ELSEWHERE

A reader had a rather interesting comment on my post yesterday about morality. I noted that when ordinary people debate whether an action is ethically right or not, the critierion "If everyone did that .... " is very popular. My reader commented that Leftists would not be able to accept that criterion because it would make homosexuality wrong. But as Leftists themselves often tell us, they think there is no such thing as right and wrong anyway (except when convenient) so there is really no problem for them. I might mention that there is an big post on Gene Expression that also looks at morality as a product of evolutionary biology. It is very slow-loading, however, so it must be stored offline. Scroll down to Nov. 8th.

An unusual Muslim: "Prof. Khaleel Mohammed is not a beloved figure among Muslim students in the United States. His visits to campuses to lecture are almost always accompanied by demonstrations of protesters condemning his opinions and his views. He has also felt hostile looks at the mosque where he used to worship in the city where he lives, San Diego, and therefore he rarely goes there. And indeed Mohammed's views are very unusual in the Arab world. His main thesis is that the Holy Land (according to most commentators, this refers to the area of Israel-Palestine) was given to the Jews. He takes this from the Koran itself, the divine book that is sanctified by Muslims, and is prepared to do battle with anyone who disagrees with him."

Poor old Maureen Dowd. Feminism has failed: "Tonight on NBC, one tall and handsome white male anchor with bespoke clothes will replace another tall and handsome white male anchor with bespoke clothes.... The networks don't even give lip service to looking for women and blacks for anchor jobs - they just put pretty-boy clones in the pipeline.... Even if I felt like raising a ruckus about Boys Nation, who would care? Feminism lasted for a nanosecond, but the backlash has lasted 30 years.... I checked around for feminist outrage, but couldn't find any... But my pal admits that she watched Mr. Brokaw partly because he was "eye candy," and declares women at fault in this matter: "Women like to read books about men and go to movies about men. But men don't like to read books about women or go to movies about women. The only way this is going to change is if women refuse to watch men. And the problem is, women like watching men." (Link via Dick McDonald).

The Coulter is having fun: "In light of their reaction to the nomination of Condoleezza Rice as secretary of state, I gather liberals have gotten over their enthusiasm for multiculturalist milestones. It's interesting that they dropped their celebrations of the "first woman!" "first black!" "first Asian!" designations at the precise moment that we are about to get our first black female secretary of state. When Madeline Albright was appointed the FIRST WOMAN secretary of state, the media was euphoric... But Bush nominates a brilliant geopolitical thinker who happens to be black and female and all of a sudden she's Butterfly McQueen, who don't know nothin' 'bout birthin' no Middle Eastern democracies.... "

Pentagon, analysts hit anti-U.S. bias at Red Cross: "The International Committee of the Red Cross is breaking with tradition by publicly criticizing the United States for the way it handles terror suspects, say Pentagon officials and outside experts. On at least two occasions in recent months, the ICRC overtly criticized the Bush administration for detaining suspected Taliban and al Qaeda fighters without giving them access to judicial proceedings. The administration has deemed them 'enemy combatants' and not members of a formal military organization that would give them the rights of prisoners of war." [The Red Cross are antisemitic too. Never give them a cent]

Comment of a Leftist who DID move to Canada: "Part of what's irksome about Canadian anti-Americanism and the obsession with the United States is that it seems so corrosive to Canada. Any country that defines itself through a negative ("Canada: We're not the United States") is doomed to an endless and repetitive cycle of hand-wringing and angst. For example, Canadians often point to their system of universal health care as the best example of what it means to be Canadian (because the United States doesn't provide it), but this means that any effort to adjust or reform that system (which is not perfect) precipitates a national identity crisis: To wit, instituting co-payments or private MRI clinics will make Canada too much like the United States. The rush to make comparisons sometimes prevents meaningful examination of the very real problems that Canada faces..... Many Canadians have American relatives or travel frequently to the United States, but a large number are pretty naive about their neighbors to the south. A university student confidently told me that there had been "no dissent" in the United States during the run-up to the Iraq war.... In "officially multicultural Canada," hostility toward Americans is the last socially acceptable expression of bigotry and xenophobia. It would be impossible to say the things about any other nationality that Canadians routinely say -- both publicly and privately -- about Americans".

There is an interesting essay from a year ago here which argues that American culture has lost much of its masculinity and that that is endangering the effectiveness of America's armed forces.

Wayne Lusvardi is defending Dennis Prager from an attack posted on the Lew Rockwell site. When libertarians fall out ....

Michael Darby is online again with articles about Ukraine, the partial ban on Christmas in Sydney and the anniversary of Australia's Eureka revolt.

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 put up a man whose policies seemed to be 99% the same as George Bush's even though the Left 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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