One of our most powerful Conservative Principles remains "Limited Government." Without it, the voice and the will of the people, will perish. The bigger the government grows, the more emboldened it gets. The more emboldened it gets, the less protected our individual freedoms become. The last handful of years have revealed a lot about our human weaknesses. In this episode we outline the importance of resisting the urge to allow Government to control of our lives.
Click here to learn more about Ben: http://bit.ly/3WJ1Czl
---
Today’s Sponsor(s):
Kickin' Crab - go to https://thekickincrab.com/houston-tx-1
Gambit Construction – go to www.gambitconstruction.com
---
Socials:
Follow on Twitter: http://bit.ly/3CeR2YJ
Follow on Instagram: http://bit.ly/3XfBADV
Follow on Facebook: https://bit.ly/3vw8ww4
One of our most powerful Conservative Principles remains "Limited Government." Without it, the voice and the will of the people, will perish. The bigger the government grows, the more emboldened it gets. The more emboldened it gets, the less protected our individual freedoms become. The last handful of years have revealed a lot about our human weaknesses. In this episode we outline the importance of resisting the urge to allow Government to control of our lives.
Click here to learn more about Ben: http://bit.ly/3WJ1Czl
---
Today’s Sponsor(s):
Kickin' Crab - go to https://thekickincrab.com/houston-tx-1
Gambit Construction – go to www.gambitconstruction.com
---
Socials:
Follow on Twitter: http://bit.ly/3CeR2YJ
Follow on Instagram: http://bit.ly/3XfBADV
Follow on Facebook: https://bit.ly/3vw8ww4
Welcome, everybody. Today on the answer, we look back at some of the COVID Nonsense, and the truth, the scary truth about government overreach. We need a limited government in order to prosper as individuals and as families. Justice Neil Gorsuch wasn't afraid to speak the truth, and neither should we. Be sure to share this podcast with your family and friends. Follow me on Twitter, and Facebook at Ben Armenta Texas. You can also find out more about my story at Ben armenta.com. Pringles is a great product, we introduced it in 1968. It came out strong, and then the government got involved. They said, Hey, you're not made of 100% Potatoes, you're made up of corn and soy and wheat and potatoes. You can't call yourself potato chips. You have to call yourself potato crisps and people like yeah, we still like them. You know? The government was like, you know, they're not made of 100% potatoes and people are like, Yeah, we kind of figure that when they were uniformly stacked on top of each other in the perfect shape of a horse saddle. You know, those gummy orange slice candies, not real oranges. We figured that out. Wow, that that is so true. Government. When government is run by the government lifers, those clowns the swamp. It all gets messed up. Even even like in that clip right there. Even Pringles gets messed up. But look, all joking aside. The best part about being a conservative is that we're right. We're right. There are a lot of liberals and Democrats and socialists and commies, who, unbeknownst to themselves, are doing harm. And some of them are well intentioned people. I mean, you might know some, you might know some people who are good at heart, and who mean to do well, but they vote Democrat. People who are again, who are kind hearted, who love their neighbors. But you know, that old proverb, the states, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Good intentions, doesn't get us to where we want to be as a society. And so in turn, this makes us conservatives, right. We as a whole, we err on the side of faith, with with not not making any apology about it. Conservatives are on the side of faith, and families, we are on Team God. And unlike the left, we don't shy away from that. We don't make excuses. God is never an excuse God is He is the reason. He is the reason for why we do, what we do and why we believe and why we as conservatives, support the conservative principles. We put God and our faith at the center of everything we do. Or at least we try to. We all we're all sinners, we all make mistakes. And God has merciful ways. There's Merciful Heart forgives us, and we get to go at it again. But he's the reason why we do what we do. Are all conservatives good people? Of course not. There are bad apples. There are bad actors that in every bunch just like there are bad cops, there are bad teachers. There's there's bad preachers and priests and on and on. However, as a whole, you look at conservatives and conservatism and conservatives in its totality because of its roots in Judeo Christian values. It breeds good public policy and even better communities. But it's not all roses and the abuse of power by all sides, including on the right and I don't shy away from I'm calling on Republicans or conservatives out when they don't have your best interest in mind, and the abuse of power. And we've seen it in recent years. It's way out of hand. This past week in Texas, the House of Representatives, the State House, voted to impeach the sitting Attorney General Ken Paxton. And this process was an absolute crock of you know what? There wasn't anything good about that situation. And yet the house followed through on the bidding, essentially, of the speaker, David feeling. So let me lay this out for you for years. General Paxton. He's been under investigation for years. He's been attacked by the left. And, you know, not just the media, but by left leaning. Politicians left leaning even left leaning Republicans for years, major donors and billionaires under the guise of putting pro business officials and candidates into office. They have funded campaigns of candidates that either primaried, general Paxton or they flooded the House of Representatives with individuals that they knew would cast a vote if an impeachment case or hearing was ever held. And yet, more importantly, for years, for years now, almost eight years, neither the judiciary, or even the courts of public opinions have found Ken Paxton guilty. This is evidence by no charges being brought to him. And the will of the people of Texas, voting him into office for a third term. You see the grassroots the same folks that Tom Slocum and I chatted about a handful of episodes ago those those same people resoundingly kept Paxton in office because of one major thing. He is the greatest Attorney General in the entire country. Period. Nobody fights harder. Nobody fights harder to protect the rights of Texans than general Paxton. Nobody fights harder to keep Joe Biden out of our lives than Ken Paxton. He, he's actually I mean, he is sued the Biden administration. It seems like almost every other week. And he has won 90% of the lawsuits that he has filed against the Biden regime 90% The threat of grassroots the threat of the power of the grassroots. It's palpable. And the left and the left leaning Republicans, they hated the threat of Magha. Having a champion at the state level, the threat of the establishment cronies getting exposed. is just it was just too much. Just too much for the for the establishment in the Republican Party, Ken Paxton. He led the charge of all the lawsuits across the nation in working to ensure that we had a just an unlawful President presidential election in 2020. The establishment they hate that. And what's worse about this whole thing is that the process that was followed was a total disgrace. without any preparation or warning. Members of the House were given. I think they're just given two days. They're given 48 hours notice that this this committee, this special committee was recommending an impeachment vote, and 48 hours. So you had over 100 representatives go on about their business in this legislative session filing bills, representing them in committee hearings, but leaving them to conference reconciling the differences between the Senate and working their tails off. And at a moment's notice, we're told we're going to have to, to hear some debates and vote on impeachment for Ken Paxton. And no new evidence was presented as a result of this so called committee's investigation, no new evidence, not a single testimony from any witness that went before that committee, not a single piece of testimony was gathered under oath, no sworn declarations. And there was essentially no time for the members to review any information or assess the impacts these allegations, they just had two days, and it was over going into the memorial long weekend. It's crazy. It's ridiculous. This impeachment process. Just like all the attacks against President Trump was weaponized against the individual who called for the resignation of speaker feeling when he was caught on video in what appears to be a slurred drunken speech. While standing up in front of the house representative, so so just a few few days before a video went viral. All you have to do is go on the internet, search for Texas House Speaker drunk and it will come up and speaker feeling came back from some kind of, you know, recess or dinner. He came back late in the evening. And whole house was there. They're working long hours because they're on the final week, week and a half before for the session ended. And he appeared to be drunk. The speech was slurred, couldn't tell what he was saying. He was leaning on the podium. I mean, the mess was a mess. So Ken Paxton as a statewide elected official, a leader. He called for Speaker feelings, resignation. So now all this just looks like is a political attack. It's all this is. And so now there's going to be a trial in the Senate. And really only time is going to tell if the Texas State Senate will maintain some type of integrity on this process. But make no mistake, the political death grip that the establishment is trying to place on the grassroots you know, all the people that voted for Ken Paxton for the third time. Those are the grassroots. Those the the Maga supporters, the political death grip that they are trying to squeeze around the grassroots. It is tightening up the individuals and civil liberties of everyone, regardless of your race, regardless of your creed, your political station live doesn't matter how we are whether you're in politics or not. It is all in jeopardy. The abusive power of our government at all levels. It's out of control. Remember, COVID Remember, two weeks to slow the spread, which really turned into two years at by hack. It's more than that. We still have people that won't go back to work. I was talking with a lady earlier today. I was out running an errand and she was checking me out in line. And she was talking about how they cannot get anybody to come to work. Nobody wants to work. It wasn't like that before COVID. And we live in Texas. I know it's worse, way worse elsewhere. Remember the lock downs? The mandates. I never acquired the jabs for military. Remember, no church services including outdoors. The closure of parks swim swimming pools were closed in the middle of summer swimming pools. Kids just want to go play outside and they shut that down. Even in the early days of businesses opening back up, you couldn't get a paper menu anywhere. You have to search with a QR code. Strain the look. I mean, I, I've got sort of middle of the road eyesight is not not that great anymore. I have to keep wearing my glasses. When I'm reading fine print, got to eat, you have to get on your phone to look at a five page menu. So ridiculous. Bars and gyms shut down. In the schools, schools were closed teacher unions wanted to keep them closed. At best there were assignments being traded back and forth on some online, you know, academic technology platforms. No vacations, Airtrack travel, social distancing six feet apart. And that's just a, they just made that up. Could have been eight feet could have been 10 feet could have been four feet. And they admit that now CDC and everybody just admitted that they thought it was just a good number. Wasn't too much wasn't too little. They just thought people would be able to remember it. And Grandma passing away in nursing homes with no one around her. You remember the madness? That wasn't your neighbor causing that. That was the government. government overreach happen everywhere. And that includes the reddest GOP states that included Texas and included Florida. And Governor DeSantis loves to talk about his record with during COVID. But they still shut down schools for a while overstep their bounds might not have been as bad as California who poured sand into the skate parks. But they did it. So not that long ago, Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch, he wrote, really kind of an editorial or response when title 42 expired and Tao 42 was a federal statute that allowed our government our border patrol to retain immigrants, when they when they cross the border, send them back into Mexico and sort of contain it a bit when, under sort of the guise of, of COVID. And what's going on with with COVID and slowing down the flow of individuals coming into the country that could be infected. And when it expired, he wrote this opinion, outlining really the troubles that we faced in our government during COVID. I want to read some of this to you. It's it's really pretty powerful, and that outlines his take on government abuse of power, and how it erodes our civil liberties. Since March 2020, we may have experienced the greatest intrusions on civil liberties in the peacetime history of this country. Executive officials across the country issued emergency decrees on a breathtaking scale. Governors and local leaders imposed lockdown orders forcing people to remain in their homes. They shuttered businesses and schools public and private. They closed churches, even as they allowed casinos and other favored businesses to carry on See, see those favorite businesses. They bring in revenue to state and local governments. That's their tax base. That's how states even like the state of Texas, have a massive surplus right now, because more money was coming in than was going out during those COVID years. So he goes on. They threatened violators, not just with civil penalties, but with criminal sanctions to they arrested people like that. The lady that owned the salon in the in the Dallas area. They arrested them. They surveil, surveilled, church parking lots recorded license plates, and issued notices warning that attendance at even outdoor services satisfying all state social distancing and hygiene requirements could amount to criminal con duct. AC. That's another important thing. Do you remember that even when you followed all the ridiculous rules, they came up with new ones. You could social distance, you could have your sanitation, hygiene. You know, lotion was that called hand sanitizer. Just families together just immediate families, people wearing masks, get all that crap going on, you could be outdoors. And they said no. See, it's never about your health. It's about their power. He says they divided cities and neighborhoods into color coded zones, force individuals to fight for their freedoms in court on emergency timetables, and then changed their color coded schemes. When defeat in court seemed imminent, federal executive officials entered the act to not just with emergency immigration decrees like title 42 They deployed a public health agency to regulate landlord tenant relations nationwide. They use workplace safety agency to issue a vaccination mandate for most working Americans. They threatened to fire non compliant employees and warned that wait, I want to go back and go back. My wife used to work for a company. And I remember when it was a was a it's publicly traded company. But it was a started by families. It was for families, deep American roots, Americana, one of those companies that when you think of America or your when you think of this company, you think of America. They implemented Vax vaccine mandates, even for people who worked at home. It was so dumb, so dumb. I remember when there was a guy on my wife's team who refuse to get the shot. And there was an appeals process. He was never going to win. It's unbelievable. was on believable, remote employees working at home on their zoom calls doing their thing. And these companies forced them to get the shot. So dumb. While executive officials issued new emergency decrees at a furious pace, state legislatures and Congress, the body's normally responsible for adopting our laws often fell silent. Courts bound to protect our liberties addressed a few but hardly all. In some cases like this one talking about how 42 courts even allowed themselves to be used to perpetuate emergency public health decrees for collateral purposes, itself a form of emergency lawmaking by litigation. Doubtless many lessons can be learned from this chapter in our history, and hopefully serious efforts will be made to study it. One lesson might be this fear and the desire for safety are powerful forces. Let me read that again. Fear and the desire for safety are powerful forces. They can lead to a clamor for action, almost any action as long as someone does something to address a perceived threat. And trust me, folks, trust me, the liberals, the Democrats and even the establishment Republicans know this. They know they can they will manufacture a crisis. They will manufacture in emergency in order to maintain and tighten their grip on power. A leader he goes on a leader or an expert who claims he can fix everything. If only we do exactly what he says, can prove an irresistible force. We do not need to confront a bayonet, we need only a nudge before we willingly abandon the nicety of requiring laws to be adopted by our legislative representatives, and except rule by decree. Along the way, we will proceed to the loss of many cherished civil liberties, the right to worship freely, to debate public policy without censorship, to gather with friends and family, or simply to leave our homes. We may even cheer on those who ask us to disregard our normal lawmaking processes, and forfeit our personal freedoms. Even the ancients warned that democracies can be degenerate toward audit toward autocracy in the face of fear. But maybe we have learned another lesson to the concentration of power in the hands of so few. It may be efficient, and sometimes popular, but it does not tend towards sound government. However wise one person or his advisors may be, that is no substitute for the wisdom of the whole of the American people. And there you have it. Fear, anxiety, those emotions. When bottled up, channeled, they turn into a pressure cooker. And people and human nature is to let our civil liberties be toppled. That's what happened during those years. The establishment knows it. The left knows it, the Democrat knows it. And we can never ever, ever let it happen. Again. Tip of the old cap to justice Gorsuch finally someone with some common sense and perspective. Calling it like it is the will of the people, the will of the people is a greater force than fear. We just have to recognize it and use it. Whether it is rebuking Bud Light, or target, or North Face, or Disney or any other freakin woke company by taking our dollars elsewhere, or whether it's letting our voice be heard at the ballot box. Voting in individuals who who will actually follow through on their promises, like President Trump, or Ken Paxton, you and your family must stay true to your conservative principles. You can't let your principles be the flavor of the month. You can't let conservative principles are bedrock. your faith and your freedoms be the flavor of the month. It's not gonna work. I mean, we should be lucky that we clawed those things back and we're at where we're at now. On a previous episode, we discussed the rule of law as one of our conservative principles. Another one is limited government. The best way to think about this is that in order for an individual or family to prosper, in order in order for your freedoms to flourish, government, it can't be in the way it's got to be small, legitimate government operates only by the consent of the governed. And the best protection against government overreach and intrusion is an engaged and informed electorate. And that, my friends, is you and me. I feel like I've often having to explain this concept to conservatives, and then I have to convince them that a small government is a good thing. See that all the handouts from the left. They made it easy for Republicans to want more. All the pork they put in their bills, all the extra stuff, the free things. There's no such thing as a free lunch. All those is like a drug. And you're just taking more and more and more and more and more of it and the government is getting bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger. The more you take, the bigger it grows. It doesn't shrink. Government grows to feed the beast. When was the last time you heard a conservative person or radio host or a TV personality? Talk about cutting back on spending? They don't talk about it anymore. They just don't. Maybe because it's not a winning. It doesn't pull well, for elections. When was the last time you heard a Republican mention that they wanted to cut back on budgets? It means not really even a talking point anymore. It's not a platform point. It isn't. The the Republican Party in the state of Texas, had eight legislative priorities going into this the latest legislative session. And there really wasn't anything in there about budgets, making government smaller. Everything revolves around money, everything. So it's foolish to act as if the growth of the government doesn't have any implications on other issues. It impacts everything. The fight for life, family, or religious liberty, or culture. See the left. The left uses things like Obamacare, Medicaid, the Health and Human Services, they use those things to expand their agenda, like taxpayer funding of abortion, promoting transgender ideology, promoting the mutual mutilation of your kids. Why did what does the Department of Education at the federal level do? I have no clue. Nobody knows. Because they don't do a damn thing. Education should be run at a state and local level. The federal level doesn't do a damn thing is there are 1000s of people that work for that agency. And what they're really doing is pushing their leftist socialist agendas into our classrooms. What does the Department of Energy do? A regulates? it oppresses businesses so that government can grow. So what they do, they use those departments to declare war on things like religious hospitals, Catholic hospitals. But it's not it's not just the Democrats. It's not just Democrats, even Republicans. This happens with and this includes Donald Trump and I, I've said it before on this podcast. I voted for Trump in 2016, voted for him in 2020. But even he argued that abolishing the filibuster would allow more of his agenda to get passed. And it's the one they want to be in control. They want to take the control away from the people. Government in anyone's hands, when it's not the people, it gets weaponized. Just does. But economically small government. It's good for us. It's good for us. It's good for our communities, it's good for our nation. Small government ensures that your kids will get off their couch and get a job. They will not be able to put food on their table. If they don't have handouts, they gotta go earn it. They gotta go do something. They gotta roll up their sleeves and make it happen. If they take out a loan to pay for school, then they need to pay it back. That's a relationship between them. And the lender, not them and the government. If you pay for the lawn mowing company, to mow your yard, and you pay for it on any of those apps, Venmo cash, app paper, whatever it is, that is relationship between you and that lawn mowing company, not the government. They have no business overseeing those transactions. That is bull The smaller the government, the better. And you can just look, look at big government countries look at all the countries in Europe. And some of them are democratic countries, great allies of ours. But their economies, they're sluggish at best. Since 2010, the European Union has grown 1.4% annually, its its its economy, while the US has averaged 2.2% growth, which isn't them, which isn't great, but greater percentage in the US than in the European Union, whether they are Democrat or Republican, right or left, it doesn't really matter. Virtually all economists agree that the smaller the government, the greater the investments are governments that they just give the money out as as handouts, but they're not investing trying to grow other businesses. Governments in in 2015 analysis was done. of advanced economies around the world, and governments invested 8.5% of their spending, while the private sector invested 32%. I mean, think about it, if you're taxed, you're What are you doing your money, you're giving it back to the government. That's what you're doing. You don't have discretionary money to invest in, in businesses, corporations and your your communities, you can't invest in those kinds of things. Because all your money is going to taxes, you got to use the rest to put gas in your car. As the government's share of the economies increases, private investment falls, just the way it is just the way it is. limited government ensures that your personal freedoms, your family's freedoms, your faith, your values, your conservative principles can prosper. The whole reason I do this podcast is to help all of us, myself included, to help us all like I want us to become more informed, more engaged and as active as possible in championing conservatism. Look, I I have no idea what is going to happen the next time a COVID like incident occurs, I pray that we don't go back and respond to how we did and allow these liberties to get taken away from us. So I want to prevent that. Now, hope is not a strategy. So we need to pass bans on mandates. We need to pass bans on lock downs, you cannot shut down the economy, period. The economy is the lifeblood of our national security. And everything else we have going on. I have no idea what's going to happen during the Senate impeachment trial of general Paxton in Texas. But I know we need to call our senators and we need to tell them that they need to prioritize making decisions based on evidence not hearsay facts over fiction and constitutional law over big donations. Everywhere you look, our government has gotten fatter, it is fat. Everywhere you look, our government, especially our federal government is trying to control our lives. They want to track your money. They want to track your online surfing. They want to monitor your kids, your religious beliefs, your political beliefs. They're going jot down license plates numbers when you go to a school board meeting. It's what they're going to do. You know, and that's not even future tense. That is what they do now. Under the Biden regime. government overreach is out of control. But we the people, we can stand up and we can put it into it. If you and I can't trust that our elected officials have our back, then they have got to go. It is time for them to pack their bags and get the hell out of dodge. Buckle up, because I think this 2024 primary season that we're getting into now, it is going to be hot. I'm looking forward to it. Thank you so much for listening. As always, you can email me your thoughts to Ben at Ben armenta.com. Get to know the political candidates in your area. Ask them the hard questions about COVID. About locked down and about mandates. Ask them what it means to be a conservative and see where they stand on the role of government in our lives. And then get prepared to support and champion the ones who truly believe what you believe. Until next time, thank you again. And God bless. The answer with Ben Armenta is sponsored by the kicking crab, the latest and greatest caging concept to hit the southwest. They offer down home flavors and it's one of those places where you'll want to take the kids, no plates, just good times brought to you by folks that have strong conservative values. Just like you and me. Visit them today off highway six in Houston or at the kicking crab.com