Finland has become the first nation in the world to declare that broadband internet access is a human right. The world should stand up and applaud! After all, we are living in an information society, and knowledge equals power, right? Finland’s Minister of Communications, Ms Suvi Lindén, says, “From now on a reasonably priced broadband connection will be everyone’s basic right in Finland. This is absolutely one of the Government’s most significant achievements in regional policy and I am proud of it.”
Now that a high speed internet connection is a basic human right (according to Finland), where does that right rank in relation to, say, the right to speak your mind? How about in relation to the right to privacy? Is it a “lesser” right; are they equal?
A few months ago I read that the EU was claiming there is a basic human right to a European vacation. They drew up detailed plans on how to subsidize holidays, saying there was a “right to be tourists.”
Antonio Tajani, EU Commissioner of Enterprise and Industry, continued, “Traveling for tourism today is a right. The way we spend our holidays is a formidable indicator of our quality of life”. [Emphasis mine.] This sounds somewhat like our government claiming there is a human right to health insurance, though it is more accurately an economic good. The point is, all of these “fake rights” are distracting from the very real rights we are losing every day. We should take note that our new “right”to health insurance comes with the unprecedented mandate that Americans must buy insurance or face a stiff penalty.
Your rights as a human being aren’t something that can be invented, like the internet, and they aren’t something that can be bought or sold, like health insurance and vacation packages. Human rights are intangible. The highest ideals of liberty and decency. The right to speak one’s mind without fear of persecution from the government; the right to take the fruit of one’s own labor to his family uninterrupted; the right to be secure of your privacy in your papers and effects, within your home and business. These are the things we are losing while the world is granted the right to internet access.
It is my recommendation that we be wary of politicians suddenly discovering there are new rights that we had somehow missed until now. Instead, we should focus our attention on making sure our government does it’s most basic and important duty – to protect the freedoms of every American, and uphold the Bill of Rights.

Anthony Librera, 2010 candidate for the 60th Assembly District, was recently quoted on SILive.com regarding the need for third-party alternatives to the failing two-party system.

Change doesn’t come from political parties. Change comes from people’s ideas. The two parties in control had their shot at running the government efficiently and they failed equally miserably. The incompetence among Democrat and Republican Party lines has been fantastic. How can you run a successful operation when you only reach a deadline six times in the last 35 years? Change must come from the people.
Continuing to switch from each of the big parties hasn’t solved anything and it’s naive to believe this time is the exception. Fortunately, Staten Island and Brooklyn have a grassroots movement away from these parties and into a truly representative party for the people, the Libertarian Party. The Libertarian Party is fielding three candidates for State Assembly, Dave Narby in the 61st District, Danny Panzella in the 63rd District, and me, Anthony Librera, in the 60th District. Tom Vendittelli will be challenging Michael McMahon for the congressional seat.
The time for more than just the lesser of two evils is here. There’s a voice for the voiceless this year, and it’s directly from the people. The way the seemingly forgotten founders envisioned America to be, everyone has a say this year.
Source: SILive.com

The approval rate for Congress has been in the doldrums for quite some time. According to a basket of polls, it hasn’t been since March 2005 that more people approved than disapproved of the job they’re doing. It’s no wonder that grassroots organizations and third-party candidates are making a splash.
It’s going to be an exciting 2010 election, and we’re all looking forward to real change.

Volunteers who are interested in petitioning (gathering ballot signatures) for our candidates are encouraged to contact us at [email protected].
Petitioners can get copies of petition ballots by clicking on the links below.

• Librera/Vendittelli (east shore and Bay Ridge: map)
• Narby/Vendittelli (north shore: map)
• Panzella/Vendittelli (mid-island and north/west shore: map)
• Vendittelli (south shore: map)

In addition, petitioners are encouraged to also get signatures for the 2010 statewide candidates of the Libertarian Party of New York. The statewide petition document is also available for download.
Be sure to check out web site for late-breaking information regarding petitioning, ballot access, and our candidates.
For more information on our candidates, visit our 2010 Candidates page.

From the wire services:

7 July 2010
United States of America
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Liberty Candidates 2010 Endorses Danny Panzella for New York State Assembly 63rd District
LIBERTY-CANDIDATES.ORG enthusiastically welcomes Danny Panzella to the growing slate of candidates championing a return to Constitutional governance in the United States!
A Liberty Candidate will defend the great American principles of:

• Individual Liberty
• Constitutional Government
• Sound Money
• Free Markets
• a Non-interventionist Foreign Policy.

This endorsement is the hallmark of a true Liberty Candidate. To qualify, Candidates must submit answers to the four liberty questions. Then, each application is voted on by a committee made up of peers and other liberty minded individuals. Each candidate’s website is visited by committee members to see that a candidate’s answers and his/her stance on the issues coincide.
If accepted, each Liberty Candidate is added to the Liberty-Candidates.org site with prominent links back to his/her site(s). All Liberty Candidates are eligible to participate in the Liberty Candidate Money Bombs.
With candidates like Danny Panzella serving the people at the city, county, state and federal level, there is real hope for change in America.
Let Freedom Ring!

For more information about Liberty Candidates.org, go to http://www.Liberty-Candidates.org.
For more information about Danny Panzella, visit his 2010 Candidates page or his web site at http://www.danny4assembly.com.

Check out the latest  poll on repealing President Barack Obama’s takeover of the health care system,  According to Rasmussen Reports:

Some things never change, and voter opposition to the recently passed national health care law appears to be one of them.
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 56% favor repeal of the law, while 39% are opposed. Support for repeal is unchanged from a week ago. That support is also proving to be just as consistent as opposition to the health care plan before it was passed into law.
In polls conducted every week since the law was passed in March, support for repeal has stayed in a very narrow range from a low of 54% to a high of 58%.
The current results include 45% who Strongly Favor repeals and 33% who are Strongly Opposed. Among senior citizens, the generation most likely to use the health care system, 63% favor repeal.
The health care bill produces an enormous perception gap between the Political Class and the rest of the country. While most voters nationwide favor repeal, the Political Class is opposed to repeal by an 88% to eight percent (8%) margin.
Overall, 39% of voters believe the law will be good for the country, and 50% say it will be bad. Among the Political Class, 97% see the law as good, while 64% of Mainstream voters say it will be bad.

It clearly appears that a majority of Americans do not trust the Federal government to administer their health care, and given the Feds track record (Iraq, Katrina, the bailouts, unemployment and insuring sound money immediately come to mind),  I can’t blame them.
Nowhere in the Constitution does it give the Federal government this sort of power, and it underlines the huge disconnect between politicians and the people they supposedly represent.
Come November, I expect a great many of the political class to be wearing shocked looks on their faces as they cash their unemployment checks.

I received the following via email from Chris Edes, former Chair of the Libertarian Party of New York. He gave me permission to share it here.

Friends,
Two hundred and thirty-four years ago a new nation was born, one based on the idea that all human beings possess inherent dignity and inalienable rights.  One based on the idea of liberty and justice for all.
Our nation faced difficulties extending that promise to all people, difficulties we have risen to and overcome.  Yet at the same time, all of us increasingly feel that promise slipping away.  In February of this year, a Rasmussen poll found that only 21% of voters believe our government has the consent of the governed.  Does the promise of liberty and justice still ring true?
Well, another Rasmussen poll came out yesterday.  It found that 54% of Americans still believe the U.S. is a nation with liberty and justice for all.  34% disagreed and 11% were not sure.  Yet what I found most striking was that more than three-quarters (76%) also said that if they could live anywhere in the world, they would choose the United States.
Not only that, but “There is no significant difference among party lines — more than 70% of Republicans, Democrats and unaffiliated adults would rather live in the U.S. than anywhere else.”
Whatever our political disagreements and however disappointed we may feel in our government, Americans across all party lines overwhelmingly believe that the United States is the greatest nation on Earth.
I stand with them wholeheartedly.  Today I fly my flag as proudly as did our nation’s founders over two hundred years ago.  I’m convinced we can make this great experiment work, and fulfill the promise of Liberty.  I hope you agree, and I hope you’ll join with me today — in celebrating the birth of our nation, and thanking whatever Providence to which you may incline.
your fellow American,
Chris Edes

Thanks for your great words, Chris, and happy Independence Day to everyone!

SUMMARY: Tom Vendittelli, candidate for Congress in New York’s 13th Congressional district, rips apart the recently-passed financial reform bill.

This week the U.S. House of Representatives passed a financial “reform” bill.  Unfortunately, the bill will do nothing to avoid a future financial collapse, because it does not address the core problems of our economic system.
The legislation that has passed the House this week is only distracting and, ultimately, further destructive to our already fragile economy. If we want to be serious about financial reform in this country, we need to concern ourselves with the Federal Reserve. As long as we have a bank that operates outside the oversight of the people’s representatives in Congress, and which acts as a lender of last resort for banks and politicians, we can expect more of the same.
The Federal Reserve Bank acting as a lender of last resort is what creates the moral hazard that makes excessive risk seem so appealing.  When there is a Federal Reserve that will create credit out of thin air for a “too big to fail” bank, there is no real risk of failure. The only real risk is the public anger that arises when average Americans realize they have been swindled by politically-connected organizations in collusion with their supposed “representatives” in Congress.
Artificially low interest rates set by the Fed under Alan Greenspan caused massive over-investment in housing and other sectors of our economy, which resulted in a bust that really signaled the end of an economic era. Under the new financial reform bill, the Fed will be further empowered, with even greater oversight and influence over the economy than they already possessed.
Considering the Fed was in no small part responsible for the bad investment and excessive risk that led to the collapse of our economy in 2008, why are they now being given even greater powers? This is akin to having the fox guard the hen house. To make matters worse, in an act of brazen mass hypocrisy, 114 Congressmen who had previously cosponsored legislation to audit the Federal Reserve (H.R. 1207), voted to strip the audit out of the financial reform package at the last minute. So much for oversight.
If we want true financial reform, for the sake of our freedom and liberty, we need to examine the Federal Reserve in depth and find out what they are doing behind closed doors. This week the United Nations announced that they should dump the dollar as a world reserve currency because it has been “unable to safeguard value.”  A move like this would have direct negative consequences on the value of our currency.  This is yet another signal that the Fed has failed, with disastrous results not only to the economy at large, but to our personal finances as well.
The Federal Reserve, at best, didn’t see the collapse coming; at worst, they are in collusion with some of the most powerful money interests in the world. Neither is a situation that warrants giving them greater influence over the economy.
This huge mistake of a bill is now moving onto the Senate. If anything, this has been instructive, as it shows us exactly whom the politicians in Washington work for. Rather than grant greater powers to the Federal Reserve, it is time to declare the 100-year experiment in American central banking to be a dismal failure, and return to the sound money of our Constitution. The future of freedom and prosperity demands it.
[The author, Tom Vendittelli, is a candidate for Congress in New York’s 13th district.  This is the first of a three part series on financial reform.]

Summary: Author Danny Panzella, the Libertarian Party candidate for the New York State Assembly’s 63rd District, comments on the problem with our current elected politicians. His comments were also published on SILive.com.

Assemblywoman Janele Hyer-Spencer’s comments about “lack of…sophistication” of those running for office is the very problem that permeates Washington and Albany.
This belief that these elected representatives (80 percent of them attorneys) are an elite class of people who will “parent” the unwashed masses is unfortunately characteristic of both dominating parties.
It is time for grass-roots candidates to step up out of the Tea Party rallies (or any other grass-roots movements) and run for office, get involved in the political process and take it back from this self proclaimed political elite.
We the people must have more than just a voice that is heard at rallies on Saturdays; we must take over Albany and Washington D.C..