ELSEWHERE

In academe, Brian Leiter is probably second only to Noam Chomsky for half-truths and twisted reasoning. Because he seems to be widely-read, it is probably time someone took on the job of shooting him down regularly -- as various people do for Chomsky. Being a humble psychologist rather than a high-flying lawyer, I am not the man for the job but even I am tempted to point out the odd bit of shallow rhetoric emanating from him. Take this post. He says the very name "Constitution Restoration Act" is Orwellian. The U.S. constitution is Orwellian? How twisted can thinking be? The provisions of U.S. constitution are about as opposite to a socialist dictatorship (which is what Orwell describes) as you can get! And restoring elements and assumptions of that constitution that have been eroded by an arbitrary "progressive" judiciary must surely be similarly anti-Orwellian. So it is Leiter who is Orwellian. He is calling black white. Once again we note that familiar Leftist "projection" -- seeing your own faults in others. Leiter also heads up his discussion of the Act as "Theocracy anyone?" -- implying (apparently) that the Act concerned is designed to introduce some sort of Christian dictatorship. The whole point of the Act, however, is simply to protect people from being harassed in the courts just because they are Christians. So in Leiter's strange world protecting people from official harassment is equivalent to setting up a dictatorship! Again, he claims something is the opposite of what it is. With scholarship as atrocious as that, it is clear that Leiter's popularity derives from his Leftist ideological correctness rather than any intellectual stature. His reasoning is such garbage that I suppose it is no wonder that nobody bothers to critique it regularly.

The poll of conservative bloggers says that George Bush will defeat John Kerry hands-down.

Another stupid (psychopathic) lie: "U.N. ambassadors from several nations are disputing assertions by Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry that he met for hours with all members of the U.N. Security Council just a week before voting in October 2002 to authorize the use of force in Iraq."

The myth of the disenfranchised: "Already, in state after state, the Democrats have said that voter confusion over how to vote constitutes voter disenfranchisement. But, as George Will recently noted, disenfranchisement is something the government does to you. It's not something you do to yourself. If you can't figure out how to fill in the ovals or punch the chads -- and some minority of voters will always botch it -- that doesn't mean your right to vote was rescinded. It means that you didn't take your right to vote seriously enough to pay attention to the instructions."

Sweden "As early as 1977, Swedish relative income fell below the average for the twenty-three rich OECD countries. Swedish economic growth has been below the OECD average since 1970. The accumulated effect of the slower growth rate is large. From 1970 to 1998, fifteen countries surpassed or caught up with Sweden in terms of GDP per capita, while Sweden did not overtake a single one.... In the early 90's Sweden's extensive sick-leave system resulted in 30% of the working population being "sick" at any point in time. Unemployment rose to 13%. Taxes rose to 55% of GNP, with deficits of 15% of GNP.... It isn't difficult to conclude that Sweden took a resource-rich land, a hardy and resourceful citizenry, avoided the expense and destruction of wars, and then proceeded to smother those advantages with a socialistic welfare state. It's hard to imagine a more ideal testing ground for an ideological experiment, yet socialism has failed there as well".

For more postings, see EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH and SOCIALIZED MEDICINE. Mirror sites here, here, here, here and here

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That power only, not principles, is what matters to Leftists is perfectly shown by the Kerry campaign. They have put up a man whose policies seem to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though they have previously disagreed violently with those policies. "Whatever it takes" is their rule.

Leftists are phonies. For most of them all that they want is to sound good. They don't care about doing good. That's why they do so much harm. They don't really care what the results of their policies are as long as they are seen as having good intentions

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