1.       Where the money is - When asked why he robbed banks, Willie Sutton answered, "Because that's where the money is."  These days in the U.S., the money is in the hands of the middle class – their paychecks, homes, and other assets. This means that any major government program, from Medicare to Social Security, has to be paid for by taxing the middle class in some way.  Don’t let the politicians seduce you into thinking you can get freebies paid for by rich people, because it will never happen.  Even if the politicians taxed away 100% of rich people’s assets, it would be only a drop in the bucket. The rich just don’t have enough money.

So, knowing that you will be footing the bill, the question is who you think should be controlling and spending your money – you or the government?  Will you get better medical care at a better price if the government taxes you and then provides the doctors and hospitals or the health insurance, or will you do better if you are free to go out on the open market and choose your own doctor and hospital?  Will you get a better education for your children at a better price if the government taxes you and then provides schools and tells you which one your children have to attend, or will you do better if you can go out on the open market and choose the school that best meets their needs?       

The answer should be obvious.  You always get much better products and services at better prices when you have a choice in a free and open market.  When you are taxed and have no control over the services, you have become a slave and a beggar.  If that kind of arrangement gives you a sense of security, please go check yourself into some kind of commune, but please leave me out of it.

2.       Executions – Have you noticed that the meaning of the word “execution” is changing?  Executions used to be when the government tried a person for murder, convicted him, and then killed him by electrocution or lethal injection as punishment for his crime.  The word was sometimes used in connection with organized crime, but then it always had a modifier in front of it, like “gangland style execution” to distinguish it from the regular kind of execution.  However, now the word “execution” is turning up in articles to describe regular old murder, saying, for example, that a robber executed his victim.  Why are writers intentionally changing the meaning of this word?  I suspect it is because they are opposed to capital punishment and want to change the meaning of the word “execution” in order to try to make capital punishment indistinguishable from murder in terms of the language used to describe it.  Since we are all opposed to murder, we will then have to be opposed to capital punishment, because we will not know how to describe the difference between them. 

This is very similar to what happened to the word “liberal”, which used to be related to its Latin root, which means “freedom”.  A liberal used to be a person who believed in maximum individual liberty and minimum government interference in people’s lives.  However, now the word “liberal” refers to someone who wants lots of government interference  - from heavy taxes to control of our education, health care, property, and almost all other aspects of our lives – just the opposite of freedom.    

How can we counter this creeping obfuscation?  By being very clear ourselves and by challenging those who are trying to muddy the waters.  If we don’t do this, it will become impossible to have a debate, because there will be no words with which to conduct it.

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