationist” whereas those who applied those labels liberally became the elitists of the future, but premature in the execution of their plans. The majority of my readers will not be so incorrect to assume the edifications above to have come from this man:

You would be partially correct. The words of “Change” have been echoed by numerous political candidates for election after election, yet there are few who grasp the impact of “change” in this environment. If this man becomes President, I fear our Republic will fall faster, not much faster than a McCain tenure mind you, but faster. You see, I have properly applied the title of “The Black Jimmy Carter” to Mr. Obama and not to demean him personally, but to make a point. A hollow suit is a hollow suit. Be it in the guise of a goober minded peanut farmer from Plains, Georgia or a Senator from Illinois who sees a chance to be the opportunist of the modern age.

I’ve heard nothing “new” from either party for some twenty years now. I’ve heard nothing revolutionary other than that brief spurt of hope in the 1994 Republicans who instantly turned into Caligula’s play toys after obtaining money and power and all that is corrupted by it. Once again, at the most critical juncture in history, the American people are faced with four potential political candidates who could change history and none of them have the vision, the hope, or the ideals to save us.

As such, I urge everyone, and I mean everyone, be they rich or poor, left or right, or apathetic to our political dilemma to prepare for the absolute worst. If Caligula’s wife becomes empress we will see a rapid acceleration to the end of Constitutional freedoms, thus why I call her “Mussolini in Drag.” If the BJC (Black Jimmy Carter) becomes the leader of the free world, the consequences of indecision and inexperience shall lead us to a destination which the Soviets could never have dreamed of in their wildest fantasies. And the two RINO’s will lead us into an economic black hole along with their internationalist intentions that creates a permanent caste system that stirs a rebellion unseen since the 1860’s due to their incompetent ideals.

So prepare my friends. Everyone needs to do whatever it takes to get your personal affairs in order. This is not the time to be shy, hesitant nor to delay; get ready now. The worst is about to be upon us.

And for those that are curious, the first two sections in italics above are not from Obama; they are from another Democrat; the one and only:

James Earl Carter.

Think about it.

The song remains the same……

The Prophetic Past That Warned Us Where We Now Find Ourselves

From INVAR’s Blog

“The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money.”

“Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word, ‘equality’. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude.” – Alexis de Tocqueville

I am encouraged when countrymen look into our past history to consider what our Patriarchs, Framers and even brillaint and simple men noted about the gift of liberty that is unique to America in all the world’s existence. There has been a bit of talk about one noted philosopher and author Alexis de Tocqueville, who came to America in 1831 and 1832 to write about his impressions of America from a European perspective after he was quoted in a Powerline Blog, and got mention on talk radio circles today.

What is so timely about the following notations from “Democracy In America” is that they put an exclamation point on the dangers this Election Cycle is parading in front of us with the various pushes and calls for bigger government Socialism, oversights, “fairness” and safety (for the children of course). From the scam that is Global Warming to the promises of what Nationalized Health Care will mandate – you can read de Tocqueville and feel as if you just read an indictment of our current culture and political circus that is this year’s elections.

In Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville famously concludes with a warning of the kind of despotism to which democracies are especially susceptible. Of particular note is the chapter: “OF CERTAIN PECULIAR AND ACCIDENTAL CAUSES WHICH EITHER LEAD A PEOPLE TO COMPLETE THE CENTRALIZATION OF GOVERNMENT OR DIVERT THEM FROM IT”.

Among men who have lived free long before they became equal, the tendencies derived from free institutions combat, to a certain extent, the propensities superinduced by the principle of equality; and although the central power may increase its privileges among such a people, the private members of such a community will never entirely forfeit their independence. But when equality of conditions grows up among a people who have never known or have long ceased to know what freedom is (and such is the case on the continent of Europe), as the former habits of the nation are suddenly combined, by some sort of natural attraction, with the new habits and principles engendered by the state of society, all powers seem spontaneously to rush to the center. These powers accumulate there with astonishing rapidity, and the state instantly attains the utmost limits of its strength, while private persons allow themselves to sink as suddenly to the lowest degree of weakness.

Tocqueville warns that the passion for equality will give rise to a certain kind of degradation in which citizens will surrender their freedom democratically to a tutelary power:

Above these [citizens] an immense tutelary power is elevated, which alone takes charge of assuring their enjoyments and watching over their fate. It is absolute, detailed, far-seeing, and mild. It would resemble paternal power if, like that, it had for its object to prepare men for manhood; but on the contrary, it seeks only to keep them fixed irrevocably in childhood; it likes citizens to enjoy themselves provided that they think only of enjoying themselves. It willingly works for their happiness; but it wants to be the unique agent and sole arbiter of that; it provides for their security, foresees and secures their needs, facilitates their pleasures, conducts their principal affairs, directs their industry, regulates their estates, divides their inheritances; can it not take away from them entirely the trouble of thinking and the pain of living?

If one truly looks at and examines our culture and politics today in light of what Tocqueville is warning about – one could easily see that we have already arrived at that crucial point. Both political parties seem to be in a race over which one gets to be the bigger parent. You might recall the 1992 Presidential debate when an old hippie with pony tail asked Bill Clinton: “”We are your children, we have our needs. What will you do to take care of us-to take care of our needs?”

Government today works almost exclusively towards “providing” happiness, entertainements, bail-outs and free hand-outs to specific groups it decides deserves the largesse of the federal treasury from the pockets of a working class the government uses like slaves. All to the point that politicans and government talk about nothing but facilitating the pleasures of people, regardless how depraved and consequential they may be; dictates how industry works such as the demands Congress just placed on automakers for fuel-efficient cars and the abolishment of incandescent light bulbs for “enviro-freindly/mercury-filled” flourescents. Private property is now the pervue of the state according to the KELO decision of the Supreme Court; in Illinois you cannot smoke outside in any public place, in California not even in your own car. Your wealth is confiscated in taxes for those the government decides should receive it. This culture blames the government for not doing enough after Katrina or demanding they do something about high gas prices in the absolvement of any responsibility they should have for themselves, fulfilling what Tocqueville said about “tak[ing] away from them entirely the trouble of thinking and the pain of living”

I suppose we could almost declare Tocqueville a prophet in light of where we are today with what he was warning we could become.

Subjection in small affairs manifests itself every day and makes itself felt without distinction by all citizens. It does not make them desperate, but it constantly thwarts them and brings them to renounce the use of their wills. Thus little by little, it extinguishes their spirits and enervates their souls….

In listening to the political candidates, almost every single one of them is a purveyor of this disease. The fight for redefining what Conservatism means into some perverted nanny-state caring for others by use of government simply underscores where de Tocqueville said this Republic would end-up if we were not careful and vigilant.

Well….here we are.

Perhaps if we studied our roots rather than the latest ball game stats or arguing over who will win the next Survivor or America’s Next Top Model, we could have a chance to recpature what is being lost.

I’m not to hopeful, as the populace is become exactly like the ponytail Kid in 1992, that declared that all of us were children of Big Mama Government.

Welcome To The Tree’s Blog!

Welcome to the Tree of Liberty’s Official Blog site.

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