Today is the first real day off I've had in the past 7 months at least, a day off that I planned absolutely nothing, and did whatever the hell I felt like doing. I went on a bike ride with my wife, we went to lunch, I spent a lot of time editing two chapters of a book I'm reading for Librivox.org. It is The Age of Reason, by Thomas Paine that I'm recording, and what follows is a snippet from that work...

As to the learning that any person gains from school education, it serves only, like a small capital, to put him in a way of beginning learning for himself afterward. Every person of learning is finally his own teacher, the reason of which is that principles, being a distinct quality to circumstances, cannot be impressed upon the memory; their place of mental residence is the understanding and they are never so lasting as when they begin by conception.

Interesting. It is something I noticed reading the biographies of people of that time. Quite a few are self educated, reading and studying on their own works that in today's society are viewed as drudgery by most. The book about Hamilton by Chernow, talks of him doing just that, spending much time with ancient Roman texts, as well as Euclid's Geometry.

I also noticed it was incredibly hot in the sun, though the water temperature in the pool was below 65 degrees. I went in anyway, just to experience the chilly water, after which I could bask in the sun for a while. My wife cannot wait till the water is just a little warmer, which won't take long if the hot days continue, even for a little while. She had the pool put in during the fall season so there would be less wait and fewer problems with the builder, it being their slow season and all.

I've also been reading, or listening to, more books. Lately is was Stephen King's Duma Key, Helen Keller's My Life, and American fascist (can't remember the author, and I'm too lazy to look it up). I just received another audiobook from Amazon and will start it today.

Read something very interesting, on the very biased web site The Huffington Post. Naomi Wolf talks about why she's voting for Barack here.

When people think about the many laws that invite this kind of overreaching now in the US -- the National Security Presidential Directive (NSPD 51), for instance, that would give the president control over all systems -- governmental, legal, tribal -- in the event of an emergency -- they just assume that, gosh darn it, WE WON'T TAKE IT. And it may well be that we wouldn't want to take it and we would be willing in great numbers to run to the ramparts. But here is what I have to report to you, that the conference call made clear, and my Pakistani friend would confirm this: in a crackdown, even in the best-case scenario, NO ONE KNOWS WHERE THE RAMPARTS ARE.

Many people have expressed faith in the Military. I am sure most of our military are patriots and cherish freedom; but who would direct a resistance to such an edict? What would be the chain of command? What about ordnance? Many people have expressed faith in the courts, but if they went after the judges -- just a handful of judges -- as they did in Pakistan, would the judiciary prevail? How? All closed societies have judiciaries; the judges just know which way to rule.

Many others assume the media will cover such a depredation and rouse people; well, ideally -- but just days ago we saw a systemic blackout of a 60 Minutes report on Don Siegelman, the Democrat probably wrongly jailed in Alabama, by a TV affiliate with close ties to the White House.

Resistance? Sure, but how? The trouble with an aggressive move in any one of these directions on the part of the government is that THEY HAVE THOUGHT ABOUT WHAT IS ABOUT TO HAPPEN and we have not. They aren't surprised or shocked; we are. They have a plan; we don't.

So surely, better to roll back these terrifying laws. Just in case.

Sounds alarmist, I know. But one just needs to understand how things went down in Nazi Germany to realize how it can happen right under our noses without our being aware of it. We assume in this country that we are free, and we will continue to be free, and that most everyone sees things this way. This last may be true, but it doesn't take very many to change things, and there are people right now that advocate for limiting the freedoms of others - non-christians, for example. There are evangelists that get worked up about this to congregations, and they actually believe the country would be better off persecuting non-religious folks. They get more bold every day dipping their grubby fingers into the governments of our communities, hiding behind the religious shield, forcing others to do as they think things should be done through the rule of law. As Wolf says, would Americans be able to pull themselves away from the television and YouTube long enough to see what is happening?