Against the war, before they were for it.

I thought I would share this interesting short clip I found on youtube recently which puts togheter a couple of clips showing the ridicule and lack of credibility of the current neoconservative leadership within the republican party.

The next candidate of the freedom movement?

As most of you know, I am a Ron Paul supporter. Since the chances are very slim of him actually getting the presidency in the 2008 election, many of us "paulites" have been looking at concrete options for the future and continuity of the freedom movement. I have already mentionned that the Ron Paul Revolution must now refocus on taking over the base of the Republican party, but here is some food for thought on a possible candidate for 2012, considering that Dr. Paul will most likely be too old for another run by that time. That person is none other than Rand Paul, the son of Congressman Ron Paul. He has the convictions and knowledge of his father and with a senatorial/governor bid, he would be a very credible candidate. I do think he lacks the experience but this is why he has 4 years in front of him (maybe 8 even) before we consider a presidential run.

Here is a speech given by Rand Paul at the Montana GOP kick-off:

My (unexpected) endorsement of John McCain

I have touched on the current American presidential primaries in a previous blog and expressed my preference for Republican candidate Ron Paul. Although many "paulites" refuse to endorse Senator McCain and have decided to vote for a 3rd party candidate, I have decided to come out and endorse him.

The reasons are multiple and sometimes complex. I would normally refuse to hold my nose and support a candidate which does not hold many of my views and with whom I disagree but I think that with the current situation, we have no other choice but John McCain.

Here are the main reasons:

1) Although I wish that americans would inform themselves sufficiently and realize that in a democracy or republic, the people are ultimately the ones to decide, regardless of all the media's manipulation and favoritism. I do not believe there is any chance of an independant or third party candidate winning the 2008 election. For that reason, with the choices on both sides, I would much rather see a left-leaning conservative than two liberals, one being way far on the left, the other running as a tag-team campaign with her ex-president husband. John McCain has a long standing record that allows us to evaluate and predict how he will act as a president. Although I do not believe that he will reduce the size of government as I would like to see, I think McCain would be much better for the finances of the United States than a democratic presidency would. He has good experience with military crisis and although I disagree with his opinions on the middle east, I believe that out of the three possible candidates right now, he is the most competent on the subject. He also was the only candidate (apart from Ron Paul) to condemn the use of torture.

2) John McCain gets things done. Although I might disagree with some of his bills and projects, I cannot deny that John McCain has always found a way to get things done in a timely fashion, even if that included reaching across the isle to democrats who shared his views. This kind of politics and the apparent absence of partisanship is what Washington needs to be more efficient.

3) Although a long time supporter of Ron Paul. I believe the paulites should support McCain for the election while at the same time working within the GOP to broaden the spectre of the Ron Paul Revolution. That means to slowly take over the party by getting Ron Paul republicans elected in various positions within the party, giving a much better chance to the next libertarian leaning candidate to actually win the nomination.

So there you have it. I didn't expect it myself, but I have to support Senator McCain based on these reasons (and a few more that would take too long to write about). I don't know, maybe I have lost my convictions, maybe I have fallen to political apathy. Regardless, I will be supporting John McCain for the 2008 election.

Changes

I mentionned in my introduction post that I might in the future dedicate this blog to politics and move my personal posts to a secondary blog. Yesterday after some thinking, I opened up a new blog where I reposted all of my personal blog posts that I had up here. You can find the link on the left, or by clicking here. I will be updating both on a regular basis so if you liked the gaming stuff I had on here so far, I recommend you also visit my personal blog and add it to your bookmarks!

The USA is NOT a democracy

While writing my post on the NAFTA Superhighway yesterday, I specified that some of the dealings that were done in secrecy were unacceptable in a democracy. This brought something to my mind, something I told myself I would share with you guys. It is a video interview of Aaron Russo, a former documentary filmmaker who was very outspoken about the federal reserve system and the IRS. This short clip tells something that a majority of Americans do not seem to remember. The United States of America isn't a democracy. Democracy is mob rule, where 51% of the people can dictate the lives of the other 49%. The US is a Constitutional Republic, where you have God given rights and 99% of the population cannot take away the rights of 1% of the population.

Just in: AP president: US arrests journalist in Iraq to 'control' information

Wow, what can I say. This is pretty shocking stuff coming from a reliable source. I don't believe that the Associated Press has an agenda or is leaning on the left or right and would tend to believe and agree with it's president on this issue:

Associated Press president Tom Curley says his news organization does not buy the government's argument that one of its photographers arrested in Iraq was working on behalf of the enemy, and he alleged the US is rounding up journalists in an attempt to control information.

"To say the least, we see things very differently," Curley commented dryly, regarding photographer Bilal Hussein, who was arrested two years ago and remains in military custody.

Noting that at least a dozen other Iraqi photographers have been detained or arrested, Curley stated, "It's impossible not to conclude that the words and pictures these journalists produced were considered unhelpful to the war effort and that their arrests would have served a broader strategy of information control."

Curley also called on journalists to demand that all the presidential candidates make a commitment to reversing a directive issued by Attorney General John Ashcroft shortly after September 11 that radically restricted the scope of the Freedom of Information Act.

Ashcroft's memo stated, "When you carefully consider FOIA requests and decide to withhold records, in whole or in part, you can be assured that the Department of Justice will defend your decisions unless they lack a sound legal basis or present an unwarranted risk of adverse impact on the ability of other agencies to protect other important records."

Curley told the National Press Club, "When a matter of public policy poses a straight-up choice between the public's rights of access to government and a government effort to infringe or even narrow those rights, journalists cannot pretend to be disinterested observers."

"This is the moment to make it clear to all the presidential candidates how important reversal of the Ashcroft directive is to us and to the people," Curley continued. "We need to ask the candidates at every opportunity ... whether they are willing to appoint an attorney general willing to follow the spirit as well as the letter of the law that protects the people's right to know what their government is doing."

Here is the video of the AP conference held by the National Press Club, it basically sums up the situation. To be honest I find this a bit scary when censorship of this kind happens within the spearhead of worldwide democracy:

NAFTA Superhighway?

I have mentionned, in my introduction blog post, that I am a conservative but am "not a big fan of Mr. Harper", to quote myself. Today I wanted to touch one of the main issues that irritate me with our current Canadian prime minister.

What I am about to talk about may have gone completely unnoticed on your radar but it is a reality and to me is also very serious question that should be debated, or at least brought to the public's attention. What I wish to inform you on today is called, the NAFTA Superhighway. NAFTA, the North-American Free Trade Agreement, is, as it's name implies, a free trade deal passed between Mexico, the United States and Canada. So far, so good, everyone loves free trade. Obviously, the lower the taxes on imported good, the better the prices, therefore giving consumers more purchasing power. Where a problem arises (in my opinion) is when it comes to the Superhighway.

The superhighway project, lobbied for aggressively by groups like NASCO, is a plan to create an International Mid-Continent Trade Corridor (link) using existing highways and roads that would be upgraded as well as brand new infrastructure. To quote the wikipedia article concerning the TTC, the Trans-Texas Corridor, a transportation network being built in Texas that will be part of this Mid-Continent Trade Corridor:

"The Trans-Texas Corridor (TTC) is a transportation network in the planning and early construction stages in the U.S. state of Texas. The network, as planned, would be composed of a 4,000-mile (6,000 km) network of supercorridors up to 1,200 feet (370 m) wide to carry parallel links of tollways, rails, and utility lines.The tollway portion would be divided into two separate elements: truck lanes and lanes for passenger vehicles. Similarly, the rail lines in the corridor would be divided among freight, commuter, and high-speed rail. Services expected to be carried in the utility corridor include water, electricity, natural gas, petroleum, fiber optic lines, and other telecommunications services. The Trans-Texas Corridor will allow passenger vehicular speed limits of up to 85 mph (140 km/h). The network will be funded by private investors and built and expanded as demand warrants."

This sounds like a good idea so far, but then, why would the government deny the existence of these plans?

Wait ... what? The government denies the existence of plans for a NAFTA Superhighway?

Yep. In many occasions have questions been asked to elected officials who had either genuinely never heard of it or simply denied it's existence and tried to ridicule concerns about this. These concerns range from the security risks of having freight travel freely with pre-clearance for international shipping to the loss of control over such multi-national organisations. The corridor's plans also completely disregard property rights and will have to appropriate thousands of acres of private land. It will surely be funded with tax money, at least in part (which will probably be higher in Canada, where we love to tax). Worse, many, including myself, believe there is more to this, seeing how the plans for this have been drafted under the secrecy of SPP meetings.

This partnership (SPP), which many refer to as a precursor to a North American Union (which has been pushed for years by the very powerful Council on Foreign Relations) is, to me, the biggest threat to Canadian sovereignty. Far beyond any of their individual projects, like the Superhighway I have brought to your attention today, the SPP is a U.N. type multinational organisation whose power could very soon rule over national governments, in the same way the European Union does. For a conservative like me, such a loss of our sovereignty is unacceptable. What makes it even worse is that all of this is done behind closed door, by people whose agendas we do not know about. The SPP agreement, for example, was signed without a vote being passed (at least in Canada and the USA, I am not sure about Mexico). This kind of secret deals, in any republic or democracy, are suspicious and certainly appear to me as dishonest.

To illustrate my point and also link all of this with my dislike of Stephen Harper, I shall conclude with this video and a warning that it may make you slightly mad:



**After some feedback from a reader over at RonPaulForums.com, I've decided to post an MSNBC article that he submitted to my attention.

Drivers protest allowing Mexico trucks in U.S.

Teamsters, others say plan giving vehicles nationwide access is unsafe
SAN DIEGO - Dozens of truckers rallied at Mexican border crossings in California and Texas Thursday to protest a pilot program to allow up to 100 Mexican trucking companies to haul their cargo anywhere in the United States.

Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20625369

And again, thanks to "New Governor Of Alaska" from RPF for sending me this additionnal information, more proof that this is very real and happening right now, while the mainstream media ignores the subject.

Ron Paul, an outstanding Republican

A message of hope, from the most outspoken libertarian politician of our times. Please watch these videos, regardless of your party affiliation or beliefs. One cannot deny the truth, and this is the only politician who actually speaks the truth to the public. A man of honor and principle, the only politician in the 2008 presidential race (although he has now lost to John McCain) to have never flip-flopped on any issue. A true gentleman, a man of ideas, a man of conviction and honor. A man of such virtue that could lead armies of fanatical supporters without even asking for this support. He has been shut out by the mainstream American media and viewed as a "kook" for wanting to get out of Iraq (the only anti-war republican). I know these three videos togheter are a good twenty minutes but please take twenty minutes of your time to learn about a man who has given his entire life to the cause of freedom and liberty.

Although he may have lost the presidential election, Paul's campaign has opened a pandora's box. The message of liberty and freedom has been "catching on" (to quote an early New Hampshire advertisement spot from the Ron Paul campaign) in the United States. Regardless of the 10% he got on average, despite finishing second in Louisianna and faring quite well in Montana if my memory serves me right, Ron Paul has touched an entire new generation of internet users. He overwhelmingly won most if not all of the online polls he was included in. His message has been resonating with a young new wave of politically savvy kids who will soon be old enough to vote. His ideals of freedom, his consistent record and his flawless obediance to the American constitution have made him a very popular man with the internet crowd and increasingly offline as well. His honesty and straightforwardness when answering questions made him a smart debater, although the current attack-type format is his main weakness. Congressman Paul is now 72 and the odds that he will run again in 2012 are very slim, but beyond the election, the message that he carried has left it's mark. All around the country grassroots campaigners have switched on local mode and are now trying to get what they call "Ron Paul Republicans" elected in congressional seats and in some cases, for Senate bids. What they have been trying to do is nothing less than taking over the GOP step by step, to ensure that the next candidate of the newly formed "freedom movement", gets a fair shake in his bid for the presidency.

It is my hope to see RandPaul2012.com go up some day, but realistically, Dr Paul's son would need more exposure before this is attempted. Running as a governor or senator would help him greatly, since experience matters alot in presidential elections. Until then, the Ron Paul Revolution will keep slowly trying to move the GOP around

Now onto the videos:

First post, author's introduction.

Hey there guys, thanks for visiting my new blog! After years of reading other people's lives and thoughts on their own blogs, I thought I would create one for myself. As you will discover (if you return to this page in the future), I will post on very different subjects. I might actually have to have separate blogs seeing how some of the things I am passionate about have absolutely nothing in common. In this blog you will find politics/society related opinions, interesting finds (whether videos, pictures or stories), video game related stuff as well as a lot of random rantings on pretty much anything I feel like writing about.

About me
Well to start off, my names Francis Cloutier, I am 21 years old and as you may have noticed from my last name, my first language is french (so please excuse the occasionnal typo). I live in Canada, in the eastern part known as the province of Quebec (the french part of Canada, basically). I currently work as a day trader on the NYSE and NASDAQ as well as playing poker on the side for additionnal income. I am an avid fan of politics, personally a libertarian (right wing) and member of the provincial party known as the ADQ (Action Democratique du Quebec), the only conservative party in the province, currently sitting as the opposition in the house of commons. I also am a conservative voter on the national level, but not a big fan of Mr. Harper, our current conservative prime minister. Outside of politics and poker, I play some online video games, a hobby I have picked up during high school and have enjoyed ever since and am also obssessed by cars and racing (mostly Formula 1, ALMS, IRL, not a big fan of Nascar). I read a lot, about pretty much anything, although I have a preference for historical and political books, as well as science fiction (all hail Frank Herbert's "Dune" series). As you can see on the left side, I posted some links to other pages I maintain, my poker blog on liquidpoker.com as well as my Youtube channel.