Endlessly quotable, a Ulysses of adventure, Winston Churchill continues to fascinate all comers. Apropos our current literary project, we find the Great Commoner described in Aristotelian terms: "(Churchill's) great virtue lay in choosing well."
Fight or flight?-- courage (says Aristotle) is a moral virtue, prudence an intellectual one. Active yet contemplative, Churchill excelled at both: "By precept and example, he wove thought and action seamlessly, heroically together." Aristotle asserts that "magnanimity", greatness of soul and spirit, is humankind's great excellence.
Of all Americans, we think Abraham Lincoln most sanctifies Aristotle's insight. (Washington too, in different contexts.) Yeats wrote, "The intellect of man is forced to choose perfection of the Life or of the Work." Perhaps for we mere mortals... but Churchill, Washington and Lincoln attained magnanimity as of Mahatmas, "a beauty of the spirit that transfigures you and me."
One could do worse than meditate these matters. "And will a' not come again?"
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Ways to Say
Vodkapundit and assorted other bloggers have transmitted some dozen advisories on the disgraceful PCBS destruction of Roget's Thesaurus ten days ago. Though we've reverted to a 1911 version, relatively disordered and obsolete, a fellow sufferer informs us that a site called FreeThesaurus.net (qv) is a more than adequate replacement.
Indeed it is... site posts 30,000 main entries with 2,500,000+ synonyms. In contrast to Roget's (sic) genuinely stupid results for "Father" or "Weapon", FreeThesaurus.net lists dozens upon dozens of stated or implied equivalents, including "City Fathers", "Holy Father"; elder, patriarch, senior, ad infinitum. Verb forms and turns-of-phrase receive extensive treatment. Nothing could reveal more starkly the crude ideological bias behind Roget's desecration.
If our own and Vodkapundit's reaction to gutting Roget's is any indication, that originally appealing site will be out of business in three months. Good riddance.
Indeed it is... site posts 30,000 main entries with 2,500,000+ synonyms. In contrast to Roget's (sic) genuinely stupid results for "Father" or "Weapon", FreeThesaurus.net lists dozens upon dozens of stated or implied equivalents, including "City Fathers", "Holy Father"; elder, patriarch, senior, ad infinitum. Verb forms and turns-of-phrase receive extensive treatment. Nothing could reveal more starkly the crude ideological bias behind Roget's desecration.
If our own and Vodkapundit's reaction to gutting Roget's is any indication, that originally appealing site will be out of business in three months. Good riddance.
Monday, April 28, 2008
Out of Camelot, a Banana Peeled
Current campaign commentary has degenerated to cliches... the only question seems to be, will Denver's Superdelegates in August plump for BHO (aka "the Banana") or the egregious MzBill, wife of the First Black President so characterized because prosecuting violations of his Presidential Oath amounted to "lynch law."
Since LBJ in 1964, no D-rat presidential candidate has ever won the national "white vote." Over decades, blacks voting 90%+ en bloc have become D-rats' indispensable core constituency. The Obama Phenomenon was thus inevitable, however long-delayed.
In 2008, however, the Banana's problem is not race but character and personality: A Statist demagogue espousing typically vile anti-Semitism, an exclusionary group-identity, rancid entitlement snobbery the more outrageous for being entirely unearned. A feckless, rootless Leftard, the Banana seeks out racist Black Supremacists, certified crooks and terrorists, hate-America types of all stripes foreign and domestic. His wife, code-named Michelle, is only the most vocal.
D-rats nominated the first Catholic (Al Smith, in 1928); the first female VP (Geraldine Ferraro/Zacaro in 1984-- she preferred her maiden name [sic] to that of her notorious Mafioso spouse)... now comes the first black candidate, so divorced from America's mainstream that Kenya, Indonesia, Muslim cesspools East and West have come to seem like front-porch enclaves in Dubuque.
We hope indeed that MzBill and the Banana will tally losing totals come November 2008. But as Victor David Hansen says, the worry is how their validation of Pastor Putrid's hateful rhetoric will carry on-- does not this guarantee that our next racist demagogue will be "quite white," i.e. that the next Senator Bilbo's crazed rants will seem unassailable because the Banana and his coterie proclaimed them first?
The Civil War is long since ended. The dialectical rebound from 1960s perverse "Black Liberation" is just gearing up. Meantime, benighted Superdelegates must eventually decide: Write off their black vote, probably forever, accepting riots in the streets to go with MzBill's blackmailing extortionists for patronage reasons; or watch whites riot (per "Recreate '68") as their Feminazi favorite shrinks before a Candidate of Color incapable of winning but a single State?
If only McCain would campaign for dogcatcher, opening his convention to Bobby Jindal, Fred Thomson, or any competent Conviction Candidate!
Since LBJ in 1964, no D-rat presidential candidate has ever won the national "white vote." Over decades, blacks voting 90%+ en bloc have become D-rats' indispensable core constituency. The Obama Phenomenon was thus inevitable, however long-delayed.
In 2008, however, the Banana's problem is not race but character and personality: A Statist demagogue espousing typically vile anti-Semitism, an exclusionary group-identity, rancid entitlement snobbery the more outrageous for being entirely unearned. A feckless, rootless Leftard, the Banana seeks out racist Black Supremacists, certified crooks and terrorists, hate-America types of all stripes foreign and domestic. His wife, code-named Michelle, is only the most vocal.
D-rats nominated the first Catholic (Al Smith, in 1928); the first female VP (Geraldine Ferraro/Zacaro in 1984-- she preferred her maiden name [sic] to that of her notorious Mafioso spouse)... now comes the first black candidate, so divorced from America's mainstream that Kenya, Indonesia, Muslim cesspools East and West have come to seem like front-porch enclaves in Dubuque.
We hope indeed that MzBill and the Banana will tally losing totals come November 2008. But as Victor David Hansen says, the worry is how their validation of Pastor Putrid's hateful rhetoric will carry on-- does not this guarantee that our next racist demagogue will be "quite white," i.e. that the next Senator Bilbo's crazed rants will seem unassailable because the Banana and his coterie proclaimed them first?
The Civil War is long since ended. The dialectical rebound from 1960s perverse "Black Liberation" is just gearing up. Meantime, benighted Superdelegates must eventually decide: Write off their black vote, probably forever, accepting riots in the streets to go with MzBill's blackmailing extortionists for patronage reasons; or watch whites riot (per "Recreate '68") as their Feminazi favorite shrinks before a Candidate of Color incapable of winning but a single State?
If only McCain would campaign for dogcatcher, opening his convention to Bobby Jindal, Fred Thomson, or any competent Conviction Candidate!
Ansel Adam's Yosemite
I bring it up for two reasons, one I need to look at letters instead of numbers for a bit, and two because his photos are littered in buildings across campus. I have seen them often and not thought much of them, they are attractive and eye catching, I've stopped and looked at a couple but more often than not I'm involved in my thoughts and en route to somewhere else. It was only today that I happened to been studying in the Rawls building; a quiet place, with the open architecture one would find in a computer applied to a "new age" building. However Rawls is part of the Krannert School of Management where they have, out in the open, free copies of the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times for the taking, I usually pick up the WSJ and glance at whatever shock and awe picture the NYT has determined to stain its front page. However, today the travel section of the NYT had been removed from the Sunday edition and was sitting on a chair next to the rack where the papers are kept in the margin I noticed the name Ansel Adams. I did not think of it immediately, but was stirred and once I turned to the page, remembered instantly. I had known nothing about this man except the prints I had seen and his name written in bold block letters along the bottom of the prints, upon reading this piece (online version found here) I soon had a new found respect for his work, and realized someone had actually put thought into the interior aesthetics of the buildings on campus, imagine walking into the Electrical Engineering building and seeing "Bridalveil Fall" on the wall; I'm sure some EE majors feel like they are heading down that fall at times. All in all they are refreshing scenery in buildings where students can easily drown in the knowledge required for their major and forget whats out THERE, Yosemite is truly a national treasure.
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Roget's Hijacked
Anyone who doubts that "Roget's II" represents a a dumbed-down, skewed and truncated, ideologically sabotaged "update" (by an acknowledged radical femmer masquerading as a disinterested PhD) might visit Vodkapundit and associated sites. Roget's 175-year old reference is available in other forms --we've substituted an English-French version from 1911-- but really, this latest text represents censorship, not "editing".
Try "father", which returns "A male parent", period. No noun synonyms, no verb forms (bear, engender, foster, nurture etc.), no turns-of-phrase. As for "weapon": What of "rapier wit" and so on? Rumor? This eviscerated Roget's is a Dick-and-Jane monument to duckspeak PCBS, no longer a thesaurus at all-- an assault on language as communication in Orwell's fundamental sense. Depriving work-a-day writers of this classic tool (for what?) is an absolute insult.
What's next, "dictionaries" with amended definitions, encyclopedias careful to fit all history, philosophy, cross-referenced bibliographies to Mde. BS Femmer's mold? Betcha she's beavering at it, as we speak.
Try "father", which returns "A male parent", period. No noun synonyms, no verb forms (bear, engender, foster, nurture etc.), no turns-of-phrase. As for "weapon": What of "rapier wit" and so on? Rumor? This eviscerated Roget's is a Dick-and-Jane monument to duckspeak PCBS, no longer a thesaurus at all-- an assault on language as communication in Orwell's fundamental sense. Depriving work-a-day writers of this classic tool (for what?) is an absolute insult.
What's next, "dictionaries" with amended definitions, encyclopedias careful to fit all history, philosophy, cross-referenced bibliographies to Mde. BS Femmer's mold? Betcha she's beavering at it, as we speak.
The Internet Rumor Mill: Entirely Unreliable
You can stop your stomachs from churning. We've seen this happen before, where blogs are tools in the propagation of rumors. A blogger gets hold of a meme and runs with it. Instapundit seems to me very credulous. A recent example I've seen: "The University of Kentucky no longer mentions the Jewish holocaust in history classes," is a lie. Checking Pyrthroes' claim below I went to thesaurus.com which is the online cousin of Roget's. It is linked to dictionary.com and encyclopedia.com here. It's true there is no return for "weapon." However, there is a definition for it and an encyclopedia entry for it. Likewise, if you try "sword" in the thesaurus, you do get a reply. I conclude that this is simply bad software. The existence of "sword" in the thesaurus belies the notion that there's a conspiracy, no? That "phallo-centric" term would surely have been expunged before "weapon," no?
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Roget's Thesaurus
From Glenn Reynolds' "Instapundit" via "Vodkapundit" we have learned and verified that Roget's Thesaurus, a classic English-language reference, has been "edited" --brutally censored-- to reflect ur-Left PCBS speech codes that now render this standard work completely worthless. ("Weapon", for example, returns "no results". Feministical, peacenik, vicious partisan rants go on for pages.)
We've E-mailed a website or two concerning this, but are cynical enough to think that Roget's invaluable tool is lost forever. Is his Thesaurus such a nerd-like technical compendium that no-one cares? Do we not see that dictionaries, encyclopedias, historical biographies and bibliographies et al. will not survive this vicious totalitarian assault?
Composing "Alligator" in three volumes over some time now, forfeiting Roget makes one's stomach churn.
We've E-mailed a website or two concerning this, but are cynical enough to think that Roget's invaluable tool is lost forever. Is his Thesaurus such a nerd-like technical compendium that no-one cares? Do we not see that dictionaries, encyclopedias, historical biographies and bibliographies et al. will not survive this vicious totalitarian assault?
Composing "Alligator" in three volumes over some time now, forfeiting Roget makes one's stomach churn.
Hurricane Gore
Newsmax reports that Kerry Emanuel, a "prominent MIT hurricane scientist", has repudiated assertions that Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) drives tropical storm systems that grow to hurricanes. Computer models project scenarios in wild divergence from reality, asserts Prof. Emanuel, previously cited as a major authority by Gore-bastic acolytes. Though hurricanes have strengthened over the past thirty years (1979, satellites' first global coverage), their annual incidence has lessened: "(Our) models ... (fail at) reproducing Nature," says Emanuel.
Strange... since at least the mid-19th Century, before "climatology" became an acknowledged technical if not scientific discipline ["models" are no substitute for controlled experiments, which by definition cannot obtain], atmospheric studies have unequivocally defined cyclic phenomena that cancel or reinforce in overlapping waves. Lorenz's "butterfly effect", the basis of Chaos Theory [Lorenz just died at age 96], asserts that non-random processes may yet be indeterminate: On self-similar ("fractal") scales, chance and necessity drive patterns from root biases entirely too subtle to detect. Wholly determined, yes, but also unpredictable because consequences in fractal-geometric detail are unknown, unknowable.
Short-term climate cycles are just that. Whatever engendered oscillating fluctuations centuries ago, modern industrial civilization is not a factor. And since cycles by definition DO repeat, why waste literally billions of dollars to re-state the obvious, when by Chaos Theory no meaningful cause-and-effect correlation of factors is evident, or can be.
In any case, top aides to AGW skeptics in the U.S. Congress --Senator James Inhofe, R-Oklahoma, for one-- boldly assert that 2007 represented a "tipping point" for AGW alarmists, that as new-found skeptics like Emanuel speak out 2008 may finally drive a stake through Global Warming's vampire heart, restore a modicum of scrutiny to this latest ur-Leftist campaign to bleed free-enterprise capitalism to death by a thousand pseudo-scientific cuts.
Strange... since at least the mid-19th Century, before "climatology" became an acknowledged technical if not scientific discipline ["models" are no substitute for controlled experiments, which by definition cannot obtain], atmospheric studies have unequivocally defined cyclic phenomena that cancel or reinforce in overlapping waves. Lorenz's "butterfly effect", the basis of Chaos Theory [Lorenz just died at age 96], asserts that non-random processes may yet be indeterminate: On self-similar ("fractal") scales, chance and necessity drive patterns from root biases entirely too subtle to detect. Wholly determined, yes, but also unpredictable because consequences in fractal-geometric detail are unknown, unknowable.
Short-term climate cycles are just that. Whatever engendered oscillating fluctuations centuries ago, modern industrial civilization is not a factor. And since cycles by definition DO repeat, why waste literally billions of dollars to re-state the obvious, when by Chaos Theory no meaningful cause-and-effect correlation of factors is evident, or can be.
In any case, top aides to AGW skeptics in the U.S. Congress --Senator James Inhofe, R-Oklahoma, for one-- boldly assert that 2007 represented a "tipping point" for AGW alarmists, that as new-found skeptics like Emanuel speak out 2008 may finally drive a stake through Global Warming's vampire heart, restore a modicum of scrutiny to this latest ur-Leftist campaign to bleed free-enterprise capitalism to death by a thousand pseudo-scientific cuts.
Saturday, April 19, 2008
The 19th Day of April, 1775
Our esteemed nephew, Brent, was born 21 years ago today - on April 19, Patriots Day in Massachusetts, the anniversary of Paul Revere's ride and and the Battles of Lexington and Concord that began the American Revolution. "Embattled farmers," our determined ancestors among them, picked off nearly every British officer and sent 800 of King George's professional troops fleeing back to Boston in mounting panic. Only the timely arrival of reinforcements saved their precipitous retreat from becoming a wholesale rout.
A couple of months later the British army sallied forth again, this time to attack Rebel fortifications overlooking Boston from the high ground known as Breed's, now Bunker, Hill. Up marched the disciplined, red coated lines, wave on wave, drums rat-tatting and bag pipes scirling. Sun glistened on thousands of leveled musket barrels with terrible splendor.
"Steady, men!" called Brent's cousin, Capt. William Prescott. "Don't fire till you see the whites of their eyes!"
Volleys roared from behind wicker breastworks packed with earth. Gaps appeared in the British line, but the ranks closed and pressed on up the hill. Three times the British fell back and three times they rallied and surged forward. The Patriots were running out of ammunition. Peter Hayward, a giant blacksmith "with arms like oak trees," called his black, Indian-fighting dog, leaped the parapet, and charged into the enemy line, "raging like a demon (and) cracking British skulls like egg shells" with the butt of his musket as his ferocious hound sprang for their throats.
George Washington sounded the retreat, leaving England in possession of the field. But when the attackers mustered their force they found that, again, nearly every officer was dead and that casualties were nearly 50%. The Revolution lasted another eight years, but the British army never set foot out of Boston again.
Bunker Hill is a proud part of America's heritage - the "Glorious Cause" of freedom and democracy. Brent, an Eagle Scout and ROTC cadet at Purdue University, is only the latest on the eternal roll of honor. We hoist a glass in his honor on this special day!
A couple of months later the British army sallied forth again, this time to attack Rebel fortifications overlooking Boston from the high ground known as Breed's, now Bunker, Hill. Up marched the disciplined, red coated lines, wave on wave, drums rat-tatting and bag pipes scirling. Sun glistened on thousands of leveled musket barrels with terrible splendor.
"Steady, men!" called Brent's cousin, Capt. William Prescott. "Don't fire till you see the whites of their eyes!"
Volleys roared from behind wicker breastworks packed with earth. Gaps appeared in the British line, but the ranks closed and pressed on up the hill. Three times the British fell back and three times they rallied and surged forward. The Patriots were running out of ammunition. Peter Hayward, a giant blacksmith "with arms like oak trees," called his black, Indian-fighting dog, leaped the parapet, and charged into the enemy line, "raging like a demon (and) cracking British skulls like egg shells" with the butt of his musket as his ferocious hound sprang for their throats.
George Washington sounded the retreat, leaving England in possession of the field. But when the attackers mustered their force they found that, again, nearly every officer was dead and that casualties were nearly 50%. The Revolution lasted another eight years, but the British army never set foot out of Boston again.
Bunker Hill is a proud part of America's heritage - the "Glorious Cause" of freedom and democracy. Brent, an Eagle Scout and ROTC cadet at Purdue University, is only the latest on the eternal roll of honor. We hoist a glass in his honor on this special day!
What, Me Debate?
Last Thursday night, April 17, Democrat Presidential candidate Barack Hussein Obama (www.townhall.com/michaelbarone/ 08/04/19) debated with his opponent, Mrs. Bill Clinton, preparatory to the important Pennsylvania primary this coming Tuesday. One of the two moderators was George Stephanoupolos, press secretary in Democrat President Bill Clinton's administration - hardly an antagonistic participant. But Stephanoupolos had the nerve to go beyond Obama's general campaign talking points, raising issues of substance important to an informed vote.
Stephanoupolos probably intended to give Obama the opportunity to add substance to his rhetoric. But Pastor Wright's protege' - the popular Chicago pol who announced his Senate bid only two years ago from the home of his friend, Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers - is widely considered to have made a fool of himself. Without going into detail, this Harvard Law graduate held a press conference next day and announced that he would not engage in further debates, because the questions were "unfair."
A leading contender for President of the United States now refuses to discuss his position on matters of vital public policy! "Trust me!" smirks Obama. So here's another question for the man who disdains to wear an American flag pin: Why should we? Are half of all Americans really that stupid? What will it take for Democrats to wake up and smell the snake oil?
Stephanoupolos probably intended to give Obama the opportunity to add substance to his rhetoric. But Pastor Wright's protege' - the popular Chicago pol who announced his Senate bid only two years ago from the home of his friend, Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers - is widely considered to have made a fool of himself. Without going into detail, this Harvard Law graduate held a press conference next day and announced that he would not engage in further debates, because the questions were "unfair."
A leading contender for President of the United States now refuses to discuss his position on matters of vital public policy! "Trust me!" smirks Obama. So here's another question for the man who disdains to wear an American flag pin: Why should we? Are half of all Americans really that stupid? What will it take for Democrats to wake up and smell the snake oil?
Friday, April 18, 2008
Green Machines
Arthur St. Antoine, "Asphalt Jungle" (editorial) in Motor Trend, 04/18/2008 (Friday)
http://blogs.motortrend.com/6245781/editorials/is-the-earth-producing-more-oil/index.html
Brazils' deep-ocean Sugar Loaf of 33-billion bbls cannot possibly originate as fossil residues. Nor can Russia's 40,000-foot drill-shafts (42,350 ft. = eight miles). If petrochemicals ooze up as hydrocarbons, converted to "fossil fuel" deposits by abiogenic action under geophysical heat and pressure, oil becomes an eco-friendly renewable resource and whacked-out Greenies must bark their tarnation bow-wows elsewhere.
Over-population, crop failures, resource depletion; air-and-water contamination, anthropogenic global warming (AGW), mutating plagues-- Gaia runs a fever, life is a disease. What must we do to be saved? Chant mantras, kiss my ring, send money, says Al Gore. Fifty years of such tripe, and we haven't cited Nuclear Power yet.
Pysch tests akin to the Minnesota Multiphasic Personlity Profile (MMPP) dating from the 1950s are beginning to predict "leftist" tendencies based on parentage (functional two-parent --father and mother-- households) , narcissism ("compensatory self-esteem" deriving not from material deprivation but its spoiled-brat opposite, instant gratification where nothing is ever enough); and temperament, defined as Optimism regarding potential self-fulfillment vs. Pessimism that projects one's personal sense of failure and unworthiness onto others, transferred for safety's sake into public/political domains.
In other words, extreme partisan proclivities are "built in", innate, irrational symptoms of deep-seated personality traits. "Robber barons" sublimate ambitions constructively (cf: "Edifice complex"); others less talented default en masse to "rob Peter" principles, claiming entitlements --something for nothing-- rather than admit themselves incapable of ordering their own destinies.
Circumstances, people change... but suppose that by First Grade, psych-testing revealed with 95% probability where a subject's partisan leanings lay. Would productive sectors move in self-defense to winnow that chaff, or stand passively aside awaiting legions of new tapeworms prepared to smash-and-grab anything and everything worthwhile?
http://blogs.motortrend.com/6245781/editorials/is-the-earth-producing-more-oil/index.html
Brazils' deep-ocean Sugar Loaf of 33-billion bbls cannot possibly originate as fossil residues. Nor can Russia's 40,000-foot drill-shafts (42,350 ft. = eight miles). If petrochemicals ooze up as hydrocarbons, converted to "fossil fuel" deposits by abiogenic action under geophysical heat and pressure, oil becomes an eco-friendly renewable resource and whacked-out Greenies must bark their tarnation bow-wows elsewhere.
Over-population, crop failures, resource depletion; air-and-water contamination, anthropogenic global warming (AGW), mutating plagues-- Gaia runs a fever, life is a disease. What must we do to be saved? Chant mantras, kiss my ring, send money, says Al Gore. Fifty years of such tripe, and we haven't cited Nuclear Power yet.
Pysch tests akin to the Minnesota Multiphasic Personlity Profile (MMPP) dating from the 1950s are beginning to predict "leftist" tendencies based on parentage (functional two-parent --father and mother-- households) , narcissism ("compensatory self-esteem" deriving not from material deprivation but its spoiled-brat opposite, instant gratification where nothing is ever enough); and temperament, defined as Optimism regarding potential self-fulfillment vs. Pessimism that projects one's personal sense of failure and unworthiness onto others, transferred for safety's sake into public/political domains.
In other words, extreme partisan proclivities are "built in", innate, irrational symptoms of deep-seated personality traits. "Robber barons" sublimate ambitions constructively (cf: "Edifice complex"); others less talented default en masse to "rob Peter" principles, claiming entitlements --something for nothing-- rather than admit themselves incapable of ordering their own destinies.
Circumstances, people change... but suppose that by First Grade, psych-testing revealed with 95% probability where a subject's partisan leanings lay. Would productive sectors move in self-defense to winnow that chaff, or stand passively aside awaiting legions of new tapeworms prepared to smash-and-grab anything and everything worthwhile?
Ripples in the Stream
Recent financial news relates that Citibank has written down $14-billion of assets, eliminated 9,000 jobs in 1-Qtr-08. "We're not happy with these results," said newly-appointed CEO Vikram Pandit during a Wall Street conference call [yuh don' say]. On 'tother hand, analysts/traders view Citibank as "padded" by its global consumer and wealth-management operations, which compensate for sub-prime losses plus tens of billions of dollars vanished into thin air via "derivative" transactions which no-one at Citi even pretends to understand.
Meantime, as search-engine-of-record, Google Corp. recorded a 30% leap in profits from Dec-07 through end-March 2008. In context, Google shares have dropped 35% on a $75-billion "evaporation of shareholder value" over that same period. Google closed Thursday, 17 April 2008, at $449.54 per share (10:1 split, anyone?). The company's founders jet about in custom-fitted 747s, comparable to Saudi princes' low-end conveyances.
Anyone care to bet where the U.S. economy is headed, or markets either: Great Depression (Soros), slow-growth re-adjustment (Bernanke), lingering recession (unanimous press verdict, until a Democrat takes office)? Strange how pessimism regarding D-rat political prospects --Obama and MzBill-- correlates with investor optimism. Seems ye olde Consumer Confidence is also picking up.
"Hey-hey, ho-ho, prosperity has got to go!" Over to you, Karl.
Meantime, as search-engine-of-record, Google Corp. recorded a 30% leap in profits from Dec-07 through end-March 2008. In context, Google shares have dropped 35% on a $75-billion "evaporation of shareholder value" over that same period. Google closed Thursday, 17 April 2008, at $449.54 per share (10:1 split, anyone?). The company's founders jet about in custom-fitted 747s, comparable to Saudi princes' low-end conveyances.
Anyone care to bet where the U.S. economy is headed, or markets either: Great Depression (Soros), slow-growth re-adjustment (Bernanke), lingering recession (unanimous press verdict, until a Democrat takes office)? Strange how pessimism regarding D-rat political prospects --Obama and MzBill-- correlates with investor optimism. Seems ye olde Consumer Confidence is also picking up.
"Hey-hey, ho-ho, prosperity has got to go!" Over to you, Karl.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Democrat Pathology
A reader has called our political posts here "negative" and "bitter." We consider this a natural response when the highest Congressional leaders in the $4-trillion U.S. government, and two widely accepted candidates for President, aggressively undermine and obstruct our county's difficult and deadly on-going war to defeat the enemy that killed 3,000 innocent civilians in cold blood. Nor are we alone in this perception.
Quin Hillyer writes today in "The American Spectator" about the first anniversary "of what might be the most craven public statement by a wartime elected leader in the history of the United States." Democrat Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader, said, "I believe ... this war is lost."
President Bush's "surge" in American troops in Iraq had barely begun, but Reid's mind was already made up. A week later, blind to facts, heedless of his effect on troop morale, and perfectly content to encourage the enemy, this corrupt, incompetent Nevada hack repeated his statement and called the nation's Commander in Chief "a liar." Reid never said this about frat-boy President Bill Clinton, who was disbarred for lying to a court under oath. Millions of loyal, patriotic American soldiers gave their lives to make Harry Reid possible. He must think they're pretty stupid.
George Bush's surge has worked brilliantly, and the war in Iraq is all but won. What are we to make of the leaders of a major political party who so eagerly offer aid and comfort to the enemy? And of their campaign contributors, like George Soros? And of the people who vote them into office? It is true, not mere rhetoric, to call them fools and traitors.
Hillyer concludes that the Left's attitude "can be described only as a potentially deadly pathology." Democrats are so beyond reason on so many issues, even so beyond common sense, that they appear collectively unbalanced. Yet our future may be in their hands. Normal citizens may well be negative and bitter at the prospect.
Quin Hillyer writes today in "The American Spectator" about the first anniversary "of what might be the most craven public statement by a wartime elected leader in the history of the United States." Democrat Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader, said, "I believe ... this war is lost."
President Bush's "surge" in American troops in Iraq had barely begun, but Reid's mind was already made up. A week later, blind to facts, heedless of his effect on troop morale, and perfectly content to encourage the enemy, this corrupt, incompetent Nevada hack repeated his statement and called the nation's Commander in Chief "a liar." Reid never said this about frat-boy President Bill Clinton, who was disbarred for lying to a court under oath. Millions of loyal, patriotic American soldiers gave their lives to make Harry Reid possible. He must think they're pretty stupid.
George Bush's surge has worked brilliantly, and the war in Iraq is all but won. What are we to make of the leaders of a major political party who so eagerly offer aid and comfort to the enemy? And of their campaign contributors, like George Soros? And of the people who vote them into office? It is true, not mere rhetoric, to call them fools and traitors.
Hillyer concludes that the Left's attitude "can be described only as a potentially deadly pathology." Democrats are so beyond reason on so many issues, even so beyond common sense, that they appear collectively unbalanced. Yet our future may be in their hands. Normal citizens may well be negative and bitter at the prospect.
Observations by Will Rogers
"The trouble with practical jokes is that very often they get elected." "Things will get better - despite our efforts to improve them."
Loyal Opposition
Reaction to Wednesday's Pennsylvania press conference ("debate") accumulates. In "American Spectator," one Quin Hillyer addresses contemporary D-rat partisanship as not merely a symptom but a contagion, a disease. In brief:
From Reid and Mde. Frum/Pelosi down, since Election 2000 if not before, hyper-partisan ultra-Leftists have hijacked the party of FDR, Harry Truman, JFK. Cliche this may be, but Hillyer spells it out-- "Rank irresponsibility, outlandish rhetoric, flat-out denial" of reality on every level. On America's economy, national defense, socio-cultural wellbeing from education and healthcare to pension planning, Congressional Democrats (sic) play word-games without regard for ruinous consequences already evident, inevitably worsening under virtual legislative sabotage.
To proclaim before America's sworn enemies that their own country is "morally indefensible on the world stage" (Gore, Kerry, Barack Banana and MzBill) is not only a treacherous betrayal on its face, but self-evident propaganda without facts, logic, even a smidgen of goodwill. Public figures espousing such positions, in defiance of all American experience, represent a virulent pathology antithetical to every force for good.
Given Obama and MzBill, whether a well-meaning, rational, marginally loyal Leftist opposition is even possible in 2008 America remains an open question. Hecatombs of dead in Vietnam, Cambodia, very near Iraq; burn food for fuel, let peons starve; observe scorched-earth Detroit, New Orleans, Boston-Chicago-Philadelphia: If you would see D-rat monuments, look around.
From Reid and Mde. Frum/Pelosi down, since Election 2000 if not before, hyper-partisan ultra-Leftists have hijacked the party of FDR, Harry Truman, JFK. Cliche this may be, but Hillyer spells it out-- "Rank irresponsibility, outlandish rhetoric, flat-out denial" of reality on every level. On America's economy, national defense, socio-cultural wellbeing from education and healthcare to pension planning, Congressional Democrats (sic) play word-games without regard for ruinous consequences already evident, inevitably worsening under virtual legislative sabotage.
To proclaim before America's sworn enemies that their own country is "morally indefensible on the world stage" (Gore, Kerry, Barack Banana and MzBill) is not only a treacherous betrayal on its face, but self-evident propaganda without facts, logic, even a smidgen of goodwill. Public figures espousing such positions, in defiance of all American experience, represent a virulent pathology antithetical to every force for good.
Given Obama and MzBill, whether a well-meaning, rational, marginally loyal Leftist opposition is even possible in 2008 America remains an open question. Hecatombs of dead in Vietnam, Cambodia, very near Iraq; burn food for fuel, let peons starve; observe scorched-earth Detroit, New Orleans, Boston-Chicago-Philadelphia: If you would see D-rat monuments, look around.
Obama's Waterloo
Commentary on last night's debate in Pennsylvania with MzBill of Tuzla fame (Wednesday, April 16th) is unanimously of opinion that the Banana's media cocoon has unraveled to bring forth a strangely mutated butterfly. To wit: Barack exposed himself not merely as an "empty suit" in matters of Capital Gains taxes, Second Amendment rights and national defense, but as an absolute clueless dolt concerning his party's bedrock Middle America constituents.
We suggest that Barry-baby open a Black Liberation funeral parlor in downtown Chicago, next to his "spiritual mentor's" Church of the God Damn, where his first memorial service could mount an open casket displaying the rouged and wrinkled corpse of 2008's incompetent, corrupt, hate-America excuse for Harry Truman's once-great coalition. C'mon, Barry-- that's one area where MzBill can't compete.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Links in Blacksmith Posts
To link to another site, 1) highlight the text in your post that you want linked; 2) click the greenish "link" icon on the menu bar above, fifth from left after "font"; and, 3) enter the web address of the linked article in the box as shown. That should do it.
Refuting IPCC
Link to www.NewsBusters.org/Blogs/Noel-Sheppard/2008/04/Nobel-Prize for letter from a real (vs. PCBS) Nobel Laureate to the UN's International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). In brief, one Svend Hendriksen decisively refutes Al Gore's "anthropgenic CO2" schtick over 22,00 years (includes graph).
Seems past time that AGW (Anthropogenic Global Warming) scamsters met scientific come-uppance in the real world. Like Paul Ehrlich's Population Bomb (1969), Limits to Growth ("peak oil", etc.), The Hot Zone (Great Plagues) and so on, Gore's latest Leftard scare ends cowering before objective natural processes. This blatant fraud and eco-phony has the nerve to accuse detractors of "false conscious" mind-crimes in Gaia's holy name.
Gore is not yet sixty-five. Will his seventieth birthday celebrate Ice Time in the way that Ehrlich has been shown up for the asinine Chicken Little that he is?
Seems past time that AGW (Anthropogenic Global Warming) scamsters met scientific come-uppance in the real world. Like Paul Ehrlich's Population Bomb (1969), Limits to Growth ("peak oil", etc.), The Hot Zone (Great Plagues) and so on, Gore's latest Leftard scare ends cowering before objective natural processes. This blatant fraud and eco-phony has the nerve to accuse detractors of "false conscious" mind-crimes in Gaia's holy name.
Gore is not yet sixty-five. Will his seventieth birthday celebrate Ice Time in the way that Ehrlich has been shown up for the asinine Chicken Little that he is?
The "Liberal" Elite
The linked article in Townhall by George F. Will is the clearest expose' of so-called liberalism that we have seen. This seasoned columnist makes the point that Hillary Clinton merely lies about facts. But Barack Obama is, himself, a lie. This left wing extremist's entire persona of "hope" and "change" is a fraud. He is certainly a racist hate-monger who only calls himself a Christian for camouflage. Now Obama's "confidential" speech in San Francisco last Friday reveals him as a stunningly arrogant, condescending elitist. This beneficiary of the best education that America has to offer has no respect for his fellow citizens, and certainly no appreciation for his country's transcendent ideals. He would be more at home in Tehran.
Latest polls show The Banana down by 20% against Clinton in the Pennsylvania primary, coming up on April 22. We can't wait to see how the Democrats deal with this lying loser, who leads in the delegate count for their party's Presidential nomination. Herewith a prediction: Clinton will be the Democrat nominee and McCain will win a decisive majority, if not an historic landslide (which I don't rule out, as MzBill's utter unfitness becomes increasingly obvious). If the Republicans also regain control of Congress, the Treason Party may not completely recover.
Latest polls show The Banana down by 20% against Clinton in the Pennsylvania primary, coming up on April 22. We can't wait to see how the Democrats deal with this lying loser, who leads in the delegate count for their party's Presidential nomination. Herewith a prediction: Clinton will be the Democrat nominee and McCain will win a decisive majority, if not an historic landslide (which I don't rule out, as MzBill's utter unfitness becomes increasingly obvious). If the Republicans also regain control of Congress, the Treason Party may not completely recover.
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Choices
"Anonymous" comments on other comments in "The Grand Inquisitor." We answer, yes, of course times change. But progress means changing for the better, and the on-going loss of fundamental American values we are witnessing today is quite the opposite. The collectivist assault on liberty and justice affects the quality of our lives and the character of our civilization. To minimize these foul usurpations by calling them "my" narrow-minded prejudices enables Anonymous to pretend that they aren't all that important. If "liberty and justice" are just words, then they are abstractions not worth defending. Big mistake.
George Washington warned, "Government is not reason, it is not eloquence; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master." Why is Mao's "barrel of a gun" so difficult to understand?
It is indeed a sad and bitter day when the inestimable gifts purchased with the blood and sacrifice of generations of patriots - our forefathers - are not valued, but foolishly neglected and thrown away. We are betraying our heritage, and the consequences will be dire. Like the German people on Kristalnacht, when you hear the stamp of jackboots at your door it is too late.
We can debate when the assault on America's founding principles began. The process is always gradual: Hitler laughingly referred to it as "salami tactics." We propose the direct election of senators certified by Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan when the states had not, in fact, approved this Constitutional amendment. Carpetbaggers like Hillary Clinton can now pretend to represent New York while having no connection with it. Populist Democrat Woodrow Wilson, who followed Taft, not Teddy Roosevelt, instituted the per capita income tax, opening the door to the tyranny of the majority and the destructive welfare state. Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal and Lyndon Johnson's Great Society accelerated the process, and Republican George W. Bush added prescription drug entitlements. The pitch is always "something for nothing," but it's the current voters who get the benefit and their children and grandchildren who get the bill.
Anonymous offers the typical ad hominem by saying that your writer's "tone echoes the liberal eugenicism [he] supposedly denounce[s]." Really? My critic should look up the definition of words he doesn't understand, but he is right about "liberal eugenics." Ethnic cleansing appeals to people who don't value others' lives. As a matter of fact your writer actually does oppose mass murder, which leftists are prone to think of as "social engineering." Stalin's slaughter of the Kulaks, Mao's Great Leap Forward, and Pol Pot's "killing fields" come to mind, all ideologically motivated atrocities without parallel in sane society. We find this kind of moral relativism abhorrent, but recognize Anonymous' need to posture in the absence of disciplined thought.
What solutions do we propose? The enemies of freedom are too delusional, or worse, selfish and ignorant, to recognize their own best interest, so reasoned argument is wasted. They can only be defeated politically. Numerous structural fixes come to mind, which we'll discuss at leisure. The 20th Century's encroachments on freedom can be reversed, but the longer we wait the more difficult and dangerous the task becomes. Thomas Jefferson declares that "when government becomes destructive of [man's natural right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness], it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it." That day will come.
In the meantime, we note that Communist China has aroused a worldwide storm of protest over its outrageous tyranny in Tibet. It may also be true that the stark incompetence, disloyalty and arrogance of this year's Presidential candidates may finally get enough people's attention to prompt the necessary debate on where the nation has gone wrong. Could the scales be falling? Anonymous sighs, "we can't go back to the 1950s." Who said we wanted to? Just another Straw Man. As Prythroes writes in his "Inquisitor" comment, better to ask where we'll be in 2018. Time is getting short.
George Washington warned, "Government is not reason, it is not eloquence; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master." Why is Mao's "barrel of a gun" so difficult to understand?
It is indeed a sad and bitter day when the inestimable gifts purchased with the blood and sacrifice of generations of patriots - our forefathers - are not valued, but foolishly neglected and thrown away. We are betraying our heritage, and the consequences will be dire. Like the German people on Kristalnacht, when you hear the stamp of jackboots at your door it is too late.
We can debate when the assault on America's founding principles began. The process is always gradual: Hitler laughingly referred to it as "salami tactics." We propose the direct election of senators certified by Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan when the states had not, in fact, approved this Constitutional amendment. Carpetbaggers like Hillary Clinton can now pretend to represent New York while having no connection with it. Populist Democrat Woodrow Wilson, who followed Taft, not Teddy Roosevelt, instituted the per capita income tax, opening the door to the tyranny of the majority and the destructive welfare state. Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal and Lyndon Johnson's Great Society accelerated the process, and Republican George W. Bush added prescription drug entitlements. The pitch is always "something for nothing," but it's the current voters who get the benefit and their children and grandchildren who get the bill.
Anonymous offers the typical ad hominem by saying that your writer's "tone echoes the liberal eugenicism [he] supposedly denounce[s]." Really? My critic should look up the definition of words he doesn't understand, but he is right about "liberal eugenics." Ethnic cleansing appeals to people who don't value others' lives. As a matter of fact your writer actually does oppose mass murder, which leftists are prone to think of as "social engineering." Stalin's slaughter of the Kulaks, Mao's Great Leap Forward, and Pol Pot's "killing fields" come to mind, all ideologically motivated atrocities without parallel in sane society. We find this kind of moral relativism abhorrent, but recognize Anonymous' need to posture in the absence of disciplined thought.
What solutions do we propose? The enemies of freedom are too delusional, or worse, selfish and ignorant, to recognize their own best interest, so reasoned argument is wasted. They can only be defeated politically. Numerous structural fixes come to mind, which we'll discuss at leisure. The 20th Century's encroachments on freedom can be reversed, but the longer we wait the more difficult and dangerous the task becomes. Thomas Jefferson declares that "when government becomes destructive of [man's natural right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness], it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it." That day will come.
In the meantime, we note that Communist China has aroused a worldwide storm of protest over its outrageous tyranny in Tibet. It may also be true that the stark incompetence, disloyalty and arrogance of this year's Presidential candidates may finally get enough people's attention to prompt the necessary debate on where the nation has gone wrong. Could the scales be falling? Anonymous sighs, "we can't go back to the 1950s." Who said we wanted to? Just another Straw Man. As Prythroes writes in his "Inquisitor" comment, better to ask where we'll be in 2018. Time is getting short.
Thursday, April 10, 2008
The Grand Inquisitor
In Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov, the above says to a silent Christ:
Oh never, never can they(the masses) feed themselves without us. No science will give them bread so long as they remain free. In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us "make us your slaves, but feed us."
Oh never, never can they(the masses) feed themselves without us. No science will give them bread so long as they remain free. In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us "make us your slaves, but feed us."
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Five Years On
For perspective on this day, link to JulesCrittenden.com/2007/04/08/April-8-2003/
wherein is related a vignette of early combat in Iraq which every contemporary congressional D-rat first supported with enthusiasm.
The war against Saddam Hussein (as in Barack) was won by June 2003. Courtesy of Assad's Syria and Ahmadinejad's Iran, mop-up operations took the standard four years to complete, essentially ending in mid-summer 2007. Now that al Sadr's "Mahdi Army" is in full retreat, by Labor Day 2008 even the worst defeatists (Pelosi, Reid et al.) are due to bolt down great, heaping fewmets of proverbial crow.
wherein is related a vignette of early combat in Iraq which every contemporary congressional D-rat first supported with enthusiasm.
The war against Saddam Hussein (as in Barack) was won by June 2003. Courtesy of Assad's Syria and Ahmadinejad's Iran, mop-up operations took the standard four years to complete, essentially ending in mid-summer 2007. Now that al Sadr's "Mahdi Army" is in full retreat, by Labor Day 2008 even the worst defeatists (Pelosi, Reid et al.) are due to bolt down great, heaping fewmets of proverbial crow.
Monday, April 7, 2008
Iraq Militias
As of Monday (04/07/08) we read that Maliki has demanded that Sadr's Iran-sponsored militia must disband or face annihilation by Iraqi Army forces operating with minimal American participation. Mookie the Wookie's response is a face-saving statement to effect that his Mahdi Army (sic) will de-commission if an appropriate gaggle of Mullahs so desires.
Given clerical mandate, Sadr's force in Basra may well cave to Iraqi vs. American military pressure. If so, Iran will have suffered a setback; Basra will be relieved of Sadr's vigilante terrorists; and Maliki's central government will definitely have enhanced its credibility.
Crocker and Petraeus are due to report developments before Pelosi's wretched Fifth Columnists tomorrow (Tuesday). We guarantee that nothing either of them says will be reported honestly.
Given clerical mandate, Sadr's force in Basra may well cave to Iraqi vs. American military pressure. If so, Iran will have suffered a setback; Basra will be relieved of Sadr's vigilante terrorists; and Maliki's central government will definitely have enhanced its credibility.
Crocker and Petraeus are due to report developments before Pelosi's wretched Fifth Columnists tomorrow (Tuesday). We guarantee that nothing either of them says will be reported honestly.
Sunday, April 6, 2008
Partners in Peace and Freedom
Today, in a major and naturally under-reported political milestone, Mr. Allawi, the new prime minister of Iraq, gave a short speech when swearing in the country's first independent government. The PM promised to "crush the outlaws" of al-Aqaida who are responsible for a bloody assassination spree in Fallujah, a vicious attempt to delay the turn-over that has left hundreds dead. Allawi had sought to restrain the United States' response in Fallujah - until he learned that he himself was targeted for death.
"I warn the forces of terror once again," now declares the prime minister. "We will not forget who stood with us and against us in this crisis."
With us and against us. Even in the Middle East, if not in Pastor Wright's United Church of Christ in Chicago, Illinois, normal people recognize the difference between the forces of hate and murder and America's protectors of peace and freedom. -- Our thanks to Grim's Hall, "True Believers," heartily recommended.
"I warn the forces of terror once again," now declares the prime minister. "We will not forget who stood with us and against us in this crisis."
With us and against us. Even in the Middle East, if not in Pastor Wright's United Church of Christ in Chicago, Illinois, normal people recognize the difference between the forces of hate and murder and America's protectors of peace and freedom. -- Our thanks to Grim's Hall, "True Believers," heartily recommended.
Saturday, April 5, 2008
The Unprofitable Servant
In 1794 Thomas Jefferson, primary author of the Declaration of Independence and 3rd President of the United States, began separating the moral teachings of Jesus from the Bible's accretion of supernatural elements and imposed dogma. Calling his book "The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, Extracted Textually from the Gospels," he focused on Christ's essential message of love and service. Jefferson's unique and influential volume appeared in print only at the turn of the twentieth century, when it became a tradition to present it to new members of Congress. Our copy is from Dover Publications, New York, 2006.
The Left's fashionable "Liberation Theology" is careful to over-look this passage from Matthew xxv, 14-30, "The Parable of the Talents" (pp. 76-77; our condensation). We notice that its title obscures its theme. But Jesus celebrates the virtues of capitalism and warns where sloth and default will lead:
For the kingdom of heaven is a man traveling into a far country, who called his servants and delivered unto them his goods for safe-keeping. And unto one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another one, according to their abilities, and went on his journey.
Then he that had received the five talents went and traded with them, and earned five more. Likewise he that had received two gained two more; but he that had received one talent went and buried it in the earth.
After a long time the lord of those servants came again, and reckoned with them. And he that had received the five talents said, "Lord, behold, I have gained beside them five talents more." His lord said unto him, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant! As thou hast been faithful over these few things, now shalt ye rule over many things: enter into the joy of thy lord."
He also that had received two talents came and said, "Lord, thou deliverdest unto me two talents; behold, I have gained two other talents beside them." And his lord said unto him, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant! Thou too hast been faithful over these few things: I will make thee ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of thy lord."
Then he that had received the one talent came and said, "Lord, I know that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown and gathering where thou hast not strawed. And I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth: lo, here is that which is thine."
His lord answered and said unto him, "Thou wicked, slothful servant, thou knowest that I reap where I sowed not, and gather where I have not strawed. Thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the exchangers, and then at my coming I should have received mine own with usury.
"Therefore take the talent from him, and give it unto him which hath ten talents. For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.
"And cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth."
Our Puritan ancestors saw themselves as servants of God, and interpreted this parable to mean that they were entrusted to increase what was given to them. Their Puritan Ethic viewed material prosperity as the reward of competent diligence, a sign of divine favor. But they labored in the Lord's vineyard not for themselves alone. Their creed was harsh and demanding, because they feared God and took His Kingdom seriously. Charity was their hope for salvation, and they knew that they could not give from empty hands.
We recognize that the profound parables of Jesus teach truth at many levels. The saying "I reap where I have not sown" is easy to mistake; but the Lord is not a farmer. "Seed" takes different forms - it is an investment in the future that must not just be buried in the ground, but watched over and husbanded till harvest time. Jesus himself says here that of all the forms of seed, capital (talent indeed!) is among the most important.
The Left's fashionable "Liberation Theology" is careful to over-look this passage from Matthew xxv, 14-30, "The Parable of the Talents" (pp. 76-77; our condensation). We notice that its title obscures its theme. But Jesus celebrates the virtues of capitalism and warns where sloth and default will lead:
For the kingdom of heaven is a man traveling into a far country, who called his servants and delivered unto them his goods for safe-keeping. And unto one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another one, according to their abilities, and went on his journey.
Then he that had received the five talents went and traded with them, and earned five more. Likewise he that had received two gained two more; but he that had received one talent went and buried it in the earth.
After a long time the lord of those servants came again, and reckoned with them. And he that had received the five talents said, "Lord, behold, I have gained beside them five talents more." His lord said unto him, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant! As thou hast been faithful over these few things, now shalt ye rule over many things: enter into the joy of thy lord."
He also that had received two talents came and said, "Lord, thou deliverdest unto me two talents; behold, I have gained two other talents beside them." And his lord said unto him, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant! Thou too hast been faithful over these few things: I will make thee ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of thy lord."
Then he that had received the one talent came and said, "Lord, I know that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown and gathering where thou hast not strawed. And I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth: lo, here is that which is thine."
His lord answered and said unto him, "Thou wicked, slothful servant, thou knowest that I reap where I sowed not, and gather where I have not strawed. Thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the exchangers, and then at my coming I should have received mine own with usury.
"Therefore take the talent from him, and give it unto him which hath ten talents. For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.
"And cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth."
Our Puritan ancestors saw themselves as servants of God, and interpreted this parable to mean that they were entrusted to increase what was given to them. Their Puritan Ethic viewed material prosperity as the reward of competent diligence, a sign of divine favor. But they labored in the Lord's vineyard not for themselves alone. Their creed was harsh and demanding, because they feared God and took His Kingdom seriously. Charity was their hope for salvation, and they knew that they could not give from empty hands.
We recognize that the profound parables of Jesus teach truth at many levels. The saying "I reap where I have not sown" is easy to mistake; but the Lord is not a farmer. "Seed" takes different forms - it is an investment in the future that must not just be buried in the ground, but watched over and husbanded till harvest time. Jesus himself says here that of all the forms of seed, capital (talent indeed!) is among the most important.
Friday, April 4, 2008
Clearing Underbrush
As the nation's presidential campaigns grind forward, much is said about the candidates' economic prescriptions for this country. Whoever is elected this November, and whichever political party controls Congress, the new President's policies will affect our lives in direct and noticeable ways. Can we agree that the fundamental duty of our elected representatives is to protect our lives and property, and to preserve our freedom with equal justice under law? Surely it is obvious that the fellow citizens who we send to Washington and temporarily entrust with ultimate power are stewards, not nannies. They have no business imposing "experiments" attempting to force us into some arbitrary "social engineering" template.
Who has, earns, or inherits more or less money is not the government's business. Rich and poor must receive equal respect, for to legislate otherwise is to create privileged classes contrary to our founding principles, special interests each scrambling for power to oppress the other. Justice and wisdom demand treating all conditions fairly, the rich because they are the engine of culture and prosperity and the poor because we value human life and recognize its infinite potential.
The fundamental problem with democracy, recognized since ancient Greece, is the "tyranny of the majority." Greedy, lawless mobs will always band together to vote themselves benefits at their neighbors' expense, and ruthless, equally lawless aristocracies arise precisely to prevent it. America's founding fathers were acutely aware of this fatal flaw and designed the U.S. Constitution to minimize the danger.
Clinton and Obama, the two Democrat candidates, both advocate rapacious economic policies that defy this reality of human nature and ignore the gigantic, miserable failure of every socialist regime ever imposed. Surely we need not bring up the ghastly results of the Soviet Union; China; Cuba; North Korea. Clinton and Obama graduated from the elite Yale and Harvard Law Schools, respectively. But the goal of higher education goes beyond academic knowledge. Study and reflection are supposed to induce wisdom and integrity: the ability to recognize the difference between right and wrong and make principled choices between them. These two flunk. Either they don't know that socialism is Frederick Hayek's Road to Serfdom - or they don't care. They should be running for dog catcher.
John McCain, the so-called Republican who won his party's nomination with Democrat cross-over votes, inspires a bit more confidence, but not much. We're tired of hearing him demagogue about "tax cuts for the rich" when 1% of earners pay 39% of income taxes collected, and wonder what he thinks he's going to Washington to do. Memo to Big John: the President's job is to serve all the people in the broad, long term national interest. You're not elected to subject us to the European Union; to oppress us with junk science like Al Gore's global warming bunk; to throw our borders open to all comers; or to subvert the Constitution by ignoring the Bill of Rights. This guy graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy ranked 594th in his Class of 598! He's not very smart, just smarter than his opponents. Where is the vision? Where is the inspiration? All we see is arrogant, short sighted attitudinizing.
This election is the nadir of high principle. We only hope that when the wheel turns, as it will, the hero who rides to the rescue of the Republic is George Washington, and not Adolf Hitler.
Who has, earns, or inherits more or less money is not the government's business. Rich and poor must receive equal respect, for to legislate otherwise is to create privileged classes contrary to our founding principles, special interests each scrambling for power to oppress the other. Justice and wisdom demand treating all conditions fairly, the rich because they are the engine of culture and prosperity and the poor because we value human life and recognize its infinite potential.
The fundamental problem with democracy, recognized since ancient Greece, is the "tyranny of the majority." Greedy, lawless mobs will always band together to vote themselves benefits at their neighbors' expense, and ruthless, equally lawless aristocracies arise precisely to prevent it. America's founding fathers were acutely aware of this fatal flaw and designed the U.S. Constitution to minimize the danger.
Clinton and Obama, the two Democrat candidates, both advocate rapacious economic policies that defy this reality of human nature and ignore the gigantic, miserable failure of every socialist regime ever imposed. Surely we need not bring up the ghastly results of the Soviet Union; China; Cuba; North Korea. Clinton and Obama graduated from the elite Yale and Harvard Law Schools, respectively. But the goal of higher education goes beyond academic knowledge. Study and reflection are supposed to induce wisdom and integrity: the ability to recognize the difference between right and wrong and make principled choices between them. These two flunk. Either they don't know that socialism is Frederick Hayek's Road to Serfdom - or they don't care. They should be running for dog catcher.
John McCain, the so-called Republican who won his party's nomination with Democrat cross-over votes, inspires a bit more confidence, but not much. We're tired of hearing him demagogue about "tax cuts for the rich" when 1% of earners pay 39% of income taxes collected, and wonder what he thinks he's going to Washington to do. Memo to Big John: the President's job is to serve all the people in the broad, long term national interest. You're not elected to subject us to the European Union; to oppress us with junk science like Al Gore's global warming bunk; to throw our borders open to all comers; or to subvert the Constitution by ignoring the Bill of Rights. This guy graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy ranked 594th in his Class of 598! He's not very smart, just smarter than his opponents. Where is the vision? Where is the inspiration? All we see is arrogant, short sighted attitudinizing.
This election is the nadir of high principle. We only hope that when the wheel turns, as it will, the hero who rides to the rescue of the Republic is George Washington, and not Adolf Hitler.
Thursday, April 3, 2008
Winning the West
A reader asks whether my argument for the morality of European conquest in "Winning the West" would apply if the Chinese decided they needed more natural resources or room for expansion (see comment). My answer is, "yes, of course!" Japan put this theory into practice on Dec. 7, 1941. We call it Pearl Harbor Day.
China is free to invade North America anytime it chooses. Earnest appeals for peace won't stop them, so we would resort, in the words of Clausewitz, to "diplomacy by other means." America would crush Beijing's invasion fleet in less time than it takes to say "Hiroshima." That part of my post made the point that between nations there is no law, because no higher authority exists to enforce one. Self preservation is the most moral of all acts, and self defense is just another way of stating it. The 2nd Amendment to our Constitution recognizes this imperative by giving each citizen the right "to keep and bear arms."
The morality of survival is obvious to those who value freedom and recognize their duty to sacrifice in its defense. But my post made another important point as well. It is that the Indians benefited greatly when Europeans brought the blessings of civilization to their savage, stone age cultures. They should thank us.
The canard that dead Indians can't benefit ducks the issue. The European conquest of North America was tragically brutal in many ways, but the Indians themselves were barbarians. We defeated them on their own terms. Now the lives of their descendants have the potential to be infinitely superior to the objective misery and squalor of their past, honorable as it was in its time and romanticized as it has been. But the Red Men themselves are responsible to realize what white civilization has to offer. Real warriors rise to the occasion. Japan's noble Samurai certainly did.
We enjoy reading Sir Walter Scott's colorful tales of Ivanhoe and King Arthur's knights, but no one in their right mind would volunteer to return to the Middle Ages, so very dark in more than name. We urge those who value truth to study the native Americans' actual pre-Columbian way of life, as we have, and compare it with these welcome, worthy citizens' vastly greater opportunities in the 21st Century. One can be content enough in a dugout or tepee, knowing no better. But when we do know better, we recognize the waste. The time has come to shake out that old buffalo robe and create a moth-free Happy Hunting Ground.
China is free to invade North America anytime it chooses. Earnest appeals for peace won't stop them, so we would resort, in the words of Clausewitz, to "diplomacy by other means." America would crush Beijing's invasion fleet in less time than it takes to say "Hiroshima." That part of my post made the point that between nations there is no law, because no higher authority exists to enforce one. Self preservation is the most moral of all acts, and self defense is just another way of stating it. The 2nd Amendment to our Constitution recognizes this imperative by giving each citizen the right "to keep and bear arms."
The morality of survival is obvious to those who value freedom and recognize their duty to sacrifice in its defense. But my post made another important point as well. It is that the Indians benefited greatly when Europeans brought the blessings of civilization to their savage, stone age cultures. They should thank us.
The canard that dead Indians can't benefit ducks the issue. The European conquest of North America was tragically brutal in many ways, but the Indians themselves were barbarians. We defeated them on their own terms. Now the lives of their descendants have the potential to be infinitely superior to the objective misery and squalor of their past, honorable as it was in its time and romanticized as it has been. But the Red Men themselves are responsible to realize what white civilization has to offer. Real warriors rise to the occasion. Japan's noble Samurai certainly did.
We enjoy reading Sir Walter Scott's colorful tales of Ivanhoe and King Arthur's knights, but no one in their right mind would volunteer to return to the Middle Ages, so very dark in more than name. We urge those who value truth to study the native Americans' actual pre-Columbian way of life, as we have, and compare it with these welcome, worthy citizens' vastly greater opportunities in the 21st Century. One can be content enough in a dugout or tepee, knowing no better. But when we do know better, we recognize the waste. The time has come to shake out that old buffalo robe and create a moth-free Happy Hunting Ground.
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