The Problem with the Pledge of Allegiance, Summarized

The problems with the Pledge of Allegiance are manifold: first, the baseless and paradoxical assertion that Americans ought to pledge their allegiance to a flag or to a republic instead of the principles of freedom, liberty, sovereignty, and eternal vigilance to the devices of government, the ambitions of political actors, and the republic itself, when in fact the Patriots waged and won a war on the very basis of challenging institutional thinking; second, the very word “nation” was one hotly debated (in political terms) at the Constitutional Conventions and intentionally left out of the founding documents because the Union forged was not a “nation” after all, or at least not a political “nation” (or “nation-state”), but rather a confederation of free and independent states; and finally the notion of an “indivisible” nation (rather than a geographical “nation” sharing to some extent in cultural values and goals of mutual defense) is one not only antithetical to the story of these independent states, each emerging from the Revolution free and independent in their own right, but ignorant to the right of secession inherent to any consensual union and historically affirmed in the founding documents and the infancy of the United States.

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Summarizing the “Separation of Church and State”

There is much confusion surrounding the concept of the “separation of church and state”; much of it likely born out of the steep secular decline in religious affiliation across recent generations, with particular emphasis among atheists and anti-deists. While many have hastened to leverage this language (“separation of church and state”) in order to condemn or censure religious values — particularly those which are Christian — where they have carried influence in public life (i.e. prayer in schools, teachers covering lessons from the Bible, government representatives appealing to God, coinage bearing the words “In God We Trust”), the truth is that this “separation” was never expected to completely eliminate religious practice or religious sentiment from all matter of public life. In fact, religion was so deeply enmeshed in American life during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries that the French magistrate and prison reformer Gustave de Beaumont, during his nine-month tour of A...

The Deal with Tariffs

Over the course of President Trump’s two terms, there has been much talk around the matter of tariffs — taxes on imported goods. However, much of the talk seems to miss the point. After all, for those of us who seek the truth, it’s not really a question of whether tariffs are ‘good’ but whether they are preferable to other kinds of taxes — assuming, of course, that taxes are the rule, as certain as the eventuality of death. First, let’s establish the theory: beyond the generic purpose of revenue generation for the state, the institution of tariffs ordinarily serves to reduce (or discourage) imports by making them artificially more expensive, while encouraging domestic production by making domestic products more appealing on a relative price basis. In the realm of foreign affairs, tariffs are instituted or threatened in the course of international trade negotiations in order to signal dissatisfaction with existing trade barriers and to push for more favorable trade terms; or in ord...

Cullen Roche's Not So "Pragmatic Capitalism"

In his riveting new work Pragmatic Capitalism , Cullen Roche, founder of Orcam Financial Group, a San Diego-based financial firm, sets out to correct the mainstream schools of economic thought, focusing on Keynesians, Monetarists, and Austrians alike. This new macroeconomic perspective claims to reveal What Every Investor Needs to Know About Money and Finance . Indeed, Roche introduces the layman to various elementary principles of economics and financial markets, revealing in early chapters the failed state of the average hedge fund and mutual fund operators — who are better car salesmen than financial pundits, Roche writes — who have fallen victim to the groupthink phenomenon, responsible for their nearly perfect positive correlation to the major indexes; and thus, accounting for tax, inflation, and service adjustments, holistically wiping out any value added by their professed market insight. Roche also references popular stu...

The ‘Values’ Problem in the NFL

Every year, there is talk across the major sports leagues about which players are due for contract extensions and huge paydays. The chatter is seemingly endless, and it often seems to cast a shadow over the sports themselves — talking heads arguing and debating, insisting that so-and-so is going to ‘reset the market’ or so-and-so is demanding the ‘market rate’ for his position. This is where the conversation goes awry, economically speaking. The truth is that players are not commodities: they are neither fungible nor interchangeable. Each player brings a distinct skill set, and each team operates within a unique scheme, meaning that each player’s value is situational rather than universal. There is, thus, no ‘market rate’ for any player or position; contracts exist in relation to each team’s particular situation, and every dollar spent on one player (in a salary-cap league) directly reduces the resources available for others — where ‘overspending’ in any case necessari...

Fischer: Tortured in the Pasadena Jailhouse (featuring the Morals of Chess by Benjamin Franklin)

Buy your copy today of Fischer: Tortured in the Pasadena Jailhouse (featuring the Morals of Chess by Benjamin Franklin) , available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble . The name Bobby Fischer reigns supreme in the world of chess, yet there was a time when it hogged headlines, struck fear into the eyes of the competition, and was on the lips of folks all across the globe. More than the face of the centuries-old game, there was a time when Bobby Fischer was synonymous with the cause and spirit of America, that his moves on the chessboard sought more than checkmate but to pit the strength of “raw-boned American individualism” against “the Soviet megalithic system” which had come to dominate the game of chess at the same time it dominated Cold War politics. Fischer’s triumph over the USSR's Boris Spassky in the ’72 World Chess Championship would ultimately be celebrated as a symbolic and diplomatic victory for the U.S., but, as time would tell, it would not mean the American...

Their Lives, Their Fortunes, and Their Sacred Honor

A recent YouTube post by the political organization PragerU betrays the truth about the American Revolution. It goes as follows: “Britain spent a fortune defending the colonies in the French & Indian War. America’s response? Boycotts, protests, rebellion. Ingratitude that sparked a revolution.” This description of history is not just a reductive reframing of the issues; it is a crude and provocative statement insulting the intelligence of Americans who remember their history and disrespecting the men who staked everything in their noblest of causes during the American Revolution. One commenter in the comments section even sided with PragerU, taking to task any who dares criticize the post: “Are you incapable of creating scenarios from the opposite side?” Unfortunately for this commenter, true history isn’t about “creating scenarios”; it’s about understanding what actually happened — the totality of the circumstances. So, let us do just that: let’s get straight to the fac...

Death By Cop

A recent post from a popular YouTube channel has provided more evidence of that which is blatantly obvious in modern America, at least to those who are willing to face the truth: the fact that cops, as with the governments they serve, are the enemy to goodness, justice, and American liberty. This latest post is from The Civil Rights Lawyer, a channel (by a practicing civil rights lawyer) documenting police misconduct and civil rights violations since the year 2020. This time, it is a case of an elderly man, a former pastor suffering from dementia, murdered at the hands of “ the very people who were supposed to protect and care for him”: “Officers were dispatched to a business to assist an elderly customer who appeared to be suffering from dementia. At the scene, officers found him extremely confused. He told them the year was 1948 and that the president was George Washington. So they call his daughter to come pick him up. So how did things go so terribly wrong that day, tha...

“Stolen Land”

The claim that America was built on “stolen land” is not only a politically-loaded oversimplification, but a deliberately narrow framing that keeps America — and America alone — under perpetual moral scrutiny. It collapses fundamentally different actors, motives, and historical processes into a single accusation, thereby obscuring more than it explains. At a macro political level, land claims have always been in flux. Long before European contact, tribes across North America routinely warred over territory, resources, hunting grounds, and waterways. Claims were seasonal, contingent, and often overlapping, shaped by migration patterns, environmental conditions, and intertribal treaties that themselves shifted over time. Had Europeans never settled in America, this dynamic would have continued to dominate; it was the prevailing condition of the continent. From this perspective, “ownership” has never been an abstract moral constant but a function of enforceability under a...

Taxation Without Representation

During the American Revolution, one of the most popular rallying cries was “No taxation without representation!” This came at a time when the American colonists were being subjected to progressively higher taxes — imposed on progressively greater numbers of goods — levied by the Crown with the assurance that the colonists enjoyed “virtual representation”. Of course, this “virtual representation” was no representation at all, as the “virtual representative” was not elected by the colonists nor disposed to their grievances. Well, there are those among us who fail to recognize (or to admit) the parallels present in the modern day, where taxes on Americans are not just unfathomably higher than when the colonists decried the injustice; they are just part of the total cost imposed upon a people not present in the negotiations nor properly represented in the government which claims to have resolved the problems of the past. A recent YouTube comment illustrates the misconception: “ T...

Church Over Christ

The true “believer” is revealed by the consistency between his beliefs and his behavior. If someone truly believes that eternal destinies are at stake — that heaven and hell are real, that the consequences are everlasting, and that salvation depends upon faith or works — then the stakes are not merely high but infinite: infinite in degree and in scope, with the effects propagating into the future as humanity continues generation after generation. The number of souls at risk is not just in the billions today but expands indefinitely into the future. If that framework is taken seriously, then the rational response would seem to be an overwhelming sense urgency by those who claim to appreciate the stakes. Everything else — career, comfort, reputation, leisure — would become secondary to the singular task of “saving” as many people as possible. Yet, despite the billions who claim to be Christian — or who claim to believe in any God — there are precious few who make this their life’s purpos...

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