The Godless Libyan War

Written by Mel Valkner | 29 March 2011

I am really ticked off. I don’t recognize this country anymore. President Obama may be right when he said it is no longer a Christian nation. Christians sit on their hands like lost sheep. Long forgotten is the Scriptural admonition, “Blessed are the peacemakers.”

The definition of warmonger is, “Somebody who is eager for war or tries to start a war.” The United States now fits that mold.

The level of “double-speak” has gone to new levels. This is not a war, but “kinetic military action.” After encouraging its people to rebel and setting it on fire, President Obama has called for “humanitarian intervention” which mostly consists of bombing raids.

Do you understand that we rained down cruise missiles on a country, Libya, which was not attacking us, not planning an attack on us, and not talking about attacking us? This country has lost its moral compass.

The War on Libya is bothersome from several vantage points.

Secretary of Gates admits that Libya did not pose a threat to U.S. and it was not in our “vital national interest” to intervene there. We were not attacked and there was no imminent danger to U.S. citizens. But President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and their staffs went to go to war armed with only a United Nations mandate which does not supersede our Constitution. The President may be Commander-in-Chief, but only Congress can declare war.

Supposedly in this day and age it was the Republicans crying out for closer adherence to the Constitution, yet it is Rep. Dennis Kucinich who is demanding a stop to the madness. Karl Rove, Bill O’Reilly, Sarah Palin, Fox News, MSNBC and many leading Democrats support and defend this unprovoked war effort. They are all complicit.

The Obama Administration encouraged a revolt. Gaddafi wants to crush it. Now the U.S. is supporting rebels that Abdel-Hakim al-Hasidi, the Libyan rebel leader, claims fought against allied troops in Iraq. This is insane.

Our leaders say we had to go war, that people were fighting for their independence and, after all, others came to our rescue when we were fighting for independence. This obscures the facts. England, a foreign country was the oppressor during our Revolutionary War, not our Civil War. Libya is in a civil war, not fighting off a foreign entity.

President Eisenhower said to beware the military-industrial complex. Now we impulsively go to war with no planning and no predefined objective of what constitutes success. Instead of a few days, the word is now that the war will last for some time. What happens if Gaddafi manages to protract this war? Libya is a conglomerate of tribes. Who knows what will happen?

No war is cheap. The U.S. War on Libya will cost at least $1 billion and the lives of many Libyan civilians.

We need new leaders. They ALL need to be replaced. Their maturity seems stuck in high school, but that may be unkind to young people everywhere.

This country is a godless warmonger. Count me out. I want no part of it.

My Observations

Jobs are not coming back under the current policies of the Democrats and Republicans.

The Founding Fathers made the income tax illegal by Article I, Section 9, when they wrote, “No...direct tax (income tax) shall be laid...” They wanted a wealthy people. I believe all income taxes should be eliminated and Duties (tariffs) re-implemented as the Framers envisioned.

For 125 years the tariff system, though fraught with difficulty, was the foundation of revenue for the federal government. As a military physically protects its citizenry, so tariffs protect the economy.

History reveals that by the early 1900s the federal government was seeking more revenue to cure its deficits (imagine that!).

The U.S. was the manufacturing center of the world and so it was thought, according to F.W. Taussig, Ph.D., who in 1914 wrote The Tariff History of the United States in (page 447) that, “It was worth while…to put an end to the superstition that all prosperity was dependent on the maintenance of a rigid protective tariff.” There were “…predictions of general disaster, of collapse for all manufacturing enterprises, of destruction to the American standard of living."

Guess what? After 97 years we can see the consequences of substituting the tariff system (tax on imported goods) in 1913 for the income tax (tax on personal wealth creation) those very things are now upon us: Our manufacturing has collapsed and the American standard of living is declining.

You may ask if the income tax is made illegal again, how will the federal government obtain sufficient tax revenue? The Constitution still lays out three methods.

1)  It is authorized to have an excise tax. In today’s world when you buy gas the tax on gas helps pay for roads (sounds fair enough).

2)  It can impose tariffs. Again in today’s world, if a pair of shoes cost $10 to make overseas and $40 to make in the U.S., the federal government is supposed to collect a $30 tax. This provides tax revenue and protects American jobs (big business won’t like this!).

3)  If the federal government needs more revenue they can then impose a direct tax according to census. For example, Michigan has 3.3% of the nation’s population. So if the federal government needed $3 trillion, Michigan’s share would be $99 billion - 2.5 times the state budget of $40 billion!

The great benefit of the income tax, as far as politicians are concerned, is that it obscures the level of taxes we are paying. If the people of Michigan knew that $7 of every $10 of their tax dollars went to Washington with Michigan’s state budget unbalanced and so many neighborhoods in poverty and towns across Michigan filling up with empty storefronts and second-hand shops, do you think they would approve?

Much has changed since the 1908 Republican platform's strong endorsement of tariffs. Now they are opposed to tariffs, strongly supporting "free trade." (Read loss of American jobs.).

So what does the 2008 Republican platform say about all this? It mentions repealing the income tax but only if replaced by a Value Added Tax (VAT), which would hide taxes deep in every transaction, or a National Sales Tax. In other words, there would NOT be a reduction in your taxes or the size of government. Sounds something like a scam, doesn’t it?

What about the 2008 Democratic platform? No mention.

The bottom line: Don't expect jobs or prosperity to return - ever - under free trade policies. Oh, there may be times where it looks like things are getting better. But their solutions are delusions.

And the Republicans have hardly put a dent to stop the deficit spending? Looks like another record deficit is coming. Remember, the federal debt can be paid off only by a budget surplus.

It is time to vote for the Constitution Party to stop this nonsense. If you would like more information about the Taxpayers Party, Michigan's affiliate of the national Constitution Party, please contact me at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or visit USTPM.org. Get involved.