The Best of 2007
Reminiscing on The Coffee Coaster's first season

The Coffee Coaster began in the latter months of
2006 with a general notion to comment on public affairs from a homey "rational, spiritual, libertarian, transhumanist" perspective. What I thought was missing from general discourse in the freedom movement was a sense of community with "all those other people out there." For a variety of reasons over the years many libertarians have tended to be so into their heads they forget most people, themselves included, are simply trying to work out the issues of life, give a good effort, and have a little fun on the journey.

Along these lines of reaching out to real people, the
Free State Project represents a giant step forward for humankind. What could be more humanitarian than the effort of ordinary folks—with a natural American love of liberty—to put their freedom where their feet are and create a new country: one seeming to better "effect their safety and happiness"? The FSP is not a head trip or an ego trip; it's a body trip, literally, to move to and build a beacon to the world of how to live practically, consensually, peaceably, and ultimately abundantly.

So in the normal course of affairs, as a proud member of the FSP and an early mover to New Hampshire (though with fits and starts), I was led to develop the Coffee Coaster. And I hope my readers—from the freedom community and from the regular, impending-freedom communities—feel they're getting their money's worth. All that being stated, here are some "best of" recommendations from my 2007 columns and reviews:

Columns

Why I'm a Free Stater: Special times call for special measures—one of my early panegyrics of the FSP; another source of information: the monograph, New Pilgrim Chronicles.
Golf in the Provinces—a series of reality bites where I describe a man's love of the game and how it's generally played away from the manicured greens and fairways of the PGA.
The Demise of the Jalapeno Slider: The sad decline of restaurant arithmetic—another human interest story, this one involving the common complaint that it's hard to find good help... and clear-headed bistro owners.
9/11 Truth and the Grand Awakening: The cathartic potential of unraveling the Big Lie—putting a positive spin on the general spread of awareness of high levels of US government complicity and culpability in the crimes of 9/11.

Movie Reviews

Who Killed the Electric Car—some of my favorite themes in the movies I reviewed this year have to do with corporate-state treachery and being nice to Mother Nature.
Lone Star and Selena—mentioning both movies because of the topicality of border culture; Lone Star is one of the best movies ever made on a lot of levels, Selena a happy, musical feast.
V for Vendetta—so many great movies, so little time; V is for the
vicarious thrill most libertarians feel when seeing justice dispensed on celluloid fascist corporocrats.
Love Actually—yes, actually; I'm a sucker for happy holiday fare, and LA is the perfect antidote to the Orwellian media.

Book Reviews

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and Building a Bridge to the 18th Century—classics by Pirsig and Postman, both trying valiantly to resurrect the concept of Quality in our time; the latter is an ode to reading, writing, and the concept of liberty.
The Weather Makers—the quintessential work for green libertarians: a humane, intelligent explanation of the scientific evidence behind deleterious anthropogenic global warming and useful, in-depth analyses of what free people can do.
The Singularity is Near: When humans transcend biology—Ray Kurzweil's vision of the technological future barreling down upon us, finally the prospect of immortality; also, consistent with this new human potential the works of Eckhart Tolle are pertinent.
The New Pearl Harbor and 911 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions—9/11 exposés by Professor David Ray Griffin; please believe me if you read these books, the official government story of 9/11 will become Fantasy Island to you.
The Deep Blue Good-By, Nightmare in Pink, and Free Fall in Crimson—recognizing my general tastes in books tend toward political nonfiction, I try to take a break sometimes; these John D. MacDonald Travis McGee stories are most rewarding.

That's it then. 2008 Coffee Coaster will stay with much the same format: a column on Monday, book review on Wednesday, movie review for the weekend. I'd like to encourage my readers to use the CC forum whenever they have a beef or a comment. I'm also interested in provocative or insightful guest columns/articles. Please contact me if you have an idea you want to promote or a book you wish to recommend.

I'm looking forward to 2008 in the best way; I do feel we are the verge of a great spiritual awakening as a species as we learn to put decades of statism and mind control in our collective rear view mirror. Freedom is the original idea. Moreover, the individual creative spirit will blossom in so many of us that the Pathocracy will simply collapse for lack of interest, funding, or cannon fodder. These are exciting times. Here's to restoration of the republic!

A note on the business end; I expect the work on my site to eventually become funded from four principal sources, first from my Associates links to Amazon (in general, if you click on a text link to a book or movie and wind up purchasing that book or movie via Amazon, the CC gets a small cut), from affiliate sales, from miscellaneous ad revenue, and from donations. As my site visits grow, normally these streams grow as well. I'm always amenable to link exchanges, and I'll be developing my own links to others in the first few months of 2008. Word of mouth is vital. If you like a particular view or review, please consider sending and recommending that page link to someone else who may share your appreciation. Best wishes for a great '08!