ELSEWHERE
In the light of my post yesterday about unionist attacks on Republican college students, the following seems a relevant comment: The Democrats' contempt for democracy: "If you believe in liberalism -- the idea that the economy should be heavily controlled, that resources should be distributed "fairly," that opportunities should be allocated by a central authority -- then you hate the idea of an independent American populace.... Democracy, according to the left, means only part-time democracy: It's democracy when people vote for us; it's a threat to democracy when they vote against us. It is no coincidence that fascism in the 20th century sprang from socialism. Socialists and the modern-day left feel that they have the only Truth. If democracy fails to recognize that Truth, democracy must be superseded."
General Clark is now part of the Democrat line-up to run against GWB in the next Presidential election. The Left have proclaimed him as the “hero of Kosovo” for his role in commanding US forces during Kosovo’s liberation. As A Little More to the Right comments: “Yesterday during an interview Clark was asked about the war in Iraq and whether it was the right thing to do. Clark replied that no, it wasn't because there was "no imminent threat to the United States". Well, what was the imminent threat in Kosovo General Clark??” He has only just become a Democrat politician but already the dishonesty is starting to set in.
Amazing! The Dalai Lama supports the war on terror and has refused to condemn the Iraq intervention!
Australian historian and whistle-blower Keith Windschuttle has a short reply to his critics in his latest posting. The Leftist attack on him edited by Robert Manne fails completely to look at the evidence. Windschuttle is of course known for exploding the Leftist lie that Tasmania recorded the one clear case of genocide in the British Empire. Leftists use the lie to claim that the early British colonists from whom most Australians are descended were like the Nazis!
Patrick West makes a good point about recent crashes of privately-run British passenger trains. The Left-leaning media are parading it as just what you would expect of privatization and those heartless, cost-cutting capitalists. He points out that there were roughly TWICE as many deaths BEFORE privatization. Touche!
George Will has some interesting comments about recent research showing that people are hardwired (born) to be part of a community and share that community’s values -- which is why membership of a church or religious group is so often beneficial to a person’s mental health and adaptation to society. GWB is a good case in point. Turning to Christian faith changed him from being a drunkard into President of the United States.
Sowell says: One of the signs of our times is a recent ruling by a federal judge that those who lost loved ones in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks can sue the planes' manufacturer and the owners of the World Trade Center, among others. This extraordinary -- indeed, unique -- terrorist attack was "foreseeable," according to Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein in New York. By the same reasoning, it was "foreseeable" that there would be jackasses like Judge Hellerstein on the federal bench. Similar judges have allowed our courts to become clogged with frivolous lawsuits and turned law into an instrument of legalized extortion.
Jonathan Rauch says that “Frankenfood” will save the planet. Seriously, GM food looks set to be so beneficial to the environment that even the Greens should eventually reverse their “anti” position if they have any contact with reality at all.
The Misanthropyst has a fun post devoted to the view that life itself is the ultimate test of IQ
The Wicked one has just made up for all his Irish jokes by pointing to what a great job the Irish have done of reducing the size of their government and thus greatly increasing their prosperity.
My latest academic upload here (or here) is one of the many shots I fired in my failed 20-year campaign to inject a bit more science into psychology. All sciences have indexing services that enable individual scientists to find existing publications relevant to their own work. I show that the official psychology indexing service is ludicrously incomplete. Basically, unlike true scientists, psychologists do not care about what has gone before. They have a typically Leftist disregard for what history might teach.
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Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
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Monday, September 22, 2003
Sunday, September 21, 2003
Democrat-supporting unionists have just physically attacked a small group of Republican college kids who were placarding in support of Ward Connerly’s racial privacy initiative. The Soviet mentality is never far below the surface in Western World Leftists. I have myself in my own long-gone student days been on the receiving end of similar Stalinist treatment from Leftist unionists -- as I recorded here
FREE TRADE
Steel Tariffs Are a Net Job Killer: "In a decision largely driven by his political advisers, President Bush set aside his free-trade principles last year and imposed heavy tariffs on imported steel to help out struggling mills in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, two states crucial for his re-election. Eighteen months later, key administration officials have concluded that Bush's order has turned into a debacle. Some economists say the tariffs may have cost more jobs than they saved, by driving up costs for automakers and other steel users." When will they ever learn? More on the folly of Protectionism here.
"We are hearing more and more about the loss of manufacturing jobs.... History, however, suggests that manufacturing can take care of itself. It's important to remember that warnings about the death of manufacturing are not new. I have been hearing them for more than 20 years." More here.
The WTO: "The talks in Cancun failed for two reasons. First, they failed because Americans and Europeans talk a great game about free trade but are outrageously protectionist when it comes to agriculture. And, second, because the poor countries, led by Brazil, were sufficiently peeved by point No. 1 so as to foolishly decide that no progress was better than some progress."
This abstract from an academic paper shows that the WTO is something of a paper tiger anyway. The evidence is that the minor concessions made via the WTO and its predecessor body (GATT) have had very little beneficial effect. But special concessions to allow goods from poor countries into rich countries do have a large beneficial effect.
Jagdish Bhagwati and Arvind Panagariya argue that the bilateral trade deals are pretty useless too and that real free trade would be much better.
Colin Teese argues that the proposed US-Australia "Free Trade" agreement is of dubious value too -- depending on your assumptions. But there is little doubt that it will help our farmers IF it gives them better access to the US market. But that is the big sticking point of course.
"Globalisation is good" tells a tale of two countries that were equally poor 50 years ago - Taiwan and Kenya. Today Taiwan is 20 times richer than Kenya. We meet the farmers and entrepreneurs that could develop Taiwan because it introduced a market economy and integrated into global trade. And we meet the Kenyan farmers and slum dwellers that are still desperately poor, because Kenya shut its door to globalisation. Link via Valete Fratres.
US to China: Make goods more expensive! "There is, it seems, a segment of the American population that firmly believes China to be the greatest economic threat facing our country. As if domestic taxation, regulation and deficit spending were of negligible effect upon America's economic well being, dealing with the threat from the Far East now ranks as our nation's #1 priority." And what a "threat" it is: How dare they sell us electrical goods at low prices!
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Steel Tariffs Are a Net Job Killer: "In a decision largely driven by his political advisers, President Bush set aside his free-trade principles last year and imposed heavy tariffs on imported steel to help out struggling mills in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, two states crucial for his re-election. Eighteen months later, key administration officials have concluded that Bush's order has turned into a debacle. Some economists say the tariffs may have cost more jobs than they saved, by driving up costs for automakers and other steel users." When will they ever learn? More on the folly of Protectionism here.
"We are hearing more and more about the loss of manufacturing jobs.... History, however, suggests that manufacturing can take care of itself. It's important to remember that warnings about the death of manufacturing are not new. I have been hearing them for more than 20 years." More here.
The WTO: "The talks in Cancun failed for two reasons. First, they failed because Americans and Europeans talk a great game about free trade but are outrageously protectionist when it comes to agriculture. And, second, because the poor countries, led by Brazil, were sufficiently peeved by point No. 1 so as to foolishly decide that no progress was better than some progress."
This abstract from an academic paper shows that the WTO is something of a paper tiger anyway. The evidence is that the minor concessions made via the WTO and its predecessor body (GATT) have had very little beneficial effect. But special concessions to allow goods from poor countries into rich countries do have a large beneficial effect.
Jagdish Bhagwati and Arvind Panagariya argue that the bilateral trade deals are pretty useless too and that real free trade would be much better.
Colin Teese argues that the proposed US-Australia "Free Trade" agreement is of dubious value too -- depending on your assumptions. But there is little doubt that it will help our farmers IF it gives them better access to the US market. But that is the big sticking point of course.
"Globalisation is good" tells a tale of two countries that were equally poor 50 years ago - Taiwan and Kenya. Today Taiwan is 20 times richer than Kenya. We meet the farmers and entrepreneurs that could develop Taiwan because it introduced a market economy and integrated into global trade. And we meet the Kenyan farmers and slum dwellers that are still desperately poor, because Kenya shut its door to globalisation. Link via Valete Fratres.
US to China: Make goods more expensive! "There is, it seems, a segment of the American population that firmly believes China to be the greatest economic threat facing our country. As if domestic taxation, regulation and deficit spending were of negligible effect upon America's economic well being, dealing with the threat from the Far East now ranks as our nation's #1 priority." And what a "threat" it is: How dare they sell us electrical goods at low prices!
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GREENIE NONSENSE
Environmental scientists must stop crying wolf: "There is a crisis emerging in the scientific community. The ideals of science are being sacrificed to the god of political expediency. Environmental scientists are becoming so obsessed with the righteousness of their cause that they are damning those who wish to use science as an objective tool in public policy decisions."
As an example of crying wolf, A Little More to the Right has some remarkable pictures of that ozone hole in the atmosphere that the Greenies are all so desperately worried about.
The latest EU attack on chemicals is just chasing rainbows. Even water, salt and vitamins are bad for you if misused or taken in excessive doses. Chemical safety is a myth -- but a very costly myth for us all. And more regulations are most unlikely to improve our already high level of safety.
Moon power alright: "Homes on the Arctic tip of Norway started getting power from the moon on Saturday via a unique subsea power station driven by the rise and fall of the tide." What a lot of rot! What do they do when the tide is on the turn? Turn to coal, oil or nuclear power, of course. Intermittent sources of energy just force a hugely expensive doubling up of generating capacity.
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Environmental scientists must stop crying wolf: "There is a crisis emerging in the scientific community. The ideals of science are being sacrificed to the god of political expediency. Environmental scientists are becoming so obsessed with the righteousness of their cause that they are damning those who wish to use science as an objective tool in public policy decisions."
As an example of crying wolf, A Little More to the Right has some remarkable pictures of that ozone hole in the atmosphere that the Greenies are all so desperately worried about.
The latest EU attack on chemicals is just chasing rainbows. Even water, salt and vitamins are bad for you if misused or taken in excessive doses. Chemical safety is a myth -- but a very costly myth for us all. And more regulations are most unlikely to improve our already high level of safety.
Moon power alright: "Homes on the Arctic tip of Norway started getting power from the moon on Saturday via a unique subsea power station driven by the rise and fall of the tide." What a lot of rot! What do they do when the tide is on the turn? Turn to coal, oil or nuclear power, of course. Intermittent sources of energy just force a hugely expensive doubling up of generating capacity.
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ELSEWHERE
I like it! Apparently there is a college in Cuba named after Korean Communist dictator Kim Il Sung. The WSJ wryly comments: "Kim Il Sung Economic College in Cuba? Sounds almost as left-wing as American colleges." There is also a fun post about the metric system on the same page. As a born-and-bred Imperial man, I think America is the only place where they still measure things properly. Both Britain and Australia have converted to Metric.
Putting it plainly: "Fear of provoking terrorists is a cowardly basis on which to oppose war."
Good to see: "President Bush renewed his campaign against what he considers abuses of the legal system Saturday, returning to a longtime interest that remained mostly sidelined during the first two years of his presidency. In his weekly radio address, Bush pushed for Congress to limit damage awards in medical malpractice cases, arguing that lawsuits are sending malpractice insurance costs soaring so that shortages of doctors are occurring in many places." Australia has done it, why not the U.S.?
Interested Participant has the story about the Leftist "Rainbow Family" who love the earth but trash national forests at great cost to the taxpayer.
The Wicked one has just given the rural socialists (tax-fed farmers) another blast.
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Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
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I like it! Apparently there is a college in Cuba named after Korean Communist dictator Kim Il Sung. The WSJ wryly comments: "Kim Il Sung Economic College in Cuba? Sounds almost as left-wing as American colleges." There is also a fun post about the metric system on the same page. As a born-and-bred Imperial man, I think America is the only place where they still measure things properly. Both Britain and Australia have converted to Metric.
Putting it plainly: "Fear of provoking terrorists is a cowardly basis on which to oppose war."
Good to see: "President Bush renewed his campaign against what he considers abuses of the legal system Saturday, returning to a longtime interest that remained mostly sidelined during the first two years of his presidency. In his weekly radio address, Bush pushed for Congress to limit damage awards in medical malpractice cases, arguing that lawsuits are sending malpractice insurance costs soaring so that shortages of doctors are occurring in many places." Australia has done it, why not the U.S.?
Interested Participant has the story about the Leftist "Rainbow Family" who love the earth but trash national forests at great cost to the taxpayer.
The Wicked one has just given the rural socialists (tax-fed farmers) another blast.
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Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
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Saturday, September 20, 2003
SOME PSYCHOLOGICAL FINDINGS YOU CAN USE!
Emory University researcher Sarah Brosnan has found that monkeys get envious if another monkey does better than them and start behaving in angry and irrational ways. I have often pointed out that a lot of Leftism is genetically encoded so that monkeys are Leftists is no surprise to me.
In my latest academic upload here (or here) I look at whether or not there is such a thing as racism. What I found was that there is only a weak tendency for dislike of one ethnic group to generalize to dislike of another ethnic group. This indicates that most ethnic dislikes are NOT motivated by an overall attitude of racism. It shows that most people who express views that Leftists would call “racist” are in fact simply objecting to real phenomena that they dislike.
My theme that what the Leftists say about conservatives is mostly Freudian “projection” is confirmed in a recent WSJ article, where Bruce Bartley gives chapter and verse of Democrats accusing Republicans of things that they themselves do repeatedly. He concludes: “When Democrats assert that the Republicans will do anything to win, their complaint is relevant only in terms of what psychologists call "projection," finding your own faults in others”
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Emory University researcher Sarah Brosnan has found that monkeys get envious if another monkey does better than them and start behaving in angry and irrational ways. I have often pointed out that a lot of Leftism is genetically encoded so that monkeys are Leftists is no surprise to me.
In my latest academic upload here (or here) I look at whether or not there is such a thing as racism. What I found was that there is only a weak tendency for dislike of one ethnic group to generalize to dislike of another ethnic group. This indicates that most ethnic dislikes are NOT motivated by an overall attitude of racism. It shows that most people who express views that Leftists would call “racist” are in fact simply objecting to real phenomena that they dislike.
My theme that what the Leftists say about conservatives is mostly Freudian “projection” is confirmed in a recent WSJ article, where Bruce Bartley gives chapter and verse of Democrats accusing Republicans of things that they themselves do repeatedly. He concludes: “When Democrats assert that the Republicans will do anything to win, their complaint is relevant only in terms of what psychologists call "projection," finding your own faults in others”
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PORTUGAL
Well, shiver me timbers! (as an old sailor might say). It turns out that at least two of the Lusosphere (Portuguese-language) blogs that have been linking to me are actually from Portugal, not Brazil. If the blogs concerned had been in German or Italian I might have figured their origin out better but Portuguese stretches me a bit too far. At least I figured out that they were in Portuguese! Enlightenment came via this email from Joao Noronha of Valete Fratres (just to confuse you that means “Farewell brothers” in LATIN):
Joao has lots of interesting posts transcribed from English-language sources so pay him a visit. And I have also now heard from another blogger in Portugal -- Miguel Noronha of O Intermitente -- who links to me. He quotes some English-language sources too.
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Well, shiver me timbers! (as an old sailor might say). It turns out that at least two of the Lusosphere (Portuguese-language) blogs that have been linking to me are actually from Portugal, not Brazil. If the blogs concerned had been in German or Italian I might have figured their origin out better but Portuguese stretches me a bit too far. At least I figured out that they were in Portuguese! Enlightenment came via this email from Joao Noronha of Valete Fratres (just to confuse you that means “Farewell brothers” in LATIN):
“At least a few of your Portuguese language readers and fans are... Portuguese. But the problems here are not very different from those described in by your Brazilian reader (and Lula is a media hero here in Portugal.) In Portugal, a member of the EU, NATO, etc..., our constitution, mostly written in 1975 by Marxists, still states that we're trying to build a socialist society (preamble 4th paragraph)... A minister has recently proposed that we revise the constitution in order to get rid of all that ideological nonsense... He was immediately classified as a "far-right extremist".”
Joao has lots of interesting posts transcribed from English-language sources so pay him a visit. And I have also now heard from another blogger in Portugal -- Miguel Noronha of O Intermitente -- who links to me. He quotes some English-language sources too.
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FROM “TOWNHALL”
W. F. Buckley defends Israel's security fence and ridicules the pressure against it from GWB. Linda Chavez agrees.
Pandering to the Arabs: What a blooper! When will GWB give up on a failed policy?
Walter Williams applies a bit of sarcasm to the idea that "We need a job-saving law" in the high-tech industries.
Michelle Malkin says all that can be said about the recent picture of unborn babies smiling.
“It was only a matter of time, I suppose. Comic-book superheroes have gone into the liberal political indoctrination business.” More here
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W. F. Buckley defends Israel's security fence and ridicules the pressure against it from GWB. Linda Chavez agrees.
Pandering to the Arabs: What a blooper! When will GWB give up on a failed policy?
Walter Williams applies a bit of sarcasm to the idea that "We need a job-saving law" in the high-tech industries.
Michelle Malkin says all that can be said about the recent picture of unborn babies smiling.
“It was only a matter of time, I suppose. Comic-book superheroes have gone into the liberal political indoctrination business.” More here
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ELSEWHERE
Wayne Lusvardi drew my attention to this story about a Greenie vandal who destroys SUVs. The vandal describes himself as: “a high school dropout with a passion for math as well as Greek and Roman history” ... A math formula — Euler's Theorem — was spray painted on one of the SUVs as a way of distinguishing the participants' work. "We thought it would be nice to have something a little kooky just in case this happened," he said, adding that he finds the formula "beautiful." Comparing the guy to the Unabomber, Wayne comments: “Should we be afraid of the anti-intellectuals like President Bush or the pseudo-intellectuals like the eco-terrorists?”
Mike Tremoglie reports a little-known happening in the City of Brotherly Love: “A Molotov cocktail was tossed into the campaign office of the white, Jewish, Republican candidate for mayor Sam Katz... Supposing the circumstances were that a Molotov had been thrown into the campaign office of a black, Democrat, mayoral candidate and the campaign workers for the white, Republican, Jewish mayor had been implicated. How long would it be before CBS/NBC/ABC/CNN/MSNBC/NPR/ New York Times and the rest of the usual suspects would be reporting live from North Philadelphia?
Even in Seattle ... “A proposal to levy a 10-cent-per-cup tax on espresso in what is known as the coffee capital of the nation was overwhelmingly rejected on Tuesday by Seattle voters. The measure failed by two to one” How nasty it is for Leftists when they have to give people a choice!
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Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
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Wayne Lusvardi drew my attention to this story about a Greenie vandal who destroys SUVs. The vandal describes himself as: “a high school dropout with a passion for math as well as Greek and Roman history” ... A math formula — Euler's Theorem — was spray painted on one of the SUVs as a way of distinguishing the participants' work. "We thought it would be nice to have something a little kooky just in case this happened," he said, adding that he finds the formula "beautiful." Comparing the guy to the Unabomber, Wayne comments: “Should we be afraid of the anti-intellectuals like President Bush or the pseudo-intellectuals like the eco-terrorists?”
Mike Tremoglie reports a little-known happening in the City of Brotherly Love: “A Molotov cocktail was tossed into the campaign office of the white, Jewish, Republican candidate for mayor Sam Katz... Supposing the circumstances were that a Molotov had been thrown into the campaign office of a black, Democrat, mayoral candidate and the campaign workers for the white, Republican, Jewish mayor had been implicated. How long would it be before CBS/NBC/ABC/CNN/MSNBC/NPR/ New York Times and the rest of the usual suspects would be reporting live from North Philadelphia?
Even in Seattle ... “A proposal to levy a 10-cent-per-cup tax on espresso in what is known as the coffee capital of the nation was overwhelmingly rejected on Tuesday by Seattle voters. The measure failed by two to one” How nasty it is for Leftists when they have to give people a choice!
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Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
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Friday, September 19, 2003
CONSTITUTIONS: THE GIPPPER SAYS IT BEST
"I had a copy of the Soviet Constitution and I read it with great interest. And I saw all kinds of terms in there that sound just exactly like our own: 'Freedom of assembly' and 'freedom of speech' and so forth. Of course, they don't allow them to have those things, but they're in there in the constitution. But I began to wonder about the other constitutions -- everyone has one -- and our own, and why so much emphasis on ours. And then I found out, and the answer was very simple -- that's why you don't notice it at first. But it is so great that it tells the entire difference. All those other constitutions are documents that say, 'We, the government, allow the people the following rights,' and our Constitution says 'We the People, allow the government the following privileges and rights.' We give our permission to government to do the things that it does. And that's the whole story of the difference--why we're unique in the world and why no matter what our troubles may be, we're going to overcome." --Ronald Reagan. Via The Federalist.
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"I had a copy of the Soviet Constitution and I read it with great interest. And I saw all kinds of terms in there that sound just exactly like our own: 'Freedom of assembly' and 'freedom of speech' and so forth. Of course, they don't allow them to have those things, but they're in there in the constitution. But I began to wonder about the other constitutions -- everyone has one -- and our own, and why so much emphasis on ours. And then I found out, and the answer was very simple -- that's why you don't notice it at first. But it is so great that it tells the entire difference. All those other constitutions are documents that say, 'We, the government, allow the people the following rights,' and our Constitution says 'We the People, allow the government the following privileges and rights.' We give our permission to government to do the things that it does. And that's the whole story of the difference--why we're unique in the world and why no matter what our troubles may be, we're going to overcome." --Ronald Reagan. Via The Federalist.
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BRAZIL
I have noticed that in recent months my blog has been getting links from several foreign language blogs. Which language? German? French? No -- Portuguese! They are of course Brazilian blogs. So why should I be popular in just one non-English-speaking country? A Brazilian blogger who speaks English has just emailed me and I now begin to understand. Apparently Brazil is monolithically Leftist. He refers to the January election that put Lula da Silva in power and comments:
So in an environment like that, Leftism obviously needs to be dissected!
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I have noticed that in recent months my blog has been getting links from several foreign language blogs. Which language? German? French? No -- Portuguese! They are of course Brazilian blogs. So why should I be popular in just one non-English-speaking country? A Brazilian blogger who speaks English has just emailed me and I now begin to understand. Apparently Brazil is monolithically Leftist. He refers to the January election that put Lula da Silva in power and comments:
“The last election in Brazil was a joke: all the parties were left-wing! We didn’t have one single liberal representative party in the race. All the parties just exist to preserve themselves in power, making agreements with the government of the day. It’s what we call "phisiologism": the parties here don´t represent anybody but themselves. So Mr. Lula is putting all the parties into his government. The media is submerged by a huge leftish wave too. We have very few alternatives to it. The government’s present agenda is Gun Control (banishing all guns from the public) and Tax Reform (raising the avarage tax rate in Brazil to 40%!). And Mr. Lula supports terrorists like the Colombian FARC and regimes such as Chavez and that old-favourite -- Castro.
So in an environment like that, Leftism obviously needs to be dissected!
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ELSEWHERE
Ann Coulter points out that the NYT and other Leftists are back to their old moral equivalence game. Once it was the awful Soviet regime and the USA that were supposedly equivalent. Now it is the USA and the Islamic terrorists that are supposedly morally equivalent. Obviously the word “moral” is meaningless to Leftists. They are “moral imbeciles” -- which is an old term for a psychopath -- someone who has no idea of right and wrong.
A hard-hitting editorial in Quadrant. Excerpt: “"There is a great tension between the policy makers and the academics concerned with foreign policy in Australia, such that while the former have to deal with actual issues of national security and our place in a dangerous world, the latter are obsessed with ideology and pharisaical moralism as if national security were not the primary issue.”
Terence Corcoran is not mourning the collapse of the WTO. He says it had virtually nothing to do with free trade anyway.
Bjorn Lomborg pours cold water on the idea that global warming produces extreme weather. He also pours cold water on those who contend that failing to follow Kyoto is some sort of insult to the poor of the Third World: "The major problems of global warming will occur in the Third World. Yet these countries have many other and much more serious problems to contend with. For the cost of implementing the Kyoto Protocol in the single year of 2010, we could permanently satisfy the world's greatest need: we could provide clean drinking water and sanitation for everybody. It would surely be better to deal with those most pressing problems first."
Lefties and Greenies are always moaning about the possible health hazards of mobile phones but how often do they mention how life-saving they are? As in This story.
Hooray! Texas voters trump the lawyers "Voters amended the state constitution Saturday by a narrow margin to permit new limits on lawsuit damages, ending an expensive and heated campaign that pitted doctors against trial lawyers.”
Jeff Jacoby is stirring the pot. He makes a good case that Taiwan deserves a seat in the United Nations. Taiwan has certainly done nothing to deserve being the only nation excluded.
Sowell says California has its own brand of fundamentaliasm -- liberal fundamentalism.
“Slings and Arrows” has some excellent posts at the moment. This one is really amazing: Apparently the Germans are setting up a eugenics program again -- though at least it is voluntary this time.
My latest academic upload here (or here) is a deceptively simple paper but what it reveals totally discredits academic psychology and shows it to be nothing more than a fraud on the taxpayer. Psychology pretends to be scientific but is not. In a true science, knowledge is cumulative. Each researcher builds on what other researchers before him have found. In my paper I show that this is not remotely the case in psychology. The example I give is from an important area of psychology but shows that each year some psychologist somewhere publishes the same “new” idea over and over again -- and nobody notices. For decades psychologists have been rediscovering the wheel each year. There is no accumulation of understanding at all. Nobody KNOWS of what has gone before, let alone being able to build on it.
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Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
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Ann Coulter points out that the NYT and other Leftists are back to their old moral equivalence game. Once it was the awful Soviet regime and the USA that were supposedly equivalent. Now it is the USA and the Islamic terrorists that are supposedly morally equivalent. Obviously the word “moral” is meaningless to Leftists. They are “moral imbeciles” -- which is an old term for a psychopath -- someone who has no idea of right and wrong.
A hard-hitting editorial in Quadrant. Excerpt: “"There is a great tension between the policy makers and the academics concerned with foreign policy in Australia, such that while the former have to deal with actual issues of national security and our place in a dangerous world, the latter are obsessed with ideology and pharisaical moralism as if national security were not the primary issue.”
Terence Corcoran is not mourning the collapse of the WTO. He says it had virtually nothing to do with free trade anyway.
Bjorn Lomborg pours cold water on the idea that global warming produces extreme weather. He also pours cold water on those who contend that failing to follow Kyoto is some sort of insult to the poor of the Third World: "The major problems of global warming will occur in the Third World. Yet these countries have many other and much more serious problems to contend with. For the cost of implementing the Kyoto Protocol in the single year of 2010, we could permanently satisfy the world's greatest need: we could provide clean drinking water and sanitation for everybody. It would surely be better to deal with those most pressing problems first."
Lefties and Greenies are always moaning about the possible health hazards of mobile phones but how often do they mention how life-saving they are? As in This story.
Hooray! Texas voters trump the lawyers "Voters amended the state constitution Saturday by a narrow margin to permit new limits on lawsuit damages, ending an expensive and heated campaign that pitted doctors against trial lawyers.”
Jeff Jacoby is stirring the pot. He makes a good case that Taiwan deserves a seat in the United Nations. Taiwan has certainly done nothing to deserve being the only nation excluded.
Sowell says California has its own brand of fundamentaliasm -- liberal fundamentalism.
“Slings and Arrows” has some excellent posts at the moment. This one is really amazing: Apparently the Germans are setting up a eugenics program again -- though at least it is voluntary this time.
My latest academic upload here (or here) is a deceptively simple paper but what it reveals totally discredits academic psychology and shows it to be nothing more than a fraud on the taxpayer. Psychology pretends to be scientific but is not. In a true science, knowledge is cumulative. Each researcher builds on what other researchers before him have found. In my paper I show that this is not remotely the case in psychology. The example I give is from an important area of psychology but shows that each year some psychologist somewhere publishes the same “new” idea over and over again -- and nobody notices. For decades psychologists have been rediscovering the wheel each year. There is no accumulation of understanding at all. Nobody KNOWS of what has gone before, let alone being able to build on it.
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Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
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Thursday, September 18, 2003
GOVERNMENT DENIES DRUGS TO THE POOR
Defending drug companies must be one of the world's least popular activities but I have to say that this story from "Forbes" is another example of blaming the victim. In this case the alleged villain is the drug companies but the real culprit is government. The story tells how a non-profit group is getting funding from Bill Gates to "develop" drugs to treat third-world diseases. The story is that the drug companies will not develop these drugs because there is no profit in it for them. So our heroic altruists step into the breach to give the poor what the heartless capitalistic drug companies deny them.
What is nowhere pointed out explicitly is that these drugs already exist and that the cost of producing them is trivial. The "development" of these drugs consists solely of going through the hoops of getting bureaucratic approval to use them! If you had a law that anybody who needed a drug could get it from a qualified doctor just by signing a waiver to show that he knew that the drug had not been formally approved, all these drugs would rapidly become universally available! No do-gooders would be needed. It is the huge costs of bureacracy that prevent the drug companies from releasing these drugs, nothing else. As usual, government is the problem, not the solution.
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Defending drug companies must be one of the world's least popular activities but I have to say that this story from "Forbes" is another example of blaming the victim. In this case the alleged villain is the drug companies but the real culprit is government. The story tells how a non-profit group is getting funding from Bill Gates to "develop" drugs to treat third-world diseases. The story is that the drug companies will not develop these drugs because there is no profit in it for them. So our heroic altruists step into the breach to give the poor what the heartless capitalistic drug companies deny them.
What is nowhere pointed out explicitly is that these drugs already exist and that the cost of producing them is trivial. The "development" of these drugs consists solely of going through the hoops of getting bureaucratic approval to use them! If you had a law that anybody who needed a drug could get it from a qualified doctor just by signing a waiver to show that he knew that the drug had not been formally approved, all these drugs would rapidly become universally available! No do-gooders would be needed. It is the huge costs of bureacracy that prevent the drug companies from releasing these drugs, nothing else. As usual, government is the problem, not the solution.
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LOVE AND POLITICS
Leftists make loud claims about their being more oriented toward love and kindness than those heartless conservatives. But the truth seems to be the opposite. In my latest academic upoload here (or here), I report the results of a survey that shows that it is the moral conservatives rather than the advocates of permissiveness who believe more in the power of love and who are more idealistic about love. Conservatives are the happy people and the nice guys according to the survey data. Leftists are bitter and cynical.
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Leftists make loud claims about their being more oriented toward love and kindness than those heartless conservatives. But the truth seems to be the opposite. In my latest academic upoload here (or here), I report the results of a survey that shows that it is the moral conservatives rather than the advocates of permissiveness who believe more in the power of love and who are more idealistic about love. Conservatives are the happy people and the nice guys according to the survey data. Leftists are bitter and cynical.
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ELSEWHERE
More on the politics of research: After 26 years of trying to prove mobile phones weren't safe Mays Swicord has had enough. "It comes down to having a public conscience. The public wants to know whether there is a health issue. If there isn't one, then we should stop wasting money looking for it." Asked about why he now works for Motorola and if there is a conflict of interest, he says: "Academic researchers also have a conflict of interest in that they want to promote their own research. So one has to look at what makes sense in terms of science"
There is a good reply by Alan Caruba here to the "Blame America" brigade. How Muslims can be constantly doing the most horrific deeds worldwide and America is still the one in the wrong certainly does seem pretty deranged.
Amusing: On the “Oldie” message board someone has posted a message pointing out how similar Communism and Nazism were. By way of disagreement, a Leftist replied “Give me an example of Communism having a defined aim of genocide”. In other words, both murdered millions but being less frank about it makes a big difference! Only a Leftist would think so.
Interesting idea in the WSJ: That “the Democrats were the "mommy party" and the Republicans the "daddy party." That is, the Democrats were "nurturers," concerned with health policy and day care. The Republicans were "protectors," taking care of national security and other manly matters.” Since roughly equal numbers of men and women vote for both parties, the idea is a rather large stretch, though.
Democrats have been saying from the outset that Iraq would be "another Vietnam". The Vietnam war, however was initiated and supported by Democrats. Shouldn't that mean that Democrats SUPPORT the Iraq intervention? But I guess that they really hate how much more successful Bush has been in Iraq than they were in Vietnam. It was actually a Republican (Nixon) who got America OUT of Vietnam.
Ian Buruma on anti-Americanism and foreign policy: Buruma notes the backing for Bush received from Vaclav Havel, Adam Michnik, and especially Jose Ramos-Horta, the Nobel Peace Prize-winner from East Timor. These are men, who, unlike most commentators in London or New York, know what it is like to live under the cosh.
The Adam Smith Institute has just launched a new blog. Looks good. One titbit: “A new Heritage Foundation survey has found that four times as many Members of Congress use private schools as the American public” How odd! But This might give you an idea why: "Faced with a federal deadline to define a "highly qualified" teacher, Washington state recently decided middle school teachers could continue to teach any subject -- even if they never mastered the topic in college or proved they are knowledgeable about it"
Details about the job of a baggage screener Not very encouraging.
"Rabbit Proof Fence": This film has long been known in Australia as Leftist propaganda with a typically Leftist total disregard for the truth but it might not be so well-known for what it is elsewhere.
The Carnival of the Vanities is up again. Bigwig, who has just put it up comments: "Tired, very tired. Bloody productive Blogosphere."
The Wicked one points out some of the irrational outcomes of the recent halt in in moves toward freer trade. But Milton Friedman puts it better than anyone (of course) -- even though he is now in his 90s.
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Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
**********************************
More on the politics of research: After 26 years of trying to prove mobile phones weren't safe Mays Swicord has had enough. "It comes down to having a public conscience. The public wants to know whether there is a health issue. If there isn't one, then we should stop wasting money looking for it." Asked about why he now works for Motorola and if there is a conflict of interest, he says: "Academic researchers also have a conflict of interest in that they want to promote their own research. So one has to look at what makes sense in terms of science"
There is a good reply by Alan Caruba here to the "Blame America" brigade. How Muslims can be constantly doing the most horrific deeds worldwide and America is still the one in the wrong certainly does seem pretty deranged.
Amusing: On the “Oldie” message board someone has posted a message pointing out how similar Communism and Nazism were. By way of disagreement, a Leftist replied “Give me an example of Communism having a defined aim of genocide”. In other words, both murdered millions but being less frank about it makes a big difference! Only a Leftist would think so.
Interesting idea in the WSJ: That “the Democrats were the "mommy party" and the Republicans the "daddy party." That is, the Democrats were "nurturers," concerned with health policy and day care. The Republicans were "protectors," taking care of national security and other manly matters.” Since roughly equal numbers of men and women vote for both parties, the idea is a rather large stretch, though.
Democrats have been saying from the outset that Iraq would be "another Vietnam". The Vietnam war, however was initiated and supported by Democrats. Shouldn't that mean that Democrats SUPPORT the Iraq intervention? But I guess that they really hate how much more successful Bush has been in Iraq than they were in Vietnam. It was actually a Republican (Nixon) who got America OUT of Vietnam.
Ian Buruma on anti-Americanism and foreign policy: Buruma notes the backing for Bush received from Vaclav Havel, Adam Michnik, and especially Jose Ramos-Horta, the Nobel Peace Prize-winner from East Timor. These are men, who, unlike most commentators in London or New York, know what it is like to live under the cosh.
The Adam Smith Institute has just launched a new blog. Looks good. One titbit: “A new Heritage Foundation survey has found that four times as many Members of Congress use private schools as the American public” How odd! But This might give you an idea why: "Faced with a federal deadline to define a "highly qualified" teacher, Washington state recently decided middle school teachers could continue to teach any subject -- even if they never mastered the topic in college or proved they are knowledgeable about it"
Details about the job of a baggage screener Not very encouraging.
"Rabbit Proof Fence": This film has long been known in Australia as Leftist propaganda with a typically Leftist total disregard for the truth but it might not be so well-known for what it is elsewhere.
The Carnival of the Vanities is up again. Bigwig, who has just put it up comments: "Tired, very tired. Bloody productive Blogosphere."
The Wicked one points out some of the irrational outcomes of the recent halt in in moves toward freer trade. But Milton Friedman puts it better than anyone (of course) -- even though he is now in his 90s.
*******************************
Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
**********************************
Wednesday, September 17, 2003
COWED CONSERVATIVE PROFESSORS
As a former academic myself I can tell you that the average Professor really hates it that he has to sit in a crowded office churning out great ideas for only an average salary while someone else in business with little education and just one good idea can make a million dollars. In other words our average academic thinks that the existing system cheats him of the money and recognition that he deserves -- and that makes him want to change that system: It makes him a Leftist. And that is the big reason why academics with no alternative market for their skills and “wisdom” -- i.e. professors in the humanities and social sciences -- are so overwhelmingly Leftist. A small number of academics however -- including me -- are so constitutionally conservative that they defy the Leftist consensus all around them. Mostly, however, they have to do it very cautiously in case they lose their job over it.
A good example of such caution seems to be “Conservativenet” -- an online discussion group for conservative academics. I get the impression that the moderator, Richard Jensen, is very careful to screen out any posts that might upset the Leftists. He defines his censorship guidelines with the following bromide: “Conservativenet refuses to publish lies, hate speech and incoherent arguments”. Any Leftist Political Correctness advocate would defend HIS policies in the same way. Because the list seems to be so censored, I myself have never bothered with it but readers of this blog do occasionally send me stuff off it (plus news of posts that have been rejected).
Recently a reader noted that the list had posted on it the NYT article on Facism that I mentioned on this blog here. The NYT article did of course have that paper’s characteristic Leftist bias so my reader suggested that I post a reply on Conservativenet to set the record straight. I therefore submitted my “Front Page” article on Fascism for posting on the list. My article points out the most inconvenient truth that Fascism originated on the Left, not the Right. In a fit of rashness, moderator Jensen did in fact post it on his list.
He soon seemed to regret his rashness, however. When another contributor to the list posted some points of disagreement with my article and I endeavoured to reply, Jensen refused to post my reply on very superficial grounds. Fear reasserted itself.
I have however posted here the censored reply (plus Jensen’s feeble excuse) for the benefit of those who have less to fear. If anyone thinks my reply contained “lies, hate speech and incoherent arguments”, please let me know.
As a former academic myself I can tell you that the average Professor really hates it that he has to sit in a crowded office churning out great ideas for only an average salary while someone else in business with little education and just one good idea can make a million dollars. In other words our average academic thinks that the existing system cheats him of the money and recognition that he deserves -- and that makes him want to change that system: It makes him a Leftist. And that is the big reason why academics with no alternative market for their skills and “wisdom” -- i.e. professors in the humanities and social sciences -- are so overwhelmingly Leftist. A small number of academics however -- including me -- are so constitutionally conservative that they defy the Leftist consensus all around them. Mostly, however, they have to do it very cautiously in case they lose their job over it.
A good example of such caution seems to be “Conservativenet” -- an online discussion group for conservative academics. I get the impression that the moderator, Richard Jensen, is very careful to screen out any posts that might upset the Leftists. He defines his censorship guidelines with the following bromide: “Conservativenet refuses to publish lies, hate speech and incoherent arguments”. Any Leftist Political Correctness advocate would defend HIS policies in the same way. Because the list seems to be so censored, I myself have never bothered with it but readers of this blog do occasionally send me stuff off it (plus news of posts that have been rejected).
Recently a reader noted that the list had posted on it the NYT article on Facism that I mentioned on this blog here. The NYT article did of course have that paper’s characteristic Leftist bias so my reader suggested that I post a reply on Conservativenet to set the record straight. I therefore submitted my “Front Page” article on Fascism for posting on the list. My article points out the most inconvenient truth that Fascism originated on the Left, not the Right. In a fit of rashness, moderator Jensen did in fact post it on his list.
He soon seemed to regret his rashness, however. When another contributor to the list posted some points of disagreement with my article and I endeavoured to reply, Jensen refused to post my reply on very superficial grounds. Fear reasserted itself.
I have however posted here the censored reply (plus Jensen’s feeble excuse) for the benefit of those who have less to fear. If anyone thinks my reply contained “lies, hate speech and incoherent arguments”, please let me know.
THE POLITICS OF ACADEMIC RESEARCH
My latest upload of one of my published academic journal articles here (or here) is another example of my awkward tendency to speak the truth at all costs. I look at the claim that certain personality types predispose you to heart disease and confirm that they do -- but then I go on to point out that the correlations are so weak as to be of no practical importance. Needless to say, all the psychologists and cardiologists who were getting massive funding to investigate the connection between heart disease and personality managed to overlook my article! I in effect threatened to kill the goose that was laying their golden eggs! For similar reasons only a minority of climatologists today are willing to blow the whistle on the nonsensical “global warming” theory. Their funding depends on treating it seriously!
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My latest upload of one of my published academic journal articles here (or here) is another example of my awkward tendency to speak the truth at all costs. I look at the claim that certain personality types predispose you to heart disease and confirm that they do -- but then I go on to point out that the correlations are so weak as to be of no practical importance. Needless to say, all the psychologists and cardiologists who were getting massive funding to investigate the connection between heart disease and personality managed to overlook my article! I in effect threatened to kill the goose that was laying their golden eggs! For similar reasons only a minority of climatologists today are willing to blow the whistle on the nonsensical “global warming” theory. Their funding depends on treating it seriously!
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ELSEWHERE
Nicholas Farrell in the UK Spectator tells us more about the way Mussolini differed from Hitler and Stalin and also reflects on the recent controversial interview with Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi. He thinks that one reason why Berlusconi is so much attacked is this: “Berlusconi’s ...opponents on the Left are desperate to deflect attention from a scandal of immense proportions which threatens to engulf them. The scandal is this: in 1997, when the EU commissioner, Romano Prodi, was Italian prime minister, the state-owned Italian telecommunications company — Stet — bought 29 per cent of Telekom Serbia from Slobodan Milosevic for roughly £300 million; then, in 2002, Telecom Italia (by then Stet had been privatised) sold back the share for about £100 million. The scandal involves all the usual allegations of massive bribes, not to mention the chucking of so much public money down the drain. Worse, Milosevic used the money, according to a CIA report, to finance his ethnic cleansing in Kosovo."
Paddy McGuinness compares the treatment dished out to conservative Australian historians Geoffrey Blainey and Keith Windschuttle with the treatment received by 'the skeptical environmentalist' Bjorn Lomberg. “Letters to the Editor” in The Australian of 16th (See here) show that some people seem amazed at the personal attacks on Windschuttle but since Windschuttle has shown what liars the Leftist historians are I am not surprised at all. It is in the nature of Leftists to be vicious rather than repentant. What did Stalin ever repent of? Millions of deaths seemed to sit easily on HIS conscience. And note that at the end of the letters page Windschuttle himself catches the Leftists out in even more lies.
Now that the voters of Sweden have given the Eurocrats a black eye, it is worth looking at this classic FEE paper -- in which UK economist Norman Barry examines the case against euro-centralism and urges a return to the liberal free trading principles of the original "Treaty Of Rome" -- which differs considerably from the bureaucracy of Brussels today.
"There is a serious irony to left wing schemes like Fair Trade: The Fair Trade scheme is capitalist at heart. These lefties and hippies, the tree huggers who want change the planet and pay burros a living wage are using the free market to do it. Fair Trade is just an advertising scheme to convince people to buy a certain brand of coffee.”
Gerald Henderson points out that "mandatory detention for unlawful entrants was introduced by the Labor government in 1992" so blaming Australia’s tough illegal immigrant policy on “uncaring” conservatives is a bit rich.
You’ve heard of optical illusions? Well, The Wicked one has a verbal illusion.
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Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
**********************************
Nicholas Farrell in the UK Spectator tells us more about the way Mussolini differed from Hitler and Stalin and also reflects on the recent controversial interview with Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi. He thinks that one reason why Berlusconi is so much attacked is this: “Berlusconi’s ...opponents on the Left are desperate to deflect attention from a scandal of immense proportions which threatens to engulf them. The scandal is this: in 1997, when the EU commissioner, Romano Prodi, was Italian prime minister, the state-owned Italian telecommunications company — Stet — bought 29 per cent of Telekom Serbia from Slobodan Milosevic for roughly £300 million; then, in 2002, Telecom Italia (by then Stet had been privatised) sold back the share for about £100 million. The scandal involves all the usual allegations of massive bribes, not to mention the chucking of so much public money down the drain. Worse, Milosevic used the money, according to a CIA report, to finance his ethnic cleansing in Kosovo."
Paddy McGuinness compares the treatment dished out to conservative Australian historians Geoffrey Blainey and Keith Windschuttle with the treatment received by 'the skeptical environmentalist' Bjorn Lomberg. “Letters to the Editor” in The Australian of 16th (See here) show that some people seem amazed at the personal attacks on Windschuttle but since Windschuttle has shown what liars the Leftist historians are I am not surprised at all. It is in the nature of Leftists to be vicious rather than repentant. What did Stalin ever repent of? Millions of deaths seemed to sit easily on HIS conscience. And note that at the end of the letters page Windschuttle himself catches the Leftists out in even more lies.
Now that the voters of Sweden have given the Eurocrats a black eye, it is worth looking at this classic FEE paper -- in which UK economist Norman Barry examines the case against euro-centralism and urges a return to the liberal free trading principles of the original "Treaty Of Rome" -- which differs considerably from the bureaucracy of Brussels today.
"There is a serious irony to left wing schemes like Fair Trade: The Fair Trade scheme is capitalist at heart. These lefties and hippies, the tree huggers who want change the planet and pay burros a living wage are using the free market to do it. Fair Trade is just an advertising scheme to convince people to buy a certain brand of coffee.”
Gerald Henderson points out that "mandatory detention for unlawful entrants was introduced by the Labor government in 1992" so blaming Australia’s tough illegal immigrant policy on “uncaring” conservatives is a bit rich.
You’ve heard of optical illusions? Well, The Wicked one has a verbal illusion.
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Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
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Tuesday, September 16, 2003
THE CORE CONSERVATIVE VALUES
A recent book on the history of American conservatism lists the following as the ten most important conservative beliefs:
1. Continuity: Order and the Rate of Change. "Tradition, continuity, and order in society . . . must not be disregarded, however carefully reasoned or attractive an untested reform may be."
2. Authority: Power and the Limits of Government. "The state's primary function is to protect against foreign threats and to keep order at home . . . . The foundation of military strength is the belief that the American social order is unique and worthy of protection and respect."
3. Community: Decentralization of Social Institutions. "The proper function of government . . . is not to concentrate power but to diffuse it to the institutions of organic society . . . [which] serve as checks on the power of the central authority."
4. Deity: Man and Morality. "The conservative generally has a strong belief in God and holds to traditional moral values."
5. Duty: Responsibilities over Rights. " 'Rights are something to be earned rather than given . . . The duties of man - service, effort, obedience, cultivation of virtue, and self-restraint - are the price of rights.'"
6. Democracy: Limited Government and the Constitution. "If law changes with the circumstances of the time, it becomes uncertain and unstable. In such circumstances, Americans live under a government of men, not of laws."
7. Property: The Role of Economics. "Capitalism is built on the assumption of private property . . .Government should interfere in the economy as little as possible, allowing the law of supply and demand to guide men in making profitable decisions."
8. Liberty: Equality's Big Brother. "Individuals have an infinite variety of talents and are entitled to find economic, political, and social rewards without fear of government license or redistribution."
9. Meritocracy: The Leadership Class. "America was founded as a society opposed to titles of nobility . . . John Adams spoke of a 'natural aristocracy,' which anyone could join by virtue of merit and ability."
10. Antipathy: The Anticommunist Impulse. "The chief crime of communism is not that it takes away property, but that it removes freedom upon which property is based."
That sounds pretty right but note that most of them boil down to limiting government and maximizing individual liberty.
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GOOD STUFF FROM THE U.K. “SPECTATOR”
Interesting: Although it is common for Leftists to ascribe the origin of Al Qa'eda to Ronald Reagan's support of the Afghan Mujahadeen in the 1980s, a more realistic hypothesis seems to be that Clinton's support of the Bosnian Muslims in the 1990s was instrumental. As the Yugoslav interventions are seen as a “Good Thing” by the Left this connection is rarely raised.
German anti-Americanism really is childish: “Ever since the war there has been a strong vein of anti-American feeling in Germany. To have your country defeated, occupied and then defended by a foreign power is humiliating”
Mark Steyn says that 9/11 did a lot more psychological damage to the Europeans than it did to the USA: “I seriously underestimated the degree to which much of Europe would be unhinged by 11 September”
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A recent book on the history of American conservatism lists the following as the ten most important conservative beliefs:
1. Continuity: Order and the Rate of Change. "Tradition, continuity, and order in society . . . must not be disregarded, however carefully reasoned or attractive an untested reform may be."
2. Authority: Power and the Limits of Government. "The state's primary function is to protect against foreign threats and to keep order at home . . . . The foundation of military strength is the belief that the American social order is unique and worthy of protection and respect."
3. Community: Decentralization of Social Institutions. "The proper function of government . . . is not to concentrate power but to diffuse it to the institutions of organic society . . . [which] serve as checks on the power of the central authority."
4. Deity: Man and Morality. "The conservative generally has a strong belief in God and holds to traditional moral values."
5. Duty: Responsibilities over Rights. " 'Rights are something to be earned rather than given . . . The duties of man - service, effort, obedience, cultivation of virtue, and self-restraint - are the price of rights.'"
6. Democracy: Limited Government and the Constitution. "If law changes with the circumstances of the time, it becomes uncertain and unstable. In such circumstances, Americans live under a government of men, not of laws."
7. Property: The Role of Economics. "Capitalism is built on the assumption of private property . . .Government should interfere in the economy as little as possible, allowing the law of supply and demand to guide men in making profitable decisions."
8. Liberty: Equality's Big Brother. "Individuals have an infinite variety of talents and are entitled to find economic, political, and social rewards without fear of government license or redistribution."
9. Meritocracy: The Leadership Class. "America was founded as a society opposed to titles of nobility . . . John Adams spoke of a 'natural aristocracy,' which anyone could join by virtue of merit and ability."
10. Antipathy: The Anticommunist Impulse. "The chief crime of communism is not that it takes away property, but that it removes freedom upon which property is based."
That sounds pretty right but note that most of them boil down to limiting government and maximizing individual liberty.
************************************
GOOD STUFF FROM THE U.K. “SPECTATOR”
Interesting: Although it is common for Leftists to ascribe the origin of Al Qa'eda to Ronald Reagan's support of the Afghan Mujahadeen in the 1980s, a more realistic hypothesis seems to be that Clinton's support of the Bosnian Muslims in the 1990s was instrumental. As the Yugoslav interventions are seen as a “Good Thing” by the Left this connection is rarely raised.
German anti-Americanism really is childish: “Ever since the war there has been a strong vein of anti-American feeling in Germany. To have your country defeated, occupied and then defended by a foreign power is humiliating”
Mark Steyn says that 9/11 did a lot more psychological damage to the Europeans than it did to the USA: “I seriously underestimated the degree to which much of Europe would be unhinged by 11 September”
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ELSEWHERE
Mark Steyn notes that there were lots of people around when the Swedish foreign minister was stabbed but that these people -- who are descendants of Vikings! -- did nothing to stop the crime or grab the criminal. He links it to the passivity induced by Sweden's welfare State.
Jozef Imrich makes a good point with reference to Iraq: "There are few flawless victories. The Second World War in Europe began in defense of Poland's freedom against Nazi tyranny. It ended in a tremendous Allied victory, but left Poland subject to an alternate despotism."
A hero! "Incensed at the volume of junk e-mail he got, a determined Redmond man last week won a record $250,000 judgment against two Ohio residents who broke a Washington law by deluging him with spam.
"All that stands between us and the abyss is George W. Bush." How’s that for an extreme statement? But read the rationale and see what you think.
I have no idea what this article is saying. It SEEMS to be saying that women who spend a whole lot of money on high-priced crap in the name of fashion are behaving reasonably! Maybe someone should explain it to me.
Mangled Thoughts has a rather derogatory description of the EU.
The Wicked one has an impassioned argument against farm subsidies -- saying that they are destructive, impoverishing and amount to rural socialism.
My latest academic upload here (or here) is one of only four articles on IQ that I have had published in the academic journals. That is, however four more than 99% of my critics. The present upload reports evidence to show that highly intelligent people are much less likely to smoke than are others.
*******************************
Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
**********************************
Mark Steyn notes that there were lots of people around when the Swedish foreign minister was stabbed but that these people -- who are descendants of Vikings! -- did nothing to stop the crime or grab the criminal. He links it to the passivity induced by Sweden's welfare State.
Jozef Imrich makes a good point with reference to Iraq: "There are few flawless victories. The Second World War in Europe began in defense of Poland's freedom against Nazi tyranny. It ended in a tremendous Allied victory, but left Poland subject to an alternate despotism."
A hero! "Incensed at the volume of junk e-mail he got, a determined Redmond man last week won a record $250,000 judgment against two Ohio residents who broke a Washington law by deluging him with spam.
"All that stands between us and the abyss is George W. Bush." How’s that for an extreme statement? But read the rationale and see what you think.
I have no idea what this article is saying. It SEEMS to be saying that women who spend a whole lot of money on high-priced crap in the name of fashion are behaving reasonably! Maybe someone should explain it to me.
Mangled Thoughts has a rather derogatory description of the EU.
The Wicked one has an impassioned argument against farm subsidies -- saying that they are destructive, impoverishing and amount to rural socialism.
My latest academic upload here (or here) is one of only four articles on IQ that I have had published in the academic journals. That is, however four more than 99% of my critics. The present upload reports evidence to show that highly intelligent people are much less likely to smoke than are others.
*******************************
Comments? Email me here or here. If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Page is here or here.
**********************************
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