The Deep State, Border Adjustment taxes and Socialism

http://ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/peace-and-prosperity/2017/february/14/dennis-kucinich-push-for-new-cold-war-behind-effort-against-michael-flynn/

Dennis Kucinich is dead on.

http://www.theblaze.com/video/whats-going-to-help-our-childrens-education-needs-in-the-long-run/

Good for Ben Watson.

https://fee.org/articles/republicans-are-already-trying-to-raise-taxes/

This border adjustment/value added is perhaps the stupidest idea the republicans have ever come up with.  It really is up there with the war on drugs.

http://www.pewforum.org/2017/02/15/americans-express-increasingly-warm-feelings-toward-religious-groups/

I would have guessed just about every one of these things correctly but this is absolutely fascinating.

Quote of the day:

“Hitlerism proclaims itself as both true democracy and true socialism, and the terrible truth is that there is a grain of truth for such claims-an infinitesimal grain, to be sure, but at any rate enough to serve as a basis for such fantastic distortions.  Hitlerism even goes so far as to claim the role of protector of Christianity, and the terrible truth is that even this gross misinterpretation is able to make some impression. But one fact stands out with perfect clarity in all the fog: Hitler has never claimed to represent true liberalism. Liberalism then has the distinction of being the doctrine most hated by Hitler.” – Professor Eduard Heimann, a leader of the German religious socialism.

https://mises.org/blog/goal-socialists-socialism-%E2%80%94-not-prosperity

A few of my favorite quotes:

“I have come to a few conclusions about the nature of the arguments and the reasons why socialists remain socialists even as we see the utter failure of socialist economies throughout history. Maybe the meme that appears once in a while — ‘If socialists understood economics, they wouldn’t be socialists’ — might be true, but I doubt it. As I see it, the purpose of establishing socialism is to further promote socialism, not improve the lot of a society and certainly not to promote prosperity.”

“I believe that the end of all of this activity is — or should be — the improvement of life for people in a way that is not predatory and brings about voluntary cooperation among economic actors. In other words, economic activity is a means to an end, and the end is free people gaining in wealth and standards of living.  A socialist does not and will not see things this way. The end of socialism is not a higher living standard or even making life better for the poor, as much as a socialist will talk about the well-being of poor people. No, the end of socialism is socialism, or to better put it, the ideal of socialism. Once socialism is established, as it was in Venezuela or in the former USSR or Cuba, the social ideal had been met no matter what the actual outcome might be.”