The NY Times gets something right

Well, except for the 'by evolution' part...

Who doesn't know the difference between right and wrong? Yet that essential knowledge, generally assumed to come from parental teaching or religious or legal instruction, could turn out to have a quite different origin...Marc D. Hauser, a Harvard biologist...propose(s) that people are born with a moral grammar wired into their neural circuits by evolution....

The proposal, if true, would have far-reaching consequences. It implies that parents and teachers are not teaching children the rules of correct behavior from scratch but are, at best, giving shape to an innate behavior. And it suggests that religions are not the source of moral codes but, rather, social enforcers of instinctive moral behavior.

Both atheists and people belonging to a wide range of faiths make the same moral judgments, Dr. Hauser writes, implying that the system that unconsciously generates moral judgments is immune to religious doctrine...

I wonder if I should be surprised that the NYT (and "science" apparently) is only today discovering what "religion" has known for millennia: religions don't create morality at all, they simply attempt to draw people back to the morality that each one of us innately comprehends.

Unfortunately, because of the separation of church and science, Dr. Hauser cannot use that as an explanation for his discovery. So after making very careful measurements and writing impressive scientific studies he must invent a story about how such morality might have been subconsciously preserved since hunter-gatherer days because morality increased the survival odds of the group*. In the strange world of the evolutionist, survival defines morality.

A far better story, I think, is to change the cause and effect back into a more likely arrangement: the universe was created for the good of mankind, and when mankind acts morally (i.e. in line with the purposes of creation) he's far more likely to survive. And if we look closely enough, we'll see that truth written in far more places than just a few Harvard studies**.

* This is known as "group selection," a theory frowned on by other biologists for the banal reason that there is not a shred of evidence that such a thing exists outside its necessity in evolutionary fairy stories.

** "Tell you?" screamed the witch. "Tell you what is written in letters as deep as a spear is long on the World Ash Tree?"

A vast right-wing conspiracy dismissed

Newsbusters confuses name-calling with refutation:

On this morning's Today show, NBC's Carl Quintanilla floated the kooky conspiracy theory that the oil companies lowered gas prices to help the GOP. Today co-host Meredith Vieira at the top of the show even postulated: "You know the good news is that gas prices are down but do the elections have anything to do with it? In other words are we being manipulated?"

...The story featured loony consumers at the pump buying into the myth and liberal Air America radio host Rachel Maddow saying her listeners: "do worry that maybe there's a conspiracy." Incidentally Today has yet to cover Air America's corruption or financial problems.

By tossing out loaded words like 'loony' and 'kooky' to dismiss the idea that the government might manipulate prices for its own reasons, Newsbusters gets a chance to maintain its faith in candid conservatism without having to ask itself any hard questions. They show that they not only misunderstand power, but they ignore history as well. That's not the pedestal from which to enlighten an audience. Of course, I'm assuming that such is their intention.

The first question Newsbusters should ask is, "Can the government manipulate the market?" which must be followed quickly by "Do they?" Both can be shown to be in the affirmative:

From April of this year:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Calling the oil issue a matter of national security, President Bush outlined a plan Tuesday to cut gasoline costs and temporarily stopped deposits to the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

Gee, it was only 6 months ago that President Bush publicly outlined a plan to use government's considerable impact on the market for the express purpose of reducing gas prices. Did Newsbusters not believe he could do it then? Or do they believe that he is of such sterling character that he would only do so for the benefit of others, like the liberal insistence that the US be involved in bombing and killing foreigners so long as we have nothing to gain from it? The very fact that government can and does influence (not control, influence) every market ought to move the question out of the realm of kooky and into the realm of probabilities.

The question which follows is, "Do presidents do such things for electoral advantage?" While the answer is trickier (I have not found a president bragging about doing it) the history is illuminating. Here's one quote from 1996 (and I doubt Newsbusters would so lightly dismiss the accusation when leveled against Clinton:

Historical stats from previous election years can be telling. Since 1952, the last seven months of a presidential election year have been up for the market as presidents try to sway the economy to better their chances of re-election or help their party retain the White House. Since 1832, two-thirds of the 41 election years have proved positive for the market. In the last half century, the market has shown an average gain of 11.4 percent in 10 of the 12 presidential election years.

The entire article, which appeared in the April 1996 issue of the business magazine "The Chief Executive," (hardly a left-wing publication) illustrates a few economic parallels between 1996 and 2006, but what is most illuminating is not the revelation that presidents "try to sway" the economy, but the expectation that they do. Of course they do. They all do. And everyone with a room temperature IQ knows they do. Everyone who's honest admits that their guy does it, too.

So did Bush call up Goldman Sachs - formerly headed by Bush's current treasury secretary - and ask that they reduce the gasoline component in their commodities index, which would cause futures traders to reduce exposure to gasoline, which would cause an already overheated market to tank? I don't believe so, because things are not done that way. Do I believe, like FierceFinance, that the consequences of that move were unintended? Not at all; Goldman understands markets - and the consequences of actions - as well as anyone in the world.

Can I prove that such a move was explicitly designed to do exactly what it did: remove the price of gas as a campaign issue that benefitted the out-of-power party? Nope - nor can anyone without a tape of Bush's phone call, which is why such calls are not made.

But rather than making me a kook, I think ignoring the possibility - when history suggests that such is not only possible but probable - makes the namecallers at Newsbusters either naifs or shills. How's that for namecalling?

Baby it's cold outsiiiiiiide

But did he point to the stands first?

Out of the park

Without even trying very hard, TheTom shows why he has too many dots for mortal men:

The value of gold (and silver) is as psychological as the value of green paper (or some other piece of paper 'backed' by gold). It's only worth what someone will pay for it. The idea of being 'backed' by a chunk of metal is only as good as the individuals in the organization controlling the backing...

But thats just me.

Nope, it's not just you. The value of *everything* is psychological and subjective. And with that little truism you have completely undercut the entire philosophical superstucture of communism and welfarism. Not bad for a day's work. But there's far more to it than that.

The important question is not, "is value subjective?" but "why have certain things maintained that subjective value over millennia, and why have certain things lost that value consistently in much shorter periods?" In answering that, one can understand the reason the dollar will die, the reason gold (or silver or sea shells) is better for money than paper, and why the existence of the Federal Reserve is the only real political problem that threatens the existence of America. But since there is neither time nor room to blab about them all, let me just enlarge on the most valuable clause in TT..'s statement, that the backing is only as good as the backer.

That, of course, is the real problem when dealing with governments: they are no good at keeping their promises. When one examines the promises embossed on either a gold certificate or a silver certificate, one realizes that a government that once promised to redeem its debts with real metal not only broke the promises but in the case of gold outlawed the personal ownership of that metal, making it impossible for the citizen to collect a debt owed. The government committed a fraud and stands by it today with their irredeemable paper money. One must then come to the inescapable conclusion that the paper promises of government are worthless, that Ten Bears (Outlaw Josey Wales) was correct when he said governments are chiefed by the double-tongues. And because their promises are worthless, the paper representations of those promises eventually become so.

That explains why paper money eventually loses all its value, why where every time it has been used as currency (with the single exception of the Lincoln Greenback, issued to finance the Union's Civil War efforts) it has been defaulted on eventually. To bet on the current dollar is to take long odds indeed because the issuer has proved himself untrustworthy.

But what of the backing itself? Terrymum asks (same thread), "Why does gold continue to be so valuable to human beings?"

The short, smartass answer is that from a monetary perspective it doesn't matter. Gold always and everywhere has value that is innate because people agree, always and everywhere, that it is desireable. It continues to be valuable for no other reason than that people continue to desire it.

The longer monetary answer is that gold is uniquely suited to act as money because of its innate properties: it is rare, divisible, permanent, transportable, and useful.

The first four are obvious, somewhat in contradistinction to paper money which, while it is divisible and transportable, is neither rare nor permanent. But the last attribute is most important.

All trade, if it is to be fair and honest, gives value for value. You trade x to me, I give y to you, and we are both happy. And gold, unlike paper dollars whose only use is in trade, has value in other than monetary applications. Gold can be used in electronics, woven into threads, used in dentistry and medicine. In other words, I can use my money for something other than money. When I'm done with it, I can use it again as money. It maintains its value outside of its monetary use.

But gold's most valuable application - and not coincidentally its most widespread application - is for jewelry. It is both malleable and beautiful, and it makes the wearer more beautiful (or at least makes her feel more beautiful). And if gold's only use in this world was to make women more beautiful, it would still have more utility than all the paper money ever printed.

Tom is correct that the backing is only as good as the backer, and that is precisely why I don't believe in 'backing' currency, at least by the double-tongues. For trade to be just and for money to keep its value, it must not be denominated in paper promises to provide gold or wheat or anything else. It must be the value - gold or silver or copper - itself. That way, there is no need of a government promise that will, soon or later, be broken.

Place your head between your legs and assume crash positions

Since it is hopeless, the only thing left to do is enjoy the ride:

There's a good reason politicians don't like to talk about the nation's long-term fiscal prospects. The subject is short on political theatrics and long on complicated economics, scary graphs and very big numbers. It reveals serious problems and offers no easy solutions. Anybody who wanted to deal with it seriously would have to talk about raising taxes and cutting benefits, nasty nostrums that might doom any candidate who prescribed them...

Macroeconomic meltdown is probably preventable...(b)ut to keep it at bay the government is essentially going to have to renegotiate some of the promises it has made to its citizens, probably by some combination of tax increases and benefit cuts.

David Walker, the nation's CFO, is on the warpath again. I linked his 2003 report, "Truth and Transparency" on the left a while back, and it's not surprising that in the three years since he gave it, nothing has changed but that the numbers have grown worse. Since this election cycle seems to revolve around homoerotic emails and dirty words in fiction, it is obvious that we will again ignore the major problem we face: we have promised to give away the wealth of the nation. Politicans are not going to solve the problem. They are going to purposely ignore it and where possible make it worse.

The two paragraphs above tell the whole story: macroeconomic catastrophe is avoidable, but politicians refuse to do what is necessary to avoid it. In this game, the GOP* is, if it were possible, decidedly worse than the Democrats. While the Dems have kept any solution to the smaller SocSec problem from being implemented, the GOP made the problem far worse with El Presidente's 2003 Medicare Drug package which added in that year alone the equivalent of everything created in the nation to the government's liability column.

Read the article, sure, but understand this: the politicians know the numbers and they are ignoring them. They want to talk about other things. They know that on a national level, there is simply nothing to be gained - meaning they will not be elected - by telling the American people that every free lunch must be paid for by someone. The demographic and fiscal tsunami is coming and there will in all probability be no escape, so all an individual can rationally do is head for high ground.

But don't forget to enjoy a good football game, a sunset, or a stroll through the beautiful autumn trees on the way.

* Since I'll be out of town on election day, I'm going to vote Monday. I will punch one GOP name and no Democrat ones. It will be, as is my habit, third party and "no" all down the card. The American voter may choose someone who will ignore or exascerbate the problem -meaning Republicans and Democrats will likely win every race - but I'll be damned if I'm going to make it any easier on them.

Can you get a felony in football?

The final score should have been much worse as Fort Scott had both an interception and a fumble return for touchdowns called back on penalties. Tenth-ranked Garden City came into the game averaging 4.2 yards a carry; they had 4 yards on 17 carries at the end of the first half. And while they lost 2 other games this year, this is the first time they were left bleeding in the gutter. Fort Scott led 28-0 going into the fourth quarter.

So the playoffs start next weekend and the Greyhounds, being the #3 seed in the KJCCC tournament, will be relegated to the role of road warriors. The only way they can play at home again would be to beat #9 ranked Coffeyville next week and have Garden City knock off #1 Butler. Unless both of those happen it looks like I've seen my last Greyhounds game of the year.

That's ok. For a team that hadn't won a game since 2003, these boys have done good no matter what happens from here on out.

Pick of the litter

Nancy Pelosi makes one campaign promise her party can't help but keep. If the Democrats take over the House of Representatives

"The gavel of the speaker of the House ...will be in the hands of America's children."

And if you've ever seen a house where children are in charge, you know what that's going to be like.

He would also say, "I suggest you get to work" a lot

Chet, LaVerne, and things that go "Vote for me" in the night

Back in junior high I used to have a teacher named LaVerne Larvick. He was a fat guy with a Chester A. Arthur beard and mustache who in addition to teaching science and math, sold Amsoil. He would also grade, I guess, on a daily basis, as he often loudly announced "F for the day!" to the snickers of his uncowed charges. Any 7th grade boy, including (surprise) yours truly, was liable to be the recipient of a few. Discipline and order were not Larvick's strong suits.

I only bring that fond memory up to note that I'm going to do the same thing to the GOP, as Mona Charen has offered her list of thirteen reasons the Republicans deserve re-election and it's only fair that each item stand or fall on its own. I'll only list the short versions; you should click thru for the long ones.

However, before I begin I note with some amusement, er, interest that conspicuously absent from the list are the two main pieces of domestic legislation from Bush's first term, No Child Left Behind and the Medicare drug plan, both of which I hated passionately. It is at least telling that what the GOP puts forward as reasons to vote for them does not include so much of what they have done.

Republicans have abundant reasons to reserve a spot at their polling places on Election Day...

1) The economy.

Mona here lists a number of good things about the economy, and those things are true (well, mostly true, as one must take into account bullpucky measurements to both inflation and GDP). But she also leaves out a few things, like though the Dow is in record territory, the NASDAQ is still at half of what it was when Bush took office. I don't blame Bush, but if you ask for credit, you gotta accept blame, too. "C" for the day.

2) The Patriot Act.

May worms devour the gonads of every legislator who voted for that vile piece of trash. Twice. "F" for the day.

3) The Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty...has been cancelled

Since the nation we signed it with has not existed for almost 20 years, the least we can do is stop pretending we need to abide by it. "A" for the day.

4) Immigration.

All Mona's words about good intentions are just that. The GOP has done, accomplished, completed exactly nothing on immigration. There is no excuse. "F" for the day.

5) There has not been another terrorist attack on American soil since 9/11.

Well, except for the Anthrax attacks, Hesham Mohamed Hadayet's attack at the LA airport, Richard Ried's attempt to shoe bomb AA63, Joel Henry Hinrichs' suicide bombing outside of a packed college football stadium in Oklahoma. In all fairness, none of these is remotely like 9/11, but the assumption that the GOP gets credit (do they take blame then for 9/11?) is questionable. "B" for the day.

6) Libya has surrendered its nuclear program.

For now, but you take what you can get. "A" for the day.

7) A.Q. Khan's nuclear smuggling network has been rolled up.

Um, no. Nice try, though. "I" for the day.

8) John Roberts and Samuel Alito sit on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Herein stands the only area in which the GOP as even been close to consistent, if one is willing to ignore the fiasco of the hard-hearted harbinger of haggis (someone was stoned when the name Harriet Myers was chosen. And since they probably don't remember it, I shall endeavor not to). We will assume that those two will live up to the promises made on their behalf. Naive, I know, but I'm feeling generous. "A" for the day.

9) Those Democrats who do not want to close Guantanamo Bay altogether want to give all of its inmates the full panoply of rights Americans enjoy in criminal procedures.

I don't care if we close Gitmo. I care very much that the GOP has created out of whole cloth a new type of non-person whose rights need not be respected by government. "F" for the day.

10) Democrats believe in immediate withdrawal from Iraq.

So do I. Even the Republicans are beginning to agree that the cause is lost, and are left with only the "saving our reputation" argument Mona elucidates; the proposed course of action is becoming "Kill 'em all."

The GOP says leaving is not an option and I agree: it is an inevitability. "F" for the day.

11) Democrats would like to eliminate the terrorist surveillance program.

I'd like the eliminate the American citizen surveillance program. "D" for the day.

12) If Democrats achieve a majority in the House, Barney Frank will chair the Financial Services Committee.

Maybe Bush will finally get to veto something. "B" for the day.

13) Democrats believe that the proper response to Kim Jong Il's nuclear test is "face to face talks."

So what's wrong with talking to people? Clinton's mistake was in believing what the Norks said and in giving them free stuff at taxpayer expense. Go have coffee with them. "F" for the day.

So if I count up the report card, we have 3 As, 2 Bs, a C, a D, 5 Fs, and an incomplete.

I'm just glad none of my children ever came home with a report card like that. Even from Larvick's class.

A Halloween picture for PiffordT

The real reason for the national debt

A lot of folks presume that a national debt is just sort of an accident of poor management, that it results simply from the fact that politicians can't control themselves, and like children with a bag of Halloween candy will gorge themselves until they hurl. And they would be exactly right in that assumption except for one little word: accident. National debts are not accidents, they are designed for a specific purpose.

Alexander Hamilton, first Secretary of the US Treasury (and architect of the first national debt) wrote: "A national debt, if it is not excessive, will be to us a national blessing." Why would Hamilton, political genius that he was (he was one of the co-authors of the Federalist papers) say such a thing? Because in his case and in his time, it was true.

In 1790, the new US government had very little legitimacy and even less support. The British were all but ignoring the Treaty of Paris, a course of action that would eventually lead to the War of 1812. The French, our major ally, were in the midst of a revolution. Continental paper money had become worthless, yet there was little gold or silver in circulation. Little sagebrush rebellions (like Shay's) were starting to pop up. The government needed support.

In line with Jesus' admonition that, "where your treasure is, there will your heart be," Hamilton reasoned that if the national government took on the states' war debts and borrowed money from wealthy citizens to cover it (a 2-part plan known as "funding" and "assumption") the wealthy would suddenly have a vested interest in the success of the United States, just like a shareholder has a vested interest in the success of a company he owns. By creating a national debt, he could get the rich and powerful "on board," with a central government. Of course, he understood that he who pays the piper calls the tune, meaning that the government would also never do too much that was not in the interest of those who funded it.

The practical effect of a small national debt was a small wealth transfer from poor to rich. The rich paid taxes, but because they were paid by government in interest for money previously borrowed, they were net gainers. The poor paid taxes only to see a portion of that money siphoned off by the rich who had lent in years past. The larger effect was that the rich and powerful gradually lost the incentive to undermine their own investment. The new government was stabilized and eventually established.

Unfortunately, there can be too much of a "good thing," thus Hamilton's caveat that a national debt not be 'excessive.' A small national debt, started for the purpose of binding leading citizens to a new form of government, has in our day become a large national debt. Because the rules of interest are do not change, the same transfer - borrower to lender, poor to rich - takes place.

There is another rule that remains the same: he who pays the piper calls the tune. And therein lies the danger of today's poor management. Those with tuppence to lend always receive a return from the pockets of the citizens, yet today they are not individuals who must also live under that government, but more often foreign governments who are in competition with it.

Because people run the border

One more reason why the border problem won't be solved

is the illegality of drugs, and the corruption that arises therefrom:

El Paso, Texas -- Bribery of federal and local officials by Mexican smugglers is rising sharply, and with it the fear that a culture of corruption is taking hold along the 2,000-mile border from Brownsville, Texas, to San Diego.

At least 200 public employees have been charged with helping to move narcotics or illegal immigrants across the U.S.-Mexican border since 2004, at least double the illicit activity documented in prior years, a Los Angeles Times examination of public records has found. Thousands more are under investigation.

Criminal charges have been brought against Border Patrol agents, local police, a county sheriff, motor vehicle clerks, an FBI supervisor, immigration examiners, prison guards, school district officials and uniformed personnel of every branch of the U.S. military, among others. The vast majority have pleaded guilty or been convicted.

I'm not opposed to smuggling per se. Many of the founding fathers of this great nation, like John Hancock, the first signer of the Declaration of Independence, made their fortunes smuggling molasses, glass, lead, paper, and tea. Smuggling is simply free trade, the reliance on markets rather than government to meet the needs of people. Good on 'em.

The problem arises, however, when that activity results not in the good chase, but the subornation of government officials. And perhaps it must, especially when the revenues available for bribery run into the billions of dollars. You can buy a lot of FBI guys and border patrol agents for that much money.

Paying government officials to look the other way is not a new problem. Hell, Americans were bribing port officials to ignore the taxes due from the Molasses Act as far back as 1733. It's a myth that today's government is cleaner than that of the past, but it's a dearly held one; perhaps the major advantage of political parties is that it allows the true believers to accept that there is corruption in government but pin it on "the other guys."

Taking a shot at the hard cases

Libertarianism Criticized

Magruder sends a quote from Sean Gleeson via email:

Bestiality is so very wrong not only because using animals sexually is abusive, but because such behavior is profoundly degrading and utterly subversive to the crucial understanding that human beings are unique, special, and of the highest moral worth in the known universe - a concept known as "human exceptionalism."

Within the narrow blinders of libertarianism, laws can only be justified by appeal to an unconsenting victim. Human dignity has no place in the libertarian worldview, and the libertarian is left with no basis to outlaw what he calls "victimless crimes." Prostitution, polygamy, pornography, incest, drug abuse, bestiality, and a host of other crimes, being consensual, must be legal, and that's that.

And this is libertarianism's greatest failing. The libertarians happen to come to the right conclusions on a great many issues of policy, and I am happy to ally with them on those issues. But libertarianism is not an adequate theory of governance.

I say, if you can't think of any reason to "legislate morality," then you should step aside and let someone with some common sense do the legislating. Michael McPhail's dog says so, too.

Gleeson's point is well argued and hits straight to the heart of what most people believe right down to their common-sense bones: that things that are wrong need to be against the law because they are wrong. Well, some things, anyway.

Let's take a look at that by handling the easy ones first: polygamy and incest, sexual crimes that the vast majority of people find so wrong that one is hard-pressed to find a non-libertarian American who would support repealing laws prohibiting them.

Polygamy first. Why is polygamy wrong? Let's spell out the case. If you ask the average person (i.e. the one with "common sense") you will find that it generally comes down to one of two answers: I would not want to share my wife/husband, and "God says so."

The second can be dealt with easily: God does not say so. Paul says that leaders in the church are to be "the husband of one wife" (Ti 1:6) but there is no biblical injunction that declares polygamy universally immoral. In fact, God gave King David multiple wives (2Sam 12:8). Jacob (whom God named Israel and who is the namesake of God's chosen people, Gen 32:28) had two wives, as did Abraham. In each case, such wives were an accepted social custom, and God not only did not interfere but even made allowance for such in the Mosaic law (c.f. Deu 21:15). I do not believe that multiple wives is the wisest or best condition of mankind, but I certainly cannot go beyond what God says and put polygamy on a moral level with, say, adultery, which is everywhere condemned. Now, whether a person would want to share his wife is of course personal preference. If it's not immoral, and no one is forced to do so, why should people who wish to do so be forced against their will not to do so? I would say they should not, and I think God agrees.

How about incest? We must clarify that we are talking about three things specifically here: we are talking about adult incest (parent/child incest cannot have consent and therefore even the libertarian would ban it), we're talking about relations within a certain level of family "closeness" that must be defined, and we're talking about marriage (adultery must be dealt with separately). No one finds 10th cousins marrying to be immoral. No one finds fifth cousins marrying immoral. How about 4th? 3rd? At what point does it become immoral, and why?

Generally it is considered immoral when the odds of having a freak baby increase (first or second cousins). However, as John Stossel points out:

It's the sort of myth that leads to stupid laws. Half the states in America have banned cousin marriage, but there's no good reason for it. You can marry your cousin and have perfectly intelligent kids.

Take Albert Einstein -- was he intelligent enough for you? His parents were cousins, and he married his cousin. So did Charles Darwin and Queen Victoria. Worldwide, 20 percent of all married couples are cousins...

There is a certian "ick" factor when one considers incest, but that ick factor is again cultural. In ancient Israel, it was considered normal to marry a wife who was close (as close as half-sister - Abraham again, Gen 20:12) on the father's side. This was a real advantage in a patriarchal (extended family) culture, but not so much today. At what point of cultural development did it become immoral? In fact, at what point does the violation of any normative cultural practice become immoral? That's not a trick question, but it is one I'd like an answer to.

Prostitution and drug abuse are the same way, only the case for banning them is even weaker. It is not illegal (though it is immoral) to go down to Twister's on Friday night and take someone home for sex. Is it even *more* immoral if cash exchanges hands? What possible reason can be given to ban the sale of something that is routinely given away for free?

Is it illegal to drink oneself to sleep every night? Such is drug abuse, and is immoral. But if we choose not to make alcohol illegal, then what is the argument for a legal ban to do the same with marijuana, which is far less dangerous than Alcohol (at least as measured by deaths)? Is abusingmarijuana more immoral than abusing alcohol? For what reason (and by what authority) do we ban one but not the other?

What we find, I think, is that things are banned not just because they are immoral but because they are unusual, because a majority finds the performance of them to be odd or scary in addition to being immoral. But if we are not banning all immorality, or even similar immorality, then we are simply banning the wierd. And it is the banning of the wierd that libertarians wind up mostly fighting against.

That leaves us with bestiality. Gleeson has already put out the "abusive" argument, so that leaves us with the argument that such must be banned because it is inherently degrading to the person doing it (first paragraph). I would agree that it is that, no doubt. Now, is everything that is degrading to the self banned? How about sex with roast beef? Sex with food items is certainly as degrading as sex with animals. How about sado-masochism or coprophilia, which are designed to be degrading? If bestiality is not to be banned because it is abusive to the animal but because it is degrading, and if we are not willing to ban everything that is degrading (such would be a totalitarian's wet dream, if you'll pardon the phrase) then why are we banning it? For cultural reasons again? Because the majority find it so degrading (to someone else) that they are willing to use the power of law to keep someone else from doing it. Or rather they find the idea so degrading. 10-1 that most people have never seen the practice. Washington banned the practice only this year. Why? Because it's not really a societal problem; it's a disgusting novelty.

The difference between a conservative like Gleeson and a libertarian like me is that he sees the law as a means to shape human beings into their surrounding culture. He would ban polygamy, but that is cultural. Incest, but that (at least in its most common form) is cultural. Drug abuse for certain drugs, cultural, sex where money changes hands, cultural. It is not the immorality that is the issue, but a certain level of "common sense" immorality that is nearly indistinguishable from cultural preference. And if one is simply going to allow cultural preference to be enforced by law, then one ought to forget about individual rights altogether.

The libertarian on the other hand limits the use of force, the law, to prohibiting and punishing behaviors that are overtly or negligently injurious to others (parent/child incest, rape, murder, theft). It considers the adult responsible to himself in matters that primarily affect only himself, and counts on personal and cultural morality (conscience and religion) to inhibit the individual in areas where he may only harm or degrade himself. The libertarian limits government, which is more dangerous than sex with roast beef, in order to limit the damage humans can do to each other. The side effect is that humans are left to do damage to themselves, subject to non-coercive cultural and religious pressure. But that is a very Christian thing to do. As Paul said:

I have written unto you not to keep company with any brother who is sexually immoral, or covetous, or an idolater, or a mischief-maker, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such do not even eat. For what have I to do with judging those that are outside the church? Do you not rather judge those that are within? But those who are outside God judges. Therefore put that wicked person away from yourselves.
-- 1Cor 5:11-13

The question I always ask is this: if bestiality were legal, would you spend your evenings in the barn? If polygamy were legal, would you take another wife? If prostitution were legal, would you be or frequent a hooker? In each case the answer is "of course not...those rules are for other people, because they don't know how to run their own lives."

Which is precisely the same thing the communist, the socialist, the environmentalist, the feminist, every totalitarian who seeks to use the law to remake society, says about them.

What does a team have to do to get ranked around here?

It must suck to be a crappy college football team. Not only are you embarassingly overmatched every week - the differences between college teams, unlike pros, are an order of magnitude rather than a matter of degree - but you are constantly serving as the buffet at better schools' homecomings.

It makes perfect sense from the other schools' perspective - they want to win at homecoming, so they schedule homecoming against a crappy team. That's you. But who do you schedule it against if you *are* the crappy team? I guess you just pick whatever weekend works best for you.

Apparently this week works best for Fort Scott, and certainly - since when they set this year's schedule they hadn't won a game in more than 2 seasons - they didn't think they'd be fighting #8 Garden City for their playoff spot. If the Greyhounds win, they end up seeded third in the KJCCC playoffs, ahead of at least one nationally ranked team.

Since 2 weeks ago they took #1 (at the time) Butler into overtime before losing 26-20, they've got to be wondering what a team has to do to get noticed in this joint. Beating the nationally ranked Broncbusters for homecoming just might do it.

Nine Nations Revisited

But would the Dallas Cowboys have to play soccer?

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A University of New Mexico Chicano Studies professor predicts a new, sovereign Hispanic nation within the century, taking in the Southwest and several northern states of Mexico.

Charles Truxillo suggests the “Republica del Norte,” the Republic of the North, is “an inevitability.”

He envisions it encompassing all of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and southern Colorado, plus the northern tier of Mexican states: Baja California, Sonora, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León and Tamaulipas.

Along both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border “there is a growing fusion, a reviving of connections,” Truxillo said. “Southwest Chicanos and Norteño Mexicanos are becoming one people again.”

The detractors in this article (and they are many) share a very good point: there is no 'legal' way for such a thing to some about. Relying on the Articles of Confederation as Truxillo does is the height of folly - any court which could make the determination he desires would laugh him out of court.

But that does not mean such a thing will not come about, only that there is no mechanism to allow it to happen peacefully. Since Lincoln decided that the price of secession would be the blood of the people, that is the price that will be paid if such a thing is to happen.

To predict a sovereign nation between the US and Mexico is to predict the balkanization of the US, the end of the US, because such a thing could never happen if the US could focus on its prevention. The good professor is either a fool or he is very very farsighted.

Sometimes, of course, it's impossible to tell the difference.

The world is full of unrecognized genius

Final Fantasy VII: Dead Man's Chest

Elephants Escape the Ninth Circus

Well, isn't this a surprise

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Friday that Arizona can go ahead with requiring voters to present a photo ID, starting with next month's general election, as part of the Proposition 200 that voters passed in 2004. The ruling overturns an Oct. 5 decision by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, which put the voter ID rules on hold this election cycle.

The Supreme Court on Friday did not decide whether the new voter ID rules are constitutional. That decision is still pending in federal district court.

They didn't decide on the constitutionality, but the fact that they overturned the order all but tells what the ultimate decision will be. The Supremes shouldn't need oral arguments (after all, they went to law school) to determine that in order for a state to ensure that people's rights are protected, they may need to determine that these are people with those rights.

But it's not really the idea that people will be required to prove who they are before they can vote that intrigues me about this issue - I mean, come on, that part is just common sense. It's the idea that anyone could possibly oppose the law.

I suppose that there are some that honestly think that showing ID in order to be able to vote somehow disenfranchises the poor and elderly, whom we all know never managed to get a driver's licence or a library card in the course of their lives, and can't afford $10 to get a state ID card. People who honestly believe that are otherwise known as 'naifs.' People who don't believe it but want to bus people from precinct to precinct so they can vote repeatedly without showing ID are otherwise known as 'Democrats.'

But I take a different tack than the GOP who are just trying - they assure us - to protect the integrity of the democratic process. I don't believe in universal suffrage - hell, I barely believe in democracy at all. No, I don't limit voting by sex or race - I would rather Ayn Rand vote than John Kerry, Bill Cosby than Pat Robertson - but I think the more people we exclude from voting, the better. Voting's a damned dangerous thing to do and very few are capable of doing it well. If I believed in rain gods I'd do a little dance every election day, just so people who don't like bad weather would stay home.

So let's start with people who don't have enough vested interest in society to ever check out a library book. If you have no ID, you're gone from the voter rolls. Buh-bye.

Then move on to anyone who receives a check from the government, for anything: you have a conflict of interest. Employed by government? You're gone (in case you're wondering, yes, there goes my 'right' to vote). Foodstamps? Gone. WIC? (for which you need an ID, both to get your checks and to use them, BTW) Gone. Unemployment insurance? Gone. SocSec? Gone. Disability? Gone.

Then move on to those who don't pay taxes. After all, left-wingers love to say that if churches want to "be political" they should pay taxes. I agree: paying taxes is the cost of deciding who should be in government. If all your income taxes are refunded in April, gone. Then bring back the poll tax. If your right to vote isn't worth $100 cash on the barrelhead, you don't think much of it.

Then move on to the ignorant. If you can't name your state capital, everyone you're voting for and against, your senators and representatives (state and federal), your governor, the three branches of government, the original thirteen states, the ten amendments in the Bill of Rights, gone. If you can't sing the Preamble to the Constitution (or if you miss the one change to the Schoolhouse Rock version) gone. If you don't know who wrote the Declaration of Independence, can't recite the Gettysburg address, think Martin Luther was black, gone. The benighted have no business voting. That's asking a committee of janitors to hire the CEO.

After we eliminate all the folks who have no business imposing their will on their neighbors, we'll probably have 5% of the current electorate casting a vote, hopefully less. Some will be male, some female. Some will be white, some black, Asian, Hispanic. Every single one of them will have made a significant effort to prepare himself to accept the responsibility that every voter carries when he enters the voting booth. Every single one of them will be self-reliant, educated, and will take the responsibility seriously enough to better themselves enough to qualify for it.

And the nation will be much better off for their scarifice.

So General Washington is leading his troops up Highway 220

All I have left is three tests and two movie reviews, and then I get my "A"

Mitchell, Col. Joseph B.,
Decisive Battles of the American Revolution.
St. Simons Island, GA: Mockingbird, 1962
(1984 reprint paperback edition)

In Decisive Battles of the American Revolution, Col. Joseph B. Mitchell, author of a half dozen books on military history, recounts each major battle of the Revolutionary War, from the “Shot Heard Round the World” at Lexington to Cornwallis’ inglorious surrender at Yorktown. Mitchell recounts the major players, the preparations for and results of each battle, and the major decisions that led to victory or defeat for each side. He describes the political meddling, the betrayals, and the miscalculations that nearly ended the Americans’ ragtag and bobcat rebellion as soon as it started, and explains how Washington’s often symbolic victories over the British eventually resulted in an unlikely alliance between republican America and monarchist France. Using maps to illustrate the geography upon which each battle was played out (with modern landmarks noted) Mitchell places the reader in the heart of the action.

The American Revolution in Mitchell’s telling was less a contest of putting ordinance on target than a grand chess game, wherein each forced march, each strategic retreat, and each bayonet charge led inevitably to the final showdown that guaranteed America’s ultimate victory. An outgunned George Washington fought not only the British and their Hessian allies, but intrigues among the Continental congressmen, incompetence and insubordination among his own officers and men, and harsh New England winters that annually gutted his army. His main adversary, Sir William Howe, balanced his desire to draw the Americans to the negotiating table through symbolic shows of strength and “almost ludicrous” correspondence with Washington with his charged duty of bringing the rebellious colonists quickly back under the authority of King George. All the while, the clock was running, not on Washington but on Howe, who had authority not to negotiate any settlement other than status quo ante, but only to grant pardons. And the longer it ran, the more the Patriots reasoned they had no need of pardons, for what they were doing was right.

Colonel Mitchell’s description of battle arrangements is first rate; not surprising considering that he wrote two other books in exactly the same style. He brings the soldier’s perspective to each battle, surveying the ground, laying alternative strategies before the reader, and finally revealing what decisions led to what outcomes. He also shares a soldier’s appreciation for excellence of execution, praising the Americans’ performance at Cowpens as “superb; one of the few perfectly fought classic victories in military history,” ¹ and denouncing incompetents like General Charles Lee, who believing that nothing could stand in the face of a British bayonet charge, forced a defeat on his own newly-trained army at Monmouth though dithering and contradictory orders. He was, in Mitchell’s words, “the last one who should have been given the job.” ²

Of great value to the story Mitchell tells are the maps that accompany each battle. Hand-drawn but clear and concise, each diagram places the generals and armies in their chosen locations and illustrates the terrain they relied on and struggled against. One confusing attribute however is the placement of modern highways in the more detailed maps. While certainly of use to the modern tourist trying to orient himself to the battlefield, they lend an oxymoronic air to the reader who is simply trying to follow the battle.

If there is one criticism of the book it is that certain points the reader expects to be decisive (or at least included) are glossed over, like Arnold’s betrayal of West Point. Mitchell describes the American reaction to it, including the execution of Major John Andre, yet gives no indication that the turncoat’s actions had any real impact on the course of the war. Perhaps they did not, but I certainly expected the author to say so if that were the case.

Overall, I found Decisive Battles of the American Revolution to present a very thorough overview of the military strategies employed by both the American and British armies and would recommend it for readers who seek to understand the oft-confusing movements of the Continental army. Mitchell’s lively descriptions of the strategy and intrigue are such that the reader almost subconsciously compares the soldiers and battles to more contemporary settings (e.g. the American army in modern Iraq) and wonders whether the same clock that ticked against the British also tolls for us. Mitchell of course does not address the point even remotely, but perhaps while the places and times men fight in change, some factors they face when they do so are more universal than we know.

¹ p. 185
² p. 148

Bill Hoyt
10/20/06

(I figured I'd better leave my name on it in case my professor searches the web to see from whence I stole this)

Maybe with a little more practice

Not quite there yet...

You Are 60% Sociopath

You're not a sociopath, but you're very prone to antisocial behavior. Other people's opinions matter little to you. You live your own fringe life - for better or worse.

Are You A Sociopath?

Hat tip: Code Monkey Ramblings

Swing and a miss

Coaching the Stupid Party

Tony Blankley has apparently never benched a shortstop:

...conservative non-voters are annoyed with Republican imperfection. They are disheartened, disappointed, disillusioned, distempered, and dismal -- and thus plan to dis the party that better advances conservative principles in government*.

They appear to have fallen victim to the false syllogism: 1) Something must be done; 2) not voting is something; therefore, 3) I will not vote. Of course the fallacy of the syllogism is that the second category could be anything. For example, No. 2 could as well read "eating dog excrement is something."

Potential voters, even those who plan on staying home (and I'm not one of them, I vote reliably every time - third party and 'No') are best understood not as petulent children, but as a coach with a starting shortstop who is not getting the job done. Yes, the second string shortstop is generally worse - he makes more errors, has a weaker arm, goes down looking more often - that's why he's the second stringer. But when the first stringer is not doing his job, the only way to get him to do it is to sit him down until he learns that he is not irreplaceable. If he's not helping the team, the game must go on with such backups as are available.

Every election starts a brand new season. Every position is up for grabs. The GOP, like the Dems, has to go out every play and earn a spot on the diamond. No votes 'belong' to the GOP; the GOP gets as many votes as it earns, just like the Dems. And if the GOP doesn't get to start this game, it's not the coach's fault but their own. The coach has to field a team, and if someone's not fielding even the easy pop flies, then he has bloody little choice but to let someone else start.

* The GOP's real problem is that a signficant number of conservatives no longer believe one-party rule by the GOP advances conservative principles better than does divided, ineffective government. Or at least conservatives who remember what conservatives used to believe.

UPDATE: My man Snoop sees things differently:

Political pundits and bloggers who want to continue the “let the Democrats win drumbeat”, better go back and read up on the agendas of these Democrat lunatics.

Of course he's right so far as he goes, but I think he gives the Democrats too much credit. If he's right that Democrats are less honest and less competent than the GOP, how likely is it that they will be a) able and b) willing to keep their campaign promises when the GOP has so consistently and conspicuously failed at that very task?

Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble

Quote of the day

"(C)an the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep for ever..."
-- Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia

They're not really rules, per se

Just think of these as hints

It is not necessary to list your grade school on your resume. I'm sure it was fun and all, but it's time to let it go.

Try to be sure you spelled the name of the gal taking in your resume correctly. It's unique but not that difficult, and she thinks it's pretty important. She's right.

If you have a MySpace and a fairly unique name, it's generally bad form to have the only picture of yourself one in which you're in the back seat of a car with a beer in your hand and your boobs hanging out. Sure they're impressive, but we generally don't have that much fun here and you won't either.

It's your email address. If you can't get it right twice in a row, I'm pretty sure I'm not hiring you to do data entry.

Any cover letter that begins "to whom it may concern" does not need any words after that. They will not be read anyway.

It is not going to help you to list 17 jobs on your resume. I'm just saying...

Canadian Logic

A Canadian friend of mine sent me this picture of the whiteboard in her kitchen. Does anyone here speak Canadian, eh?

Same Issue, Same Picture

Prager's Folly

In which Dennis the Menace illustrates how the difference between emoting and thinking lies in the former's inability to draw correct distinctions:

And in Minneapolis, MN, Muslim taxi drivers, who make up a significant percentage of taxi drivers in that city, refuse to pick up passengers who have a bottle of wine or other alcoholic beverage with them.

This is significant. We are not talking here about Muslim fanatics or Muslim terrorists, but about decent everyday Muslims. And what these practices reveal is something virtually unknown in Judeo-Christian societies: the imposing of one's religious practices on others.

Seldom does one run across a conclusion that is so completely at variance with both facts and logic. Prager is here exactly wrong for two reasons: he confuses definitions and he misstates reality.

Firstly, refusing to take part in a financial transaction is not "imposing one's religious practice," it is personally living one's religious practice - eerily reminiscent of the Conservatives' (correct) argument that they have a right not to sell abortifacients. To say one person not interacting with another is somehow imposing on that person is an abuse of logic of such distinction that the only people who even occasionally come close to it are feminists.

Secondly, the assertion that the imposition of religious practice is virtually unknown in Christian countries is so ludicrous as to require a drink warning* before it can be utterred. Christians routinely impose their religious standards and practices on non-Christians, from marriage restrictions to television standards to blue laws. So do feminists. So do environmentalists. So does everyone who ever wanted a law passed for moral reasons not shared universally. It's called democracy.

To pick one example of literally hundreds, the fact that no one - whether Christian or no - can buy or sell liquor in Kansas on a Sunday is due SOLELY to the fact that Christians are imposing their religious practices on society at large. If you ask why the stores must be closed on Sunday rather than Tuesday or Thursday, the answer is the same:

"I'm against Sunday sales," said Marilyn Bundy, who helped circulate the protest petition. "I feel like Sunday is the Lord's day and it ought to be left that way."

There is simply no other argument offered for limitations on what day one can conduct otherwise lawful business other than that Christians, for religious reasons, want the practice banned for everyone on that specific one. The day apparently does not belong to the Lord if even those who don't know him can buy demon rum.

To "impose" something presupposes a measure of force, like the use of law with its resultant fines and prison for those who refuse the imposition. The Muslim taxi driver, at an airport where usually dozens of taxis are waiting to take fares, cannot impose his religion in any way. He cannot make the blind man give up his dog. He cannot make the drinker pour out his rum. He simply refuses to personally interact with it, and the buyer chooses another cab. There are plenty of Christians, on the other hand, who seek to impose their own religious diktats on society, and they are far more successful than a few turbaned cabbies. Try marrying a second wife if you disagree.

Prager is correct about one thing, however:

"There is then no analogy between Christians wanting to use the democratic process to ban a practice regarded by hundreds of millions of non-Christians as immoral and the Muslim ban on human contact with dogs, a practice regarded by no non-Muslims as immoral."

There is truly no analogy, for while Prager supports the former and abhors the latter, it is only the latter which is a free exercise of religion, and only the former which is an imposition.

Hat Tip: Political Party Poop

* the Drink Warning(tm) alerts the reader that whatever is going into the mouth will shortly come out the nose, much to the dismay of the keyboard.

Only because socialism and rationalism don't mix

Bye-bye Nobel Prize

Oct. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Bono, the rock star and campaigner against Third World debt, is asking the Irish government to contribute more to Africa. At the same time, he's reducing tax payments that could help fund that aid.

After Ireland said it would scrap a break that lets musicians and artists avoid paying taxes on royalties, Bono and his U2 bandmates earlier this year moved their music publishing company to the Netherlands. The Dublin group, which Forbes estimates earned $110 million in 2005, will pay about 5 percent tax on their royalties, less than half the Irish rate.

"Among the wealthiest people I suppose it's the norm,'' Jill Cassidy, 23, said on South King Street near a plaque marking the site of Dublin's Dandelion market, where U2 played some of its earliest concerts. "In U2's position, it does come across as quite hypocritical.''

Well of course it's hypocritical. Hypocrisy is a staple of collectivism and socialism for one reason: even socialists act rationally when it comes to their own money.

It's perfectly rational to move your business to a low-tax or no tax state. Now that technology has made such a move possible, more and more individuals and companies can be expected to make it (the geopoitical consequences of governments competing by tax rates are mind-boggling, but that will have to wait for another post). I certainly don't begrudge U2 their decision to pay less in taxes. It's their money, and they deserve to keep as much of it as they can.

But where the hypocrisy comes in is in Bono's insistence that the taxpayers of Ireland act irrationally. Bono's campaign for debt-relief in Africa, for which he has been nominated for a Nobel Prize, is no more and no less than a request for Irish taxpayers who received no benefit from the loan to pay the debt - stolen or squandered by socialist dictators - on behalf of African taxpayers who received no benefit for those same loans. In short, it's a demand that the Irish taxpayers pay back commercial banks that Idi Amin and Charles Taylor ripped off.

Such a program may seem rational from Bono's perspective - after all, I too think it's a fine idea that other people pay a lot of money so I can get a prize - but it is not rational to any individual taxpayer. If it were, they would simply donate their money without laundering it through Dublin.

And expecting others to act irrationally while acting rationally and in one's own interest is not simply the hypocrisy of Socialism, but also its fatal internal contradiction.

So stupid it just might work

Here's a stupid idea:

As of today, the price of zinc closed at just over $1.80 a pound. That means for the first time ever, the post-1982 penny*, minted in copper-coated zinc, now has more value melted into a clump than it does spent for chicklets. The current cent joins the old copper cent, nickel 5 cent coin, silver dime, quarter, half-dollar and silver dollar in that non-exclusive club, and as in prior years coin shortages can be expected to come our way. It's now almost worthwhile for the Chinese to buy up our coins, ship them to Asia, and then reprocess them for sale on the open market as a base metal. If America had any smelters left, we might consider the same idea ourselves.

Congress is reacting to the fact that they have completely destroyed the currency by floating a law that would eliminate the penny altogether and mandate that all transactions be henceforth rounded to the nearest nickel. But that doesn't really solve the problem - the problem is spending and credit creation, and Congress has no interest in solving that one - because the nickel is about to disappear from circulation as well (its melt value is 7.25 cents and climbing).

So how about we try a completely different idea? Rather than passing a federal law mandating how stores round transactions, why don't we simply stop making the penny and repeal all legal tender laws relating to it, allowing everyone to use whatever they wish for cents? Individuals or companies could mint pennies themselves out of steel or aluminum or hard plastic (standards could be retained for size in order to make processing easier). Stores could use paper coupons, or aluminum tabs, or even shiny rocks in change. They could use coupon books exchangeable for future items. There would be no limitations and of course millions of ideas; the nation would be turned into one broad (if necessarily small scale) monetary experiment and we are bound to light on something works a whole lot better than what we have. And just think of all the new coin collectors that might arise. If it works well for pennies, the nickel might be next. If Congress and el Presidente keep up their free-spending ways - and they will - that need will come sooner than we imagine anyway.

But what about fraud? After all, corporations are just as corrupt as the government (their only saving grace is that they cannot imprison or kill you for not buying their products). In a truly free system, since no one could force you to accept their pennies, and since we all agree that they are worth almost nothing anyway, I don't see how it could be much of a problem. Walmart would simply offer WalPennies in change and would probably (though they would no have to) accept TargetCents in transactions. In any case, you would be under no obligation to accept more of them than necessary to complete your transaction. Everyone, rather than just the government - which has shown it cannot do so successfully anyway - would have the opportunity to make a little seigniorage. But the market would necessarily be limited: who wants to mint 80 billion pennies that they can't get rid of in the normal course of business?

Though I am convinced it would work, since it would naturally be phased in while the billions of US pennies in circulation disappear over the years, I'll admit that I have an ulterior motive here: the government has shown that control over the currency always results in worthless currency. Today they are spending your tax dollars to mint tokens that will be simply melted down for someone else's profit. Free-market, competitive pennies - not costing the taxpayer anything and not under control of anyone but the consumer - can meet the needs for the smallest of change, while (I hope) leading to a change in the way we view money.

Of course, for that last reason alone the government would rather ban the penny than allow you to make your own. But don't say I never offered an idea, no matter how outrageous.

* the current cent 97.5% zinc cent replaced the 95% copper cent in 1982, in order for the government to continue making money by, well, making money. It worked for a while.

Maybe they just forgot to tell him

The Conservative Revolution rolls on

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The FBI is investigating whether Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa., used his influence to secure lobbying and consulting contracts for his daughter, two people familiar with the inquiry said Saturday...

Weldon's ... his top aide said Saturday no one had notified him of an investigation. "I think if there was an investigation, somebody would have contacted us," said Russ Caso, Weldon's chief of staff...

Caso, whose boss is in a tight race for re-election on November 7 against Democrat Joe Sestak, tried to cast doubt on the report of the investigation. "Unidentified sources mean nothing," Caso said. "There's no substance in that story. It's a flimsy story."

Maybe somebody should tell that to the FBI:

The FBI raided the homes of Rep. Curt Weldon's daughter and a close friend Monday as it investigates whether the congressman improperly helped the pair win lobbying and consulting contracts.

None of this is to say Weldon's guilty, of course. And besides, it's been looked at by the ethics committee, and we know that they would not let political corruption continue, well at least not without ethics reports being re-filed.

I just think it's funny that said Republican congressman, after disparaging the idea of an investigation the day before yesterday, now calls the timing suspect and the investigation "politically motivated." Last time I checked, the FBI was part of the Justice Department, the head of which reports to the President.

Perhaps el Presidente' is out to get rid of a few conservatives with some last-minute leaks? Is that what you're saying, Congressman?

Is that a map of Cuba on his head?

Reuters has a Gorbasm

and it's a mess:

BERLIN (Reuters) - Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, who played a key role in ending the Cold War, said the United States had squandered an opportunity to improve global politics after the Cold War...

Um, ok. Gorby played a key role in ending the Cold War like Custer played a key role in ending hostilities at Little Big Horn. But that little historical amnesia aside, the hits just keep coming:

Unable to extricate itself from its Cold War mentality, the United States was playing a dwindling role in world politics, while Russia, China, Brazil, Europe, India and Japan were becoming stronger, Gorbachev said.

North Korea, which said on Monday it had successfully completed a nuclear test, was an example. Only China and Russia were in a position to handle Pyongyang, he said.

"The Americans will have to understand that in future they will have to cooperate and make decisions jointly, instead of just always wanting to give orders," Gorbachev said.

The funniest thing about Gorby is not that map of Cuba on his head (I'll bet when they hid the missile locations on his skull in 1962 the Soviets never counted on male pattern baldness. After all, the New Soviet Man was scheduled to arrive long before that.) It's that like with most liberal noise, what they say is unarguable in generalties, but it is nearly the opposite of reality once applied in specifics. When they are right, it's nearly always for the wrong reasons.

Case in point, not only have Russia and China proven that they can't 'handle' NK, but the entire NK nuke tantrum came about because the US insists on "6-party" talks (read: cooperating and making decisions jointly) while NK only wants to talk to us, without others involved. If the US is relatively unimportant, someone had better tell Kim Jong Il.

Gorby is right on the big trend: the US is sinking in importance worldwide. But it has precious little to do with a "cold war mentality" and everything to do with federal spending and credit policy combined with changes in technology. In other words, short-sighted America wants the world on a plastic card and the Chinese are giving it enough hemp rope to hang itself.

But that's apparently too nuanced for Reuters. Or at least it doesn't give them a chance to turn another communist loser into a revered statesman.

Lord of the slums

So my wife just bought another house

Which is cool. She saved the money and this morning she went out and bought it. It has gorgeous woodwork, a nice location (close to our bookstore), and room enough for the boys, whom I expect will live there within 6 months. We'll close in 2 weeks, the boys will stay there until they finish college or longer (and yes, they'll work and pay the bills themselves), then we'll either rent it out (less likely) or sell it (more likely).

And since the guy she bought it from is a contractor, she got the plans he was going to use to renovate the place before circumstances forced him to sell it and is hiring him to fix it up.

A good woman, mine is.

Tempest in a wine bottle

Close to the Great White North, a few Muslim cab drivers have apparently discovered the limits of Freedom of Religion:

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Airport officials gave up Tuesday on a proposal to meant to ensure that travelers carrying liquor don’t get stranded at the curb by Muslim cabbies who refuse to transport alcohol.

Hundreds of the taxi drivers who serve Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport are Muslims, and many of them, citing Islamic prohibitions against alcohol, refuse to knowingly take passengers who are carrying see-through bags of duty-free liquor, wine boxes from the Napa Valley and the like.

Little Green Footballs finds the idea that Muslims can decline fares decidedly un-American:

In fact, these drivers shouldn’t just go to the back of the line, they should lose their licenses. This behavior is un-American, and we wouldn’t even think of allowing this kind of outrageous discrimination if it were directed at any other group of people, for any other reason.

Oh, we wouldn't, huh? I seem to remember a different tune being sung by conservatives when another group of service providers chose conscience over dollars:

The flurry of political activity (around the "morning after pill" - El B) is being welcomed by conservative groups that consider it crucial to prevent health workers from being coerced into participating in care they find morally repugnant -- protecting their "right of conscience" or "right of refusal."

"This goes to the core of what it means to be an American," said David Stevens, executive director of the Christian Medical & Dental Associations. "Conscience is the most sacred of all property. Doctors, dentists, nurses and other health care workers should not be forced to violate their consciences."

If pharmacists have the right to decline to dispense morning after pills because the spontaneous abortions they cause violates the conscience of the provider (and any good conservative would agree that they have that right), then cab drivers ought to have precisely the same rights.

The principle is as obvious as it is ignored by conservatives: in a free nation no one can be forced to take part in an economic transaction that violates their conscience. If Muslim cab drivers are forced to ferry people carrying alcohol, then Christian ones ought to be forced to ferry pregnant women to abortion clinics and black ones ought to be forced to ferry hooded miscreants to Klan rallies.

"Nor prohibiting the free excercise thereof" means that the government has no right to ban excercise of religion that does not violate the rights of others, even for people who wear funny hats and smell like garlic. And no one has the right to a cab ride any more than anyone has the right to any service not voluntarily provided by another.

Just one final question for conservatives: when did state licences, with their potential to be used to coerce economic activity in violation of conscience, become "American" anyway?

And to think they all want glass houses

The cruelty and fragility of women

From email:

Jody said she was starving...

Well I couldn't help myself...I said, "You don't look like you're starving."

She went to the bathroom and came back and told me I made her cry...

I told her to calm down it was just a joke...She said I know......sniff

I'm outta here for the weekend, off to Colorado to scheme an unstoppable assault on the gold, silver, and natural gas markets with the shadowy investor known only as Spike G. If I update before Monday, consider it your Christmas bonus.

Say it ain't so, Chad

Episode IV

Is Hell Hot Enough to Cook Nuremburgers?

The left believes in the death penalty all right, but only for thought crimes:

A U.S. based environmental magazine that both former Vice President Al Gore and PBS newsman Bill Moyers... have deemed respectable enough to grant one-on-one interviews to promote their projects, is now advocating Nuremberg-style war crimes trials for skeptics of human caused catastrophic global warming. Grist Magazine’s staff writer David Roberts called for the Nuremberg-style trials for the “bastards” who were members of what he termed the global warming “denial industry.”

Roberts wrote in the online publication on September 19, 2006, "When we've finally gotten serious about global warming, when the impacts are really hitting us and we're in a full worldwide scramble to minimize the damage, we should have war crimes trials for these bastards -- some sort of climate Nuremberg.”

A number of people have asked me since I'm neither Republican nor Democrat, since I seemingly despise both liberals and conservatives, why I am so much harder on the left than I am on the right. And the answer is fairly simple: while I consider conservatives (and blacks and Jews, FWIW) who centralize power to be naifs, the danger they create lies mostly in the fact that they are building a machine that will be run by others. They are making the state a god, and the god-state must perforce be run by little gods. If the last century proved anything, it's that little gods are far more dangerous to life and liberty than those who claim to believe in big ones.

A Nuremberg-type show trial can only be held with the power of government, but more importantly it can only be held with the power of a government that believes that it has both the right and the duty to mold the populace according to the will of those who run it.

Why is the left more likely than the right to actually employ that terrible power? Because history has shown that socialism, in its various manifestations, must employ it to coerce individuals into the communal anthill that hard leftists envision. The oven, the gulag, the guillotine are tools wielded in defense of the collective ideal, and when in this world you find starvation, mass murder, and terror used as political weapons by government against its own people, nine times in ten it is being done by someone who proudly wears a stripe of socialism on his sleeve.

It is the left that promotes grand dreams and fashions them with blood for mortar and skulls for building blocks. It is the left that is at war with the very idea of the individual, and - when they deny the individual the right to make choices in their own self-interest rather than the interests of the group - with the very idea of freedom itself, especially "when the impacts are really hitting us and we're in a scramble." The order they seek is seldom enforced simply by shouting down politically incorrect opinions when they have more effective means at their disposal.

None of this is to say that modern American Democrats will take it upon themselves to purge the nation of undesireables. Democrats, while on the left, are not the left. But the left is there, pulling the Democrats like iron slivers to a magnet, one by one - and modern Republicans, with their monstrous budgets and their petty scandals, prove no antidote for the kind of mental poison the left passes as a cure-all for mankind's ills.

There are only two sides in politics: the side that believes that power is inherently dangerous and ought to be decentralized even if it means disorganization, and the side that believes that power is inherently useful and needs to be wielded to stamp out disorganization itself. Unfortunately, both parties are on the same side presently. And one (or both) of them will be surprised very badly when the people who put the group before the individual take full control of the machinery they've built.

UPDATE:

France's Socialists belabor the point:

Turkey has condemned a French parliamentary vote which would make it a crime to deny that Armenians suffered "genocide" at the hands of the Turks...Turkey has been warning France for weeks not to pass the bill which was sponsored by the opposition Socialist party.