We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
VDH asks "Who is the forgotten American?" Read the piece. Here is his conclusion about the hard-working, responsible, tax-paying backbone of America:
The forgotten American listens to Hillary and Barack and thinks all these promises are nice and well and good, but figures that they expect someone like herself to pay for all those programs for all those who chose to live life differently than she did—for whom in most cases there was as much or more chances than she had. She wants to pay taxes and help, but shrugs that those who receive think it’s never enough—resentment, not gratitude is their more appropriate response for government help. And she assumes that Hillary and Barak, given what they make, don’t much care whether they pay a few thousand dollars more in their own taxes, and that they, like a John Edwards or John Kerry or Al Gore or Ted Kennedy, are rich enough to feel everyone else’s pain but her own.
I don’t know how many forgotten Americans there are out there, but I have a feeling the answer may well determine the next election.
Neoneo takes on Barry Obama's pablum about "sitting down to talk with anybody." A quote:
I think some of the current faith in talk comes from the popularity of “the talking cure”—therapy. Much of the rest of this post will consist of me quoting myself from an earlier piece; no need to reinvent the wheel. As I wrote some time ago:
But even therapists must acknowledge that there are times when talking does no good, when therapy is inappropriate, and when the tools of the trade not only don’t work but can be harmful. But Pelosi and Lantos and so many others [such as Obama] seem to think of dialogue as something magical and universally appropriate [the following is a Lantos quote]:
“…however objectionable, unfair, and inaccurate many of [Ahmadinejad’s] statements are, it is important that we have a dialogue with him.”
Why? Why is it important? In order to feel that we are peaceful and good people? In order to empower him to think that we are fools? In order to allow him to buy time while he develops his nuclear weaponry? In order to give him greater prestige in the eyes of the world? In order to afford him propaganda opportunities and photo ops?
As I understand it, the goal of the management of international relations is to advance the interests of one's nation and of one's allies. If it is anything else, then we Americans should not be paying your salary. That's one reason I am more than dubious about the UN.
The Chinese and the Russians do not give a damn about Western virtuousness. It's nothing but weakness, in the big leagues. Tony Soprano would understand it.
“There is an inverse relationship between reliance on the state and self-reliance.” - William F. Buckley Jr.
I have read a number of comments and reviews of Dr. Lyle Rossiter's book The Liberal Mind: The Psychological Causes of Political Madness. I suppose I should read it, but I wish I had taken the time to write it myself, because the themes of the book seem close to much of what I have posted here about liberty.
"A social scientist who understands human nature will not dismiss the vital roles of free choice, voluntary cooperation and moral integrity – as liberals do," he says. "A political leader who understands human nature will not ignore individual differences in talent, drive, personal appeal and work ethic, and then try to impose economic and social equality on the population – as liberals do. And a legislator who understands human nature will not create an environment of rules which over-regulates and over-taxes the nation's citizens, corrupts their character and reduces them to wards of the state – as liberals do."
Dr. Rossiter says the liberal agenda preys on weakness and feelings of inferiority in the population by:
creating and reinforcing perceptions of victimization;
satisfying infantile claims to entitlement, indulgence and compensation;
augmenting primitive feelings of envy;
rejecting the sovereignty of the individual, subordinating him to the will of the government.
"The roots of liberalism – and its associated madness – can be clearly identified by understanding how children develop from infancy to adulthood and how distorted development produces the irrational beliefs of the liberal mind," he says. "When the modern liberal mind whines about imaginary victims, rages against imaginary villains and seeks above all else to run the lives of persons competent to run their own lives, the neurosis of the liberal mind becomes painfully obvious."
I know exactly what is meant here, but I have reservations about terming it "neurotic," which implies internal unconscious conflict. I think Dr. R. means "irrational."
When we talk about the beliefs of others, everybody tends to views those who disagree as irrational or uninformed. The fact is that peoples' convictions and attitudes can be based on any mix of emotion, experience, emotional tendencies, fantasy, personality type, logic, self-interest, intelligence and amount of information they have, emotional maturity, and so forth. There are many recipes that end up with a bowl of Chili.
For example, I know some Liberal types who are as benevolent, independent, intelligent, and high-functioning as can be, and who want nothing from the government. And I have met (and often read) Conservatives (and Liberals too) who seem driven, in part, by a paranoid undercurrent and sense of grievance.
Thus I think that the psychology of beliefs is complicated. As readers know, I prefer to use individual liberty as my starting point in political discussion, rather than psychology. Individual liberty is what my ancestors fought, died, and lived for and the realization of it, and the reverence for the idea, is what differentiates the US from the rest of the civilized world. I believe that life in a world of individual liberty is risky, often difficult, often daunting, filled with failure, but offers endless opportunity to pursue the realization of dreams. Still, liberty is obviously not for everybody, as voting patterns indicate. Not even a majority of Americans supported the Revolution.
The failure of modern "Liberalism" to maintain the ideals of personal liberty associated with classical liberalism is discouraging for me. Modern Liberals seem to celebrate leftist dictators, and, as I have posted, How Come Liberals never talk about Liberty? Clearly it is because they do not revere the founding ideas of America. I do revere them as the highest and most noble expression of the human spirit.
Image: Trumbull's painting of Cornwallis' surrender.
For at least 100 years, there has been a slow, steady flow of power from the individual to the state in the US. Despite American history, American ideals, and some parts of the Constitution which have grown weak with disuse, these flows of power have been approved by voters. Both liberals and Republicans have played roles in this trend, and even Reagan was (unwillingly) in the grip of this populist, quasi-socialistic trend which, in my view, amounts in the end in little more than a series of power grabs from people to government, with little to show for what was bought with that bowl of lentils other than more financial security for the poor and the removal of government-supported racial discrimination.
“A Conservative is a fellow who is standing athwart history yelling "Stop!"” - William F. Buckley Jr.
This trend has been driven by Leftist populism, and opposed, especially in the past 30 years, by Conservative populism. (Both populisms are interestingly discussed here in the WSJ.) Populisms sell dreams, usually with an "us vs. them" theme as an emotional hook. Paul at Powerline takes a gander at Obama's populist dream-marketing (my highlighting).
It goes without saying that Barack Obama will end the hardship and "struggle" in our daily lives. Under the Yes We Can Man, folks (other than conservative bloggers) will be able to quit their second jobs, the price of gasoline will plummet, and Ivy League grads will never again have to work for hedge funds to pay off their college loans.
Nor does Obama's magic end at our borders. Last night, he said he would solve our immigration problem in part by improving the economy of Mexico to the point that illegal immigrants will have no need or desire to enter the paradise Obama will create here.
Most magically of all, Obama will fix Mexico's economy even while refusing to trade with Mexico unless it complies with U.S. labor and environmental standards.
I know the competition is fierce, but Obama may turn out to be the most intellectually dishonest Democratic presidential nominee of my lifetime.
As the nurse-anesthetist said to me before they put me out for my last colonoscopy, "Pick a dream." My dream for America is to reclaim the best of our pre-60s, pre-1930s historical character and ideals. But, OK, I am rambling, and posting truisms. I'll stop for now, and close with this:
“I mean to live my life an obedient man, but obedient to God, subservient to the wisdom of my ancestors; never to the authority of political truths arrived at yesterday at the voting booth.” - William F. Buckley Jr.
Quoted in a thoughtful discussion at David Thompson about the Left's internal conflict between internationalism and nationalism:
The justification for giving priority to the interests of fellow citizens boils down to a pragmatic claim about the value of the nation-state. Without fellow-citizen favouritism, the nation-state ceases to have much meaning. And most of the things that liberals desire - democracy, redistribution, welfare states, human rights - only work when one can assume the shared norms and solidarities of national communities.
How free trade and open markets can save the world, materially speaking, with wealth, health, and easier lives. We linked this fascinating 20 minute Hans Rosling piece once before, but it deserves a repeat.
You probably won't post this on your centrist PC blog, but let me make a case for affirmative action in so-called "selective" institutions of so-called "higher education."
As an undergraduate at an Ivy university, I have given up on any hopes of diversity of political opinion. The politics here are fashionably Maoist and this place is packed with tenured radicals left over from the 60s who still think their thinking is "advanced." It's a joke, really, and most of us see it for what it is.
However, I would like to see some "affimative action" in the admission policy for female undergrads.
Specifically, they need to make a serious effort to recruit and admit more cute females who are comfortable with their femininity. There are not enough of them to go around for us wholesome, regular heterosexual fellows, so we are forced to go elsewhere to find them; forced to forage widely and inconveniently to the environs of BC and, if desperate and half in the bag, BU.
Never to MIT, believe me.
What makes it worse is that some of the gal students here, who could look great, do not. As a socio-political fashion statement, they do not try to look good. They try to look dowdy, or 60s, or scholarly, or to create the illusion of indifference to their appearance, or to look like dikes. It's just not appealing to a guy for a female to look unfeminine.
I know that you will tell me that they will fix this appearance thing when they go for their job interviews at Goldman Sachs and McKinsey, but what about now? Would gals be drawn to me if I wore a skirt instead of khakis and a Brooks Brothers shirt? If it would work, I'd give it a try...
I think my idea is reasonable, since affirmative action is all about appearances anyway. So, as a consequence of my experience, I have decided to support the idea of affirmative action solutions to the statistically disproportionate lack of cute, charming, appealingly-dressed females on Ivy campuses - regardless of skin color, religion or lack thereof, ethnicity, dietary preference, or political orientation.
Your devoted nephew,
T.
PS: I dare you to post this on Maggie's. PPS: I have attached a photo of the sort of person I mean: cheerful, chipper, outdoorsy cuties who like sports is all I ask for. Smart, but they do not need to be rocket scientists. I almost went to Theo's place for a bethonged example, but thought it might detract - or distract - from the sincerity of my earnest plea for fairness.
Yes, it scares me. When it comes to medical treatment (and legal help) I want free choice - and screw "the good of all." And I wish they would quit calling it "healthcare." It's treatment from doctors when you get sick.
Meanwhile, I think I'll stay home today and watch the snow fall and maybe do an hour on ye olde eliptical machine, feed the birds, and do some writing for ye olde blogge. Looks like we may have a foot today, so I will crank up ye olde snowplow too.
The New Yoik Times, that bastion of originality, says Barack Obama is a plagiarist, because he used the same motif for a lame speech as another politician. They're very picky over there at the Times. I've heard that they discipline their own employees for making stuff up and copying things without attribution. I know it's true because it happens so often that it's always fresh in your mind. You're a bad man, Obama:
The controversy arose after Mr. Obama, of Illinois, delivered a speech at a Democratic Party dinner in Wisconsin. He responded to criticism from Mrs. Clinton, of New York, who argued that Mr. Obama might deliver smooth speeches, but that she was better prepared to solve problems.
“Don’t tell me words don’t matter,” he said in his remarks. “ ‘I have a dream.’ Just words? ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal.’ Just words? ‘We have nothing to fear but fear itself.’ Just words? Just speeches?”
The passage was similar to one used by Mr. Patrick in response to similar criticism.
Hey, I'm content to live in a world of unoriginal politicians, but far be it from me to doubt the Times when they hold everybody to a higher standard. Well, almost everybody.
That's from Noam Cohen at the New York Times, appended to the sterling and no doubt highly original article:
Hey, what's the lead time on developing stories over there at the Times? I bet I can guess. Of course, it's not my standard of plagiarism we're talking about here, it's the Times' we must adhere to: "...was similar to one used by..."
Not only would such a blatant ripoff without attribution be dishonorable, it would be sorta lame too, because the item was a re-run on Jan.3rd 2008. We ran it first on January 26th, 2007. All the unoriginal and stale news that's fit to print, I guess. Remember, it's the New York Times' world, I'm just trying to live in it. If you Google "new york times plagiarist," it returns 1,660,000 entries. That's a lot, and they all seem to be NYTimes employees, not Barack Obama. I guess it will return 1,660,001 after I hit "save." Sorry.
Let's get all Woodward and Bernstein, shall we? Wrong paper, but who cares? They don't seem to. Here goes: Hey Noam; what did you know and when did you know it?
Roger wonders what the Aussies are apologizing for. I think all of this phony apologizing for history is just a passing sanctimonious fad, but it does feed into an unwholesome and unconstructive victim mentality and does nothing to inspire people to get on board.
Nonetheless, it raises once again the interesting anthropological subject of what happens when native cultures, whether rural farmers in Asia, Indians in Saskatchewan, Bedouins in the Middle East, or Aborigines in Australia, are confronted with a powerful modernity they didn't ask for and do not really comprehend. Same thing happens among subcultures right here in the US.
The new culture is rarely embraced, even if new technologies are. Sometimes it works out well, sometimes it doesn't. I wonder what I would do if confronted with a new powerful culture from outer space. My guess is that I would resist it, because my culture is pretty good, and I am an old-fashioned, sentimental sort of guy.
h/t, Lib Leanings. Apparently Americans like to bitch about the cost of necessities like medical care and milk, but not about the cost of boats, cars, motorcycles, cameras, guns, and other toys.
Megan McArle explains simply why cutting the profits of drug companies will damage R&D. A quote:
I don't think of R&D as a budgeting problem; I think of it as an investment problem. After all, even if the pharmaceutical industry has no profits right now, they can borrow the money in the financial markets at fairly attractive rates.
The main obstacle to R&D, then, is not the current state of pharmaceutical industry profits; it is the potential return on the investment in R&D. After all, Merck doesn't have to make drugs; it could generate a nice, safe return of 5% a year in government bonds. Or it could get into some other business, such as making soap. If you drive down the profits on new drugs too far, it stops making sense to invest in new drugs, even if there is a small profit to be made on current production.
Exactly right. In fact, I feel that it was wrong to institute time limits on drug patents. (h/t, Big Pharma vs. Big Gov at NE Repub.)
Why do people who think like Rowan Williams (and there are lots of them) get it wrong every time? Stumbling and Mumbling explains it. One quote:
In sayingthat the UK's adoption of part of Sharia law is inevitable, I suspect the Archbishop of Canterbury is making the same mistake he made in calling for laws against "cruel speech." He's failing to see that there should be a (big) space between individuals and the law, a space filled by civil society. In a free society, consenting adults should be able to settle disputes however they like; this might entail recourse to a coin toss, Sharia, Beth din or whatever. The job of UK law is merely to ensure that consent is free, informed and not too onerous. This means that Sharia shouldn't and needn't be part of English law, but merely of civil society. Similarly, the task of restraining cruel and thoughtless speech - insofar as this is necessary - should fall to civil society, not the law. Whatever the response to hatemongers like David Irving should be - protest, debate, ignoring him - it should not be the law. Dr Williams, then, is failing to see that some things - many things - shouldn't be done by the law, but by free people.
Read the whole short thing linked above. I think Archbishop Moonbat may have really screwed the pooch this time. Insty has more reactions.
"Sarkozy is more pro-American than any of the American Democratic candidates."
Stanford's Russell Berman, on John Bachelor's (excellent) radio program tonight.
I also learned that Russia has a 13% flat tax. America needs more rich folks - the more, the better. It costs Americans 50billion to do their taxes - not to pay their taxes, to do them. What a waste of our labor. Even our tax attorneys typically, say, in exasperation, "Just put in a reasonable number and don't worry about it." Nobody understands it.
Some points that Larry Kudlow made on the radio yesterday (paraphrased):
Corporate taxes should be zero in the US, as should the capital gains tax, dividend taxes and estate taxes (they are all forms of double-taxation). The rest of the fast-growing world (except for dying Euroland) is coming to understand that, but our Dems are still stuck in the 1930s with their anti-business, anti-free market populism.
After all, who ends up paying those taxes on corporate income? Consumers in the US and around the world (30% of American business does exports), and investors (which now includes most Americans). Without the investors, there would be no business growth and no job growth. Kudlow reminds us that 138 million Americans work for corporations, and it is very much in their interest that those businesses do well in the world economy.
The Dem government-greed-based attacks on, and plans to control, our wonderful, high-wage industries (oil, pharmaceuticals, finance, insurance, etc.) are from another era, and promise nothing but damage to employees and shareholders.
A quote from Wesentier in TNR's Washington Diarist on Obama's apparent conciliationist foreign policy ideas:
There are autonomous countries and cultures out there. The turbulence that I have described is not caused by misunderstandings. It is caused by the interests of powers and the beliefs of peoples. Beijing, Moscow, Tehran, Pyongyang, Islamabad, Gaza City, Khartoum, Caracas - does Obama really believe that he has something to propose to these ruthless regimes that they have not already considered? Does he plan to move them, to organize them, to show them change they can believe in? With what trick of empathy, what euphoria, does he hope to join the Shia, the Sunni, and the Kurds in Iraq? Yes, he made a "muscular" speech in Chicago last spring; but I have been pondering his remarks about foreign policy in the ensuing campaign and I do not detect the hardness I seek, the disabused tone that the present world warrants. My problem is not with "day one": nobody is perfectly prepared for the White House, though the memory of Bill Clinton's "learning curve" is still vivid, which in Bosnia and Rwanda cost more than a million lives. My problem is that Obama's declarations in matters of foreign policy and national security have a certain homeopathic quality. He seems averse to the hurtful, expensive, traditional, unedifying stuff.
I'm weary of everybody finding fascism in the unlikeliest of places. I'm tired of finding little cookie duster moustaches photoshopped onto politicians that remind me of church wardens, not mail-fisted strongmen. I'm worn out from the endless denouement of every discussion on every topic, no matter how mundane, being a reference to that weird Austrian corporal.
It's a looming Weimar you're all not recognizing, not the next Fuhrer. Everybody's oblivious to the cobbling together of a miserable tottering spineless Byzantium, because they want to spot Mehmed in every passerby,when they should be fixing the chinks in the walls and looking to the horizon.
I said I was weary of it, and just look at the picture I offered. I apologize. It's not the Hitlerjugend I read about yesterday. It seemed to me Weimar being remade, not the Third Reich. Lord knows what will come after this Weimar falls. Or perhaps, Lord, peace be upon him is more to the point.
A propos of Theo’s clip on gun confiscation vs. gun crime, I looked at the Australian Bureau of Statistics site (www.abs.gov.au/ausstats) to see what changes there have been in reported firearms crimes since the 1996 ban on firearms ownership. The data is relatively buried, with different data sets on different pages in different years, but I was able to find the following data (percentage of crimes using firearms):
Percent of Australian Crimes using a Firearm 1995 2006
Kidnapping/abduction 2.8% 5.0%
Murder 17.8% 16.5%
Attempted murder 26.7% 25.3%
The gun confiscation certainly cannot be said to have materially changed the incidence of gun-related crime, although the use of a gun as a threat seems to have doubled the small kidnapping/abduction rate. The Right shouts that gun crime is up, and it is some years, but it is down other years. At best, the gun ban can be said to be irrelevant. Left shouts that they “feel safer”, although they clearly are not; however, they do not do well with statistics.
Inasmuch as Australia is entirely surrounded by ocean, the perpetual complaint that Mr. Bloomberg makes – that New York’s ban doesn’t work only because criminals can buy easy guns in the South – is clearly shown by the Australian experience to be false.
Furthermore, in New York City all firearms must be registered, but there is an exception: because it is illegal for a convicted felon to own a gun, it has been (correctly) held to be unconstitutional to require a convicted felon to registered his guns, as it would be self-incrimination!
Personal weapons are the mark of a free man or woman. Guns are not about hunting: they are about the fundamental human right of self-defence. I have been held up twice and burglarized twice. Never again, because I was neither raised, nor made, to be a passive victim of low-life scumbags.
The wealthy and powerful have bodyguards, but it is up to regular folks to be our own bodyguards and the guards of our families. In the old days, it was a club, or a spear, or a sword, or a dagger. Shooting sports are secondary: great fun, but secondary.
We do not want to see a Socialist Dem in the White House. But, if were were to end up with one, what "change" should be expected? From Kling on Mandates for Change:
How can the Democrats implement policy changes without large spending increases? The answer is regulation. The business sector is going to be increasingly told what to sell and how to sell it. Particularly in health care and energy, firms are going to be accountable to bureaucrats, not to customers. Products and services will be designed in Washington, not by competition.
Regulations and mandates are an alternative to budgetary spending. For example, if politicians do not want to spend money on recruiting a volunteer army, they can institute a draft. Similarly if politicians do not have the resources on budget to pay for universal health insurance, they can pass a law making the purchase of health insurance mandatory. If such a law is effective, then the uninsured will be "drafted" into the army of the insured.
Aren't we fortunate that the people in gummint are so much smarter than us illietrate red neck goobers?
Related: The usefulness of competition in medical insurance, at Marginal Rev.
America remains the Land of Opportunity, and the politicians should be extolling that, and bringing inspiration to those who want or need the encouragement instead of pandering to peoples' sense of ineffectiveness and their desire for some "help" from the government which will never arrive without a loss of dignity and freedom.
The politicians should be saying "We'll provide justice, civic peace, protection from external enemies, minimal interference and taxation, and personal freedom so you can go out there and pursue your dreams - whatever they may be."
Sometimes I think the Dem ideal is for everybody to become a "ward of the State." I find that attitude to be insulting, negative, and destructive to the human spirit. Furthermore, I have minimal respect for anyone who wishes to "govern" me: I desire to be self-governing.
"The most terrifying words in the English language are: 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.' "Ronald Reagan
If you have any doubts about opportunity, read about this guy who built a life with nothing but $25 and a bed in a homeless shelter.
[T]he general welfare--the common good--requires that government be limited. Government's responsibility is primary when the questions involve defending the nation from attack and subversion, protecting people from physical assaults and various other forms of depredation, and maintain public order. In other ways, however, its role is subsidiary: to support the work of families, religious communities, and other civil institutions of civil society that shoulder the primary burden of forming upright and decent citizens, caring for those in need, encouraging people to meet their responsibilities to one another while also discouraging them from harming themselves or others
Governmental respect for individual freedom and the autonomy of nongovernmental spheres of authority is, then, a requirement of political morality. Government must not try to run people's lives or usurp the roles and responsibilities of families, religious beliefs, and other character-and-culture-forming authoritative communities. The usurpation of the just authority of families, religious communities, and other institutions is unjust in principle, often seriously so, and the record of big government in the twentieth century--even when it has not degenerated into vicious totalitarianism--shows that it does little good in the long run and frequently harms those it seeks to help.
Neoneo takes on Barry Obama's pablum about "sitting down to talk with anybody." A quote:
A recent email from a nephew:
Yes, it scares me. When it comes to medical treatment (and legal help) I want free choice - and screw "the good of all." And I wish they would quit calling it "healthcare." It's treatment from doctors when you get sick.
Roger wonders what the 
Megan McArle 
I'm weary of everybody finding fascism in the unlikeliest of places. I'm tired of finding little cookie duster moustaches photoshopped onto politicians that remind me of church wardens, not mail-fisted strongmen. I'm worn out from the endless denouement of every discussion on every topic, no matter how mundane, being a reference to that weird Austrian corporal.
Guess which