Veterans for Liberty? Not as Much as They Say.
Most military veterans claim to have "fought for my freedom." Many claim to still stand ready to defend it today, and the current (late 2019) dispute over firearm freedom in Virginia includes a lot of veterans who say they're ready to fight for freedom there.
However, I must question their sincerity. In my experience, most former soldiers still revere political authority and chains of command. They believe in following orders first, and thinking about them never. This is what military basic training in boot camp is for, after all. As tax feeders past and present, they do not question the legitimacy of taxation. Sure, they're more likely than not to be decent on the subject of firearms, but liberty as a whole is foreign to military culture. While there are individual exceptions, I cannot support the conservative instinct to trust the troops as allies. I hear soldiers and veterans praising prohibition and militarized national borders. It was troops who shot students at Ohio State. It was troops who helped confiscated guns and evict people after Hurricane Katrina. It was troops who engaged in blatantly unconstitutional and immoral wars and committed atrocities from at least Vietnam through the present day.
They fought for the greatest threat to freedom in history: state monopoly. It isn't freedom the veterans espouse, it's a slightly expanded list of permissions. That isn't freedom.
Downvoted for hate speech, internet trolling, and falsifying data.
Support your assertions. It isn't hate or trolling to speak the truth. What data has been falsified?
EDIT: Oh, I see. Some of you can only downvote what you can't actually rebut. You're more triggered than the snowflakiest SJWs, then.
Saying you were a veteran to throw weight behind an argument is a blatant appeal to authority which is a type of fallacy. That said, maybe they are more informed and interested than average.
The US army just tried to ask the Korean Government for about 5 billion dollars to keep its troops stationed in Korea (current deal is 1 billion a year). Some were calling it extortion by mercenaries, I guess freedom literally isn't free.
Why the heck there are still US troops on the DMZ? End that stupid occupation. It's pointless. The South Koreans have an advanced economy. They can handle their own security.
It's not quite an occupation, but I completely agree that there should be no US army permanently stationed in South Korea. They have one of the largest armies in the world and should be able to hold off until their allies arrive. So I do think either they should be discussing the US leaving or paying a lot more. It's ridiculous. The US can keep a couple radar stations and a few hangers at a local airport for whatever intelligence gathering needs to be done in the area.
What else do you call a permanent military deployment on foreign soil perpetually facing down another foreign military?
I don't know, what do you call it? I was in the service for almost a decade. If either of you have something to say about that you can DM me. Lets remember that every anti-abuse project here is run by veterans because we served to help others and we continue to serve on the blockchain to help others.
I can pretty much state and speak for others that all of us who are active here are here with a clear conscience. The ones who aren't aren't here. To end up on our vets here you have to be.
sometimes 1 image says it all....
🤮 perpetuating collectivist violence ...for freedom ? 😂
I will tell you I am proud to have served my country and nothing you can say or do will change that! You can say we were wrong for serving our country and that is one of the freedoms you have to do so, you can speak out against the things you do not like about our country, as again it is the right to free speech. I also have the right to disagree with you and I wholeheartedly do disagree!
I have to say it seems like you are jealous that some of us had the wherewithal to serve our countries. You missed the opportunity to serve your country and you are a bitter person about it. So you come out and attack us as veterans because we served our country with honor and it seems that you wrote this post because you have no honor or pride in your country at all. You downplay all the men that gave their lives for our country and all the friends we lost in our lives, also many of us veterans that came back wounded and hurt and lost many things because of our service to our country.
It is true that the country is not perfect and it will never be perfect because it is not a reality that is feasible. There were wrongs done because of political aspirations and that is not us, the veteran's fault, it is a politician's fault. So go to the root of the problem, the elected officials of our government, and stop bashing us the veterans. You are right, freedom is not free, as there was a lot of blood spilled for your right to downplay us, as veterans, sacrifices for our country. As we say in the south when there is no other words to help you understand or knowing you will never get the point "Bless Your Heart"!
Soldiers obey politicians. Soldiers serve politicians. Soldiers are paid with money stolen by politicians. You can't shift the blame to the politicians. The government composed of these politicians does not represent the populace despite the myth of democracy. Serving politicians is not serving society. How could I take honor or pride in serving under such usurpers and liars? People fight and die for many things. This does not confer automatic nobility upon their causes. It is used by the politicians as propaganda to buy your loyalty.
And you fail to counter my observation that soldiers are conditioned to obedience, and fail to honestly defend the freedoms they claim to have fought to protect. If you did fight for my freedom, stop patting yourself on the back because I speak freely, and start fighting the system that prohibits everything it does not stifle under taxation and regulation. Fight the police who abuse their authority. Fight the endemic corruption of the political class.
It was no means patting myself on the back it was simply stating a fact of how I feel. If you hate the U.S. so bad then leave and go to another county that you find follows your ideas more. From the way you talk I am sure that Iran, Iraq, Venezuela,China or some other county would love for you to go there and speak like you do here. Go over and see how they treat you with your voice of free speech and see what it gets you there.
From where I stand you have no idea what the military really teaches soldiers and you blow and brag about corruption and you have no idea except what the media tells you. You are sounding more like the terrorist cells we fought so hard against that stifles the freedoms we have in many countries. You are preaching about fighting the government and police, tell me what have you done to fight against what you are preaching about here. You talk a good game but I want you to show me not try to blow smoke up my ass, as that is all I see you doing here.
You are being incoherent. Ergo decedo is a fallacy for good reason. Terrorism is the use of violence against a civilian population for political means, which is exactly the opposite of the non-aggression principle I espouse, but identical to what "legitimate" governments do every day. Military basic training includes aspects that are identical to cult brainwashing techniques. And as for what I do, you know damn well that being a free individual is a felony.
War is a business, and soldiers are pawns in geopolitical moves,
usually the less sharp knives, get involved, naturally.
this is a fact. but, that being said, i would be very careful of fully carachterizing them as basically
imbeciles, even though they in average are.
why? because thats not what they were intended to be, focus on whats real.
who defeated the english pirates in USA,? basically special ops, respecting no rules, keep that in mind.
I didn't characterize them as imbeciles, I said a lot of them are hypocrites when they claim to defend freedom on one hand while actively endorsing violations of liberty on the other. Remember why the American colonists went to war against Britain?
As a follower of @followforupvotes this post has been randomly selected and upvoted! Enjoy your upvote and have a great day!
No wars are unconstitutional either congress voted for the act of war or the president used his authority to deploy troops.
And your view of an immoral war is only your view.
I served in many arenas throughout 10 years of USMC duty and was proud of all the conflicts.
And no I don’t believe in the current government taxation. I disagree with income tax and there should be no such thing as money laundering but there was an admendent passed to make income tax legal so as much we don’t like it. It is completely legal by our governing documents.
Maybe you should become an expat
You don’t sound like a happy person
Without a Congressional declaration of war, the President has no Constitutional authority to order troops anywhere.
As for my view of immoral war, are you at all aware of just war theory in the first place? Beyond that, how is murdering foreigners at the behest of politicians ever a moral act?
As for the income tax, dead strangers cannot confer authority over me without my consent. Legality has no moral or rational authority, either. Slavery was legal, too, remember. Stop making your pathetic excuses for injustice in the name of legality. Don't be a damned tory.
I am not happy about injustice inflicted upon others and upon me. Your response is to suggest exile? Your patriotism is dead. Your love of liberty is dead. Your soul is enslaved, and you are not my countryman. You are no heir to liberty.
That is where you embarrassed yourself again. The president ordering troops is not unconstitutional because it is not defined in the constitution. It is powers given to him by laws passed by congress with constitutional authority to do so.
As long as you don’t understand how our country is built. Nothing else you say has any merit.
So, it's not unconstitutional because congress decided to surrender their constitutional responsibilities without amending the constitution.
Brilliant.
No real answer for the moral, rational, or constitutional argument besides appeal to status quo and false authority. The Constitutional experiment was to restrain political power, and it has been an utter failure. And people like you are ready to either wear jackboots or lick them in your haste to support their usurpation.
The constitutional experiment has not failed. Your complete lack of understanding of this basic principle is your downfall.
Are their issues ? Yes. But they are not unsolvable.
Not unsolveable? The Constitution was written to restrain government, but government has given itself exceptions to every restraint. We have no power to reimpose those restraints.
We have the highest incarceration rate in the world, global military conflicts without any declaration of war, confiscatory taxation, micromanagement regulation, licenses and permits mandated for everything that isn't outright illegal, and a byzantine legal code that makes anyone a "felon" if anyone cares to investigate enough. That is a failed system.
Even with a written Constitution and an explicit bill of rights that reinforces the idea of limited government to explicitly-granted authority in the 9th and 10th amendments, the leviathan state grew like a cancer.
That is failure.
As Lysander Spooner said 150 years ago, "But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain - that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case it is unfit to exist." No one has demonstrated practically that he was in error sincce then.
I see a lot of people saying shit about vets and military in general but I don't see a single person go out of their way to do anything for anyone. No attempts to understand how any military actually works or what goes on when any soldier goes to work either domestically or abroad. Every war is immoral by default because someone will die but some wars must be fought. That's just how it goes. People don't sign up to fight them to steal your taxpayer dollars (go check the welfare office parking lot and see all the Acuras and Infinities there for the real thieves).
People sign up to do something right and most leave with a good conscience like I already said. And it's not because we're just that stupid, its because we have the freedom of will to act accordingly to our morals. A soldier doesn't have to do anything, you're welcome to disobey and order and face the consequences. Same as in every other job. A HR worker is free to disobey his workers and give a person without a university degree an interview. It's the same in any profession. There are morals behind everything.
You can always move somewhere there is no police and no military control but then on the anniversary of your death we'll be remembering you as yet another Steemian lost because of misguided ideas. Not saying you should. I would advise you not to because its real sad to follow someone to then see them in the paper shot in their own yard.
You want to blame anyone for injustices in the world, blame those engaged in nepotism, those who bar honest hardworking people from jobs, those who scam and steal tax money pretending to be poor, stealing resources from the real pool, those who make it impossible for a lower class kid to go to school, those who refuse to teach those same lower class kids, there's a whole lot of people to blame. Incidentally, those are also the ones who make the legislature.
So blame the State, but not its enforcers. Blame the beneficiaries, not the plunderers. Simply assert that the political class knows best about who to kill, and obey their orders.
Solid philosophy.
I was in the Young Marines as a youth. Maybe it's not a military career, but I would say that gives me a higher degree of knowledge on the subject than the average Joe. I have also made considerable study of the Constitution, the federalist papers, the anti-federalist papers, economics, and philosophy compare to most. I did not arrive at my conclusions lightly.
Aren't you an enforcer yourself by that rationality? Complacency isn't righteous. And shit like not paying taxes isn't action. What have you, personally, done to move politics and society in a positive direction? Not challenging you, just asking a question because I frankly don't remember your earlier blogs.
He has not served like us. That is why it is difficult for him to understand why some wars must be fought.
He is more anti-government then me. Which I did not think was possible.
I think what he doesn’t get is by living in a country you are agreeing to a social contract. That contract is live by our laws and decisions of our government. If you are not happy get involved and vote in people that agree with you.
Elections have consequences.
I also would like to know what he has personally done.
There is no social contract.
I participated in politics enough to see that both parties are wholly corrupt, and 3rd parties have no chance to break through. The real enemy is the belief in the legitimacy of the system despite its abuses. My only option is to try to undermine that belief while living as free as I can. When people apologize for the state as it responds with abuse, I know war of ideas is far from won, too.
The US system with only two real parties is indeed an issue. How its acceptable that there are only two options boggles the mind.
If I were inclined to ascribe a secret conspiracy behind everything political, I would say it was planned as a participatory false choice exercise to create a veneer of legitimacy for someone's dark machinations. Unfortunately, I think the result is due to the basic effects of public choice economics and the nature of politics turning every dispute into a zero-sum game. This has divided society into two squabbling factions, and it will remain so until we stop pretending politics is a solution to any of these issues. Until then, each party will feel injured at every loss, and will be spurred on to be more fiercely combative for the next round.
You are entitled to your opinion and you feel free to express it without any fear of being imprisoned or shot for saying it.
I rest my case.
PS. In real life I wouldn't be so PC with my answer, I would probably tell you to go stick your pecker in a hornets nest, or something along those lines, maybe even in your own poop hole.
Out.