Looking at the above photo I live to the right, just outside the picture. I work and “play” as they say to the left, a bit farther outside the picture. In the bottom right is one of the most dangerous expressway to surface road interchanges in the city as the looping exit ramps keep automobile traffic on the high end and it is a bit unpleasant to ride through to say the least. That pretty red, yellow and orange loop doesn’t do a lot to help myself and many others ride their bikes to work. However, it’s damn fine for the weekend warriors. Great work Louisville. You’re really setting a benchmark in recreational pedestrian and bicycling facilities. $14.7 million worth.
Here’s the highlights:

• Building walking trail at A.B Sawyer Park, $616,000. The path would start at Whipps Mills Road in Lyndon and meander to near Hurstbourne Parkway. The path would be known as the A.B. Sawyer Greenway.
• Seneca Loop extension $988,350. This project, creating 40 jobs, will provide a 3.9 mile trail loop for pedestrians and bicycles in Seneca Park and around Bowman Field.
• Louisville Loop, $687,500. This project will repair a slope failure on the existing trail adjacent to Shawnee Golf Course and create as many as 35 jobs.
• Neighborhoods sidewalk construction and repair, $7.4 million. Abramson and his “Louisville At Work” team, in consultation with the Metro Council, will determine where to build and repair sidewalks. The projects could create up to 620 jobs.
• Resurfacing 70 miles of streets, $5,500,000. The “Louisville At Work” team will help determine which roads get priority paving. This could create as many as 600 jobs.
• Installation of bicycle lanes along Taylorsville Road from McMahan to Hurstbourne, $88,000 and creating 8 jobs

Can we please get the mayor’s chubby ass along with these other bureaucratic sheep out on bikes in real traffic for a couple days and then have them consider where $14.7 million might help?

There are people being killed out there - fuck recreation.

I know, I know. I’ve been neglecting the political side of things as of late. I’ve been concentrating most of my efforts towards the bike things over at FuckGas.org… that ones updated daily. However, we (that’s plural for me) will have a booth/table/spot at the SXSE (South by South End) festival happening April 24 & 25. I’ll have a handful of zines, stickers for the taking as well as some shirts for the buying. Come and get it.
Finally, it’s tax season. That means millions of people take time out of their day to prepare paperwork for state and country documenting what their labor was worth the previous year. Stop being a slave and keep what’s yours. If you don’t like the idea of a government sending hundreds of thousands of troops all over the world to tell people how to live their lives then stop assisting in flipping the bill. The same goes for local government.

Found this one over at the Drunk Cyclist. While not so much a liberty themed blog, it’s always entertaining. As for the picture above, so true. Isn’t it possible there could be a better way?

I’ve had a pretty slow week at work so I’ve been reading the latest thing to show up in my mailbox from AK Press (review soon), browsing the news and catching up on international and civil conflicts from around the world. When taking only a few minutes to read over ongoing conflicts happening throughout the world it is absolutely maddening what the simple idea of non-aggression could accomplish. I am disgusted by the attrocities delt out in the name of government, religion and finally, personal opinion.
In being human there is no reason anyone should not have the right to live their own lives in the way they see most appealing given they are not harming another person. Why anyone thinks the way they feel about any given issue is the right way for everyone to live is a genuine tragedy. Regardless of vote by majority or full blown tyranny, when you choose to control others you are choosing the path of agression over freedom. I can only hope for the total collapse of the U.S. government and in the aftermath having individuals stand up to choose voluntary interaction with one another over the coerciveness of another government.

It’s a long one at 16 minutes but well worth your time.

Enjoy your bountiful harvest americans. While I’m not real big on the fake meat thing or absurd holidays, Tofurkys are quite delicious. I find it strange that today we are supposed to be thankful for what we have and tomorrow we should seemingly go out and splurge and spend as much as possible. The most selfless and selfish two days of the year all rolled into one weekend. Have fun out there.

It’s something I’ve been hearing for years but is print really dead? This is not simply pertaining to newspapers and magazines either. Office’s all over the world have been “going paperless” for years. Every aspect of the situation is completely understandable. A paperless operation is cheaper and faster whether it be e-zines or digital workflow. Urban Velo, my favorite magazine at the moment, will be making a print run of 5,000 copies for their next issue and looking at 40,000 downloads of the free PDF from their website. This of course can not include the copies of the PDF made by people giving it to friends, something I do quite often. Regardless, that is 800 times more digital versions floating around than print. Looking at those numbers you can only imagine what some of the larger magazines, blogs, news outlets and media companies are seeing from their web traffic.

While print isn’t dead it has certainly lost it strong hold as a mark of legitimacy.

I have a problem. I fail to see what all this talk of change is actually aiming at. What is it that everyone expects the Obama administration to change exactly? Technically speaking the term is correct. Change has happened. The voters of the United States elected a non-white president. This is certainly something I never expected to witness in my lifetime and it is an interesting event. Unfortunately I can’t expect to see anything better from the situation.

When you look past the mans appearance you can see his values. Values which are very much common to any other politician looking to sit at the commanding lead of the largest empire this world has ever known. Of course there will be change as compared to how things are today. Who the fuck would in their right mind openly admit they were going to do things the same way your buddy George had for the last 8 years. That’s insane. I’ll give you that yes, there will be change. Change in the sense of additional laws being passed regarding still more victimless crimes and additional measures requiring more servitude to the state.

One such measure being that doctors and nurses owe you their time because of their chosen profession. This point of view is so out of hand in this country we’re sure to see some legislation indenturing those unlucky bastards. This idea that everyone deserves to have adequate health care sounds really nice, but who do you propose provides that care. Are you going to go back to school and become a doctor to take care of all the people in your community? Do you think the government is going to pay the same rate a doctor would normally charge for privately insured patients? Two of the three parties in this equation are going to get screwed. The doctor gets paid less, if at all and the patient gets semi-descent car at best. The government meanwhile, is the saviour.

The above scenario is normal when looking at how politics operate. “Give me control and I will provide.” It seldom works out well for those handing over the control unfortunately. Is there somewhere I can sign up to provide for myself or take part in voluntary interactions with others willing to provide services for me instead of having the government take my earnings and come up with services I never asked for in the first place?

Nazi anti-smoking ad titled “The chain-smoker” saying “He does not devour it [the cigarette], it devours him”

Just a quick excerpt from Wikipedia regarding the Nazi anti-smoking campaign. I found it enteresting coming at the heels of a comment regarding my comparing the current U.S. government to Nazi Germany being absurd scare monger tactics.

“Nazi Germany initiated a strong anti-tobacco movement and led the first public anti-smoking campaign in modern history. Anti-tobacco movements grew in many nations from the beginning of the 20th century, but these had little success except in Germany where the campaign was supported by the government after the Nazis came to power. It was the most powerful anti-smoking movement in the world during the 1930s and early 1940s. The Nazi leadership condemned smoking and several of them openly criticized tobacco consumption. Research on smoking and its effects on health thrived under Nazi rule and was the most important of its type at that time. Hitler’s personal distaste for tobacco, and the Nazi reproductive policies, were among the motivating factors behind their campaign against smoking, and this campaign was associated with both antisemitism and racism.”

“The Nazi anti-tobacco campaign included banning smoking in trams, buses and city trains, promoting health education, limiting cigarette rations in the Wehrmacht, organizing medical lectures for soldiers, and raising the tobacco tax. The Nazis also imposed restrictions on tobacco advertising and smoking in public spaces, and regulated restaurants and coffeehouses.”

You’re right, making comparisons between Nazi Germany and the current American empire are rediculous. Apologies all around. What could anyone possibly be thinking by allowing people to their own deciscions and endanger their own health. When do we welcome back prohibition?

You did it. You let your voice be heard, and did you make a difference? Did your team win?

Regardless of what your answers are to any of the above questions the only important one may be, are things going to get better now? Regardless of the fact that Barack Obama will be sitting in the oval office come January doesn’t make a damn bit of difference. Problem is, neither your or my best interests are no where close to the top of his priorities. Even if they were, what about those whose best interests do not reflect our own? This is the problem with democracy or such as you voted for, a representative republic.

Democracy is aggression. Whether you are holding the gun or not, when you vote to put rulers in power, you are aggressing against all those who may oppose that rulers ideals. For if we do not agree and dare dissent, we may be forced with threat of violence, imprisonment or by the barrel of a gun to submit. Fact is fact, and this is the path you have chosen.

As George Washington said, “Government is not reason, it is not eloquence. It is force. And force like fire is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.”