ELSEWHERE

Another good email from Germany: "I saw your link to the "German Idiocy" article and had to laugh. The story fits in quite well with my experiences as an American living in Germany and working in the German academic enviornment. I attended a presentation on Bayesian statistics several weeks ago, where the presenter needed an example of updated probabilities. He began discussing the probability that the U.S. would invade Iran now that the U.S. had invaded Iraq. This led to some in the audience mentioning other countries where the U.S. had been engaged militarily. I quickly shouted out, "Germany!" This shut them up, and the presentation continued without further America bashing."

Lawrence Auster is a pretty old-fashioned conservative himself so his critique of the "paleocons" (who as far as I can see are in fact largely anarcho-capitalists rather than any sort of conservative) got a bit of a reaction. Such internecine feuds are normally of little interest to me but this particular feud involves criticism of "psychologizing". The claim is that one should look only at the argument someone is advancing rather than their motivation for making the argument. That is of course the classic critique of "ad hominem" arguments but in cases when an argument makes no sense at the logical level, I think you have to look at the psychological motivation. It is of course my contention that Leftism can ONLY be understood as a psychological rather than a rational phenomenon. Leftist arguments are so inconsistent from occasion to occasion that one has to look at what is behind such a strange phenomenon. So I am on Auster's side in this one. There is of course an argument against speculative or "pop" psychologizing but my 200+ published academic journal articles on political psychology insulate me fairly well from that charge. I do not however rely on any claims of authority to substantiate what I say about Leftist psychology. I do what all scientists do (or should do): Present evidence for what I say. And again, I think Auster does a fair job of substantiating his points in that way.

Good news: Refusing to be brushed off by Democratic opposition in the Senate, President Bush plans to nominate for a second time 20 people who did not receive up or down votes on their nominations for federal judgeships."

Read this bit of Leftist propaganda: "Freedom has become the political buzzword of the 21st century. George Bush's agenda is to bring democracy and freedom to the rest of the peoples of the world, while his own are slaves to work, crippled by personal debt, and trapped in loneliness or loveless relationships-the shackles of the rich. Now that the surviving Afghanis and Iraqis are enjoying the benefits of Western freedoms, what will this mean for their health?" So where is the quote from? From the British Medical Journal, no less. Another example of the politicization of science. Code Blue goes to town on the story. I blogged on how far Left the BMJ is 18 months ago so the current story is no surprise to me.

Government should fund science?: "Folks like Friedman take it for granted that only the government will undertake large-scale scientific ventures. But where does the government get the money? All government can do is take wealth from those who produced it and give it to those who didn't. The stock answer is that private investors won't finance 'basic research' because it's not profitable in the short run. What this really means is that politicians and bureaucrats can be counted on to see the benefits of basic research more objectively than entrepreneurs. I'd like to see Friedman say that with a straight face."

Bush presses for "guest worker" program: "President Bush yesterday renewed his call for a guest-worker program for immigrants seeking employment in the United States. He said the Border Patrol shouldn't be chasing 'good-hearted people who are coming here to work.' Bush has wanted such a program since taking office four years ago.But the idea was sidetracked by the Sept. 11 attacks and then left on the sideline because the White House did not want to tackle such a heated issue during an election year."

Steven Landsburg is a very clever economist. He has here an amusing but serious defence of Ebenezer Scrooge. I am myself a bit of a scrooge in Landsburg's terms -- in that I live simply from choice rather than necessity -- so I quite like Landsburg's argument. I do greatly enjoy Christmas, however. I have got Christmas carols on the stereo as I write this in fact. One of my favourites is playing: "God rest ye merry gentlemen". I think Christmas carols are wonderful and I pity the poor twisted Leftist souls who cannot participate in the great and joyous emotions they convey. They must be very shaky in their own convictions if any mention of Christianity bothers them. Gloria in excelsis Deo!

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

Comments? Email me 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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THE IDEOLOGICAL ORIGINS OF GENOCIDE

"In January 1849, months before he migrated to London, Karl Marx published an article by Friedrich Engels in Die Neue Rheinische Zeitung announcing that in Central Europe only Germans, Hungarians and Poles counted as bearers of progress. The rest must go. "The chief mission of all other races and peoples, large and small, is to perish in the revolutionary holocaust."

Genocide arose out of Marx's master-theory of history -- feudalism giving place inevitably to capitalism, capitalism to socialism. The lesser races of Europe -- Basques, Serbs, Bretons and others -- being sunk in feudalism, were counter-revolutionary; having failed to develop a bourgeoisie, they would be two steps behind in the historical process. Engels dismissed them as left-overs and ethnic trash (Voelkerabfall), and called for their extinction.

So genocide was born as a doctrine in the German Rhineland in January 1849, in a Europe still reeling from the revolutions of 1848. It was to become the beacon light of socialism, proudly held and proudly proclaimed."

The above is a quote from the latest article by George Watson -- a literary historian specializing in the early history of socialism (I have an earlier article of his posted here and there is a review of his major book here). The quote is taken from an article in the December 2004 issue of Quadrant, Australia's premier intellectual conservative magazine. The article will not be online for a month or so yet but I have temporarily posted here and here a PDF of the first page.

I have of course for some time been pointing out that eugenics was a great Leftist cause right up until Hitler thoroughly discredited the idea with his atrocities. Documenting the Leftist infatuation with eugenics in the first half of the 20th century is all too easy. But the fact that the idea largely originated with Marx and Engels themselves has been hidden from public awareness with almost total success. There are many avid scholars of Marx's every word but some things are just too embarrassing to mention. I earnestly hope that the Marxian origin of Hitler's doctrines will become increasingly well-known. I hope that other bloggers will join me in publicizing it.

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ELSEWHERE

Although I am an atheist, I have never wavered from my view that the New Testament is the best guide to living and I still enjoy reading it. Here is what the apostle Paul says about vegetarians: "For one believeth that he may eat all things: another, who is weak, eateth herbs. Let not him that eatheth despise him that eateth not; and let not him which eatheth not judge him that eateth." (Romans 14: 2.3). What perfect advice! That is real tolerance: Very different from the one-way tolerance of the Left.

German idiocy: "Scene: An elevator in a hotel in a small town in Germany, about a week ago. Dramatis personae: Your humble columnist, your humble columnist's mother, a German gentleman in his 60s. My mother and I exchanged a few words in our native Russian, whereupon the German gentleman inquired amicably, 'Russisch?' I explained that we did, in fact, come from Russia originally, but had lived in the United States for nearly 25 years and were now American. The man's demeanor changed visibly. After a glum silence, he remarked sourly as we were leaving the elevator, 'America is always starting wars everywhere in the world. It's not good for people.' I was so shocked that the most obvious comeback did not occur to me until a couple of minutes later, when he was out of sight: 'You mean, like World War II?'"

Marijuana risky: "Using marijuana in adolescence and early adulthood can cause psychotic symptoms later in life, a new study suggests. The risk of developing these symptoms is "moderate", say researchers, though is higher in people with a pre-disposition to psychosis.... A team led by Jim van Os of the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands followed 2437 people aged between 14 and 24. After four years, 21% of cannabis users had experienced psychotic symptoms compared with 15% of non-users. And the more a participant used cannabis, the more likely they were to develop symptoms". [For the record, I believe that marijuana use should not be legally prohibited but I also believe that people should be fully informed about any hazards involved. There is a longer extract from the article, with comments here]

War can be necessary: "I argue that our main problems are not too much force, but too little. A peaceful world is not a world with no ready forces but one with adequate, responsible, and superior force that is used when necessary. The failure to have or use such forces causes terror and war to grow exponentially. Unused force, when needed at a particular time and place, ceases to be force..... Nor is this an argument for force "for force's sake." It is an argument for force for justice's sake. I am not for "eternal peace," which is a this-worldly myth, but for real peace of actual men in an actual and fallen world. Peace is not a goal, but a consequence of doing what is right and preventing what is wrong and, yes, knowing the difference between the two. Justice and force require one another in the actual world".

An interesting explanation of why Leftists say America is evil: "Those who reject morality in their own lives often project their conscience out onto the periphery of their experience. They take righteous stands on political issues and embrace idealistic ideologies, as a compensation for the moral failures and guilt in their personal lives. They reject personal morality but believe in social morality. Holding the right political beliefs enables them to feel self-righteousness, without the trouble of actually being righteous..... Christians know that self-righteousness of every kind is a spiritual delusion that shuts out the need for Christ's forgiveness". [(If this article is offline, find it here])

"Social justice" defined: "The Left uses the phrase 'social justice' simultaneously to claim moral high ground and to avoid addressing the weaknesses of their catchphrase arguments. By declaring that all of their positions advance 'social justice,' anyone who opposes them must necessarily be a cruel bigoted Neanderthal. After all, what reasonable person could be against 'justice?' As a general rule, the less logic there is behind an argument, the more often the words 'social justice' are uttered in defending it."

I have just put up here an email from an American lady who is very passionate about her country.

Carnival of the Vanities is up again to ensure that you have plenty to read if you are bored at Christmas.

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

Comments? Email me 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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SOME MORE ECONOMICS

Ignorant tribal thinking: "Mention any topic touching on international trade and you are sure to provoke multiple discussions, ranging from child labor to parity in workplace safety, and including catchy terms like "dumping," "outsourcing," and "brain drain." It seems as if many of our best and brightest scholars are devoting their precious talents to enumerating all of the horrible ills that will beset humanity if we do not act immediately to combat each and every development in the global economy. Yet what do these various proposals to regulate trade all have in common? They are all attempts to prevent people from cooperating with each other. The critics of recent developments in international trade relations, though they have couched their arguments in sophisticated economic rhetoric, are ultimately relying on the tribe mentality: It's us versus them, and anything that they are for must be bad for us. Fortunately for those who cherish harmony and peace, the tribe mentality is factually incorrect. Trade is a positive-sum game"

How about fairness toward employers and landlords? "The Louisville Council is debating whether to reinstate its 'fairness' ordinance, which prohibits employers and landlords from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation. The proponents of this ordinance claim that it expresses the community's tolerance and fairness toward all its citizens, but, in fact, it really expresses bigotry and intolerance against employers and landlords."

Economies as ecosystems: "Are economies ecosystems? The parallels are striking. The energy driving ecosystems ultimately comes from the sun, while the energy driving economies ultimately comes from another boundless of energy source -- human imagination and innovation. Inspired individuals -- energetic, enthusiastic, and perhaps just a bit sun-struck -- plant their seeds of innovation, creating new products and starting new companies. Those seeds are fragile at first. Many fail, crushed by competition, starved by high costs or strangled by burdensome regulations."

Even Leftists can learn eventually: "The Boston City Council voted down a rent control proposal yesterday, sparking a dramatic protest by tenants and housing activists... The 8-to-5 defeat of the ''community stabilization act," a milder version of one proposed by Mayor Thomas M. Menino and killed by the council two years ago, probably means the end of efforts to cap rents and provide other tenant protections in the city -- at least for the foreseeable future".

How to discourage job-creation in one easy lesson: "Today, in Germany and France, divorcing your spouse is easier, and in most cases cheaper, than dismissing an employee under due observance of the provisions of the contract of employment. The administrative hurdles can be a long nightmare. Court approval may be required and failing it, the employees in question must be reinstated. The labor union representing a majority of the employees must agree to the "social plan" by which the employer company undertakes to assist the employees who lose their jobs."

The myth of wartime prosperity: "It is clear enough that war stimulates certain sectors of the economy. But it is logically and economically unjustified to equate that stimulus with prosperity for the American people as a whole. Ludwig von Mises summed up the correct position when he observed, 'War prosperity is like the prosperity that an earthquake or a plague brings.' Fr,d,ric Bastiat exposed the 'broken window' fallacy in the mid-nineteenth century. A shop window broken by a man's 'incorrigible son' is said to benefit the economy, since the company that fixes the window enjoys a 'stimulus,' which in turn is passed along to those with whom the window company does business."

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ELSEWHERE

Further to my recent post on blogs Right and Left, David Boxenhorn thinks that Leftist blogs have a bigger readership because Leftists are more conformist. He is however assuming that only the top Leftist blogs have big readerships (compared with conservative blogs). My impression is that lots of Leftist blogs have big readerships. One of my correspondents had yet another take on the matter. He wrote: "I'd be willing to bet the main reason lefty blogs get so many hits is because folks on the right usually have some kind of freakin' job which precludes them from haunting the web all day..."

The Independent Institute has up a very skeptical article on America's missile defence system. Sadly, I must say that I think that the system is a flop so far and much more research needs to be done before anything is deployed.

Democrats repel Catholics: "the Party's platforms and candidates have ever more stridently advocated policies that undermine the traditional family structure, such as unrestricted abortion, embryonic stem-cell research, and homosexual "marriage." The Democrats' extreme platforms recognize no right of conscientious dissent: in other words, these policies have become the very basis on which the Party rests, and their candidates willy-nilly must accept them. The Catholic Church, which has labored for decades to preserve and promote the dignity of the person and the family, is threatened by these policies. Indeed, the founding principle of our country-that all men are created equal in their natural rights to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness-is equally contradicted by the Democratic Party's dedication to policies that weaken families, kill unborn human beings, and manipulate human nature in the name of science. Until the Democratic Party reforms itself, most Catholics-educated by their bishops to recognize these policies as sinful-will no longer vote for Democratic presidential nominees".

Hilarious! The tax-loving People's Republic of Berkeley has just knocked back tax increases: "After years of voting for various tax measures that have made Berkeley's property taxes the highest in the state, voters are now saying: enough already. On Nov. 2, four tax measures designed to fund basic services such as fire and police, youth programs, medical services and libraries -- yes, libraries -- failed to get the two-thirds vote they needed to pass"

David Brooks has a very sarcastic article about the "unfortunate" stream of events that have led to various encouraging developments in the Middle East.

There is a good short account of the history of ancient Rome here that shows how Rome destroyed itself through socialism.

There is a humorous posting here called: ""Overcoming Leftism: A 12-Step Program"

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

Comments? Email me 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 ROUNDUP

In recognition of the fact that I post too much for many readers to keep up with, I once again list what I think are the best posts on my various blogs over the last week.

Dissecting Leftism says that a belief in individual liberty is more basic to conservatism than is traditionalism.

Political Correctness Watch lists some of the recent attacks on Christmas.

Greenie Watch lists some of the low points of the big global warming confab in Buenos Aires.

Gun Watch notes a case of free speech about guns being suppressed at a university.

Socialized Medicine lists big problems with Canada's "free" health care

Education Watch notes that the Dutch too are now fleeing from "black" inner-city schools.

Leftists as Elitists says that contempt for the ordinary person underlies the desire to keep retirement funding in government hands.

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HISPANIC IMMIGRATION

I rarely say much about immigration control. It is now a settled issue in Australia with illegal immigration having been brought to a virtual standstill. So I have no concerns about the Australian situation. The American situation is however a different matter. The great divisions in America are mainly among conservatives and I can see merit on both sides of the argument. I do however contribute regularly to a blog that is concerned with minority/majority issues so I have posted there a few thoughts on what I see as the basic issues involved. For those who are interested see here and here.

Update

Drat! The site on which my thoughts on immigration are recorded seems to be down at the moment. I have therefore reposted the material here

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ELSEWHERE

A WSJ article here says that GWB has won a new and like-minded ally in India. Policies that piss off the Europeans are well-received in India.

There is an article here about how intensely Christian the American revolutionaries were. That their constituton has been interpreted to ban public displays of anything Christian is clearly a vast perversion of their intent and thus reflects badly on most of the modern courts that have claimed to interpret it.

An amusing WSJ article here points out that the "Blue Stater" grumbles about paying more tax than the "Red Staters" do is a direct result of the "soak the rich" policies that the Blue Staters up until now have always claimed to believe in. They have brought their higher taxes on themselves!

Mike Tremoglie exposes the distortions in media reports of what Rumsfeld said in Iraq about armour for U.S. military vehicles.

Chomsky's myth of the leftist silent majority: "What we are really dealing with here is a classic trope which has been a sacred catechism of the Chomskyite Left since the landslide defeat of George McGovern in 1972: the myth of the silent Leftist majority; the idea that, somehow, the majority of the American electorate is, in fact, composed of radical Leftists who, if given the chance, would vote the capitalist system out of existence; the only reason they do not, the theory goes, is the sinister manipulations of the media/political class, who brainwash them into ignoring their true beliefs and interests and conspires through the electoral/media system to keep the Left a marginal electoral force."

Discrimination myths: "The ideology that informs the thinking of present-day "civil rights" agitation is cluttered with misconceptions. It is not true, for example, that discrimination must lead to poverty. As Thomas Sowell observes, the Chinese have never enjoyed an equal playing field in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, or Vietnam, yet the Chinese minority in these countries - a mere five percent of the population - owns most of these nations' total investments in a variety of key industries. In Malaysia, the Chinese minority suffers official discrimination at the hands of the Malaysian constitution, and yet their incomes are still twice the national average"

The Leftist track-record: "With the fall of the Soviet Union and communist governments in Eastern Europe, too many have the impression that Marxism, the religion of communism, is dead. Hardly. It is alive and well in many countries still, such as North Korea, China, Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, a gaggle of African countries, and in the minds of many South American political leaders. However, of most importance to the future of democracy, communism still pollutes the thinking of a vast multitude of Western academics and intellectuals. Of all religions, secular and otherwise, that of Marxism has been by far the bloodiest - bloodier than the Catholic Inquisition, the various Catholic crusades, and the Thirty Years War between Catholics and Protestants. In practice, Marxism has meant bloody terrorism, deadly purges, lethal prison camps and murderous forced labor, fatal deportations, man-made famines, extrajudicial executions and fraudulent show trials, outright mass murder and genocide. In total, Marxist regimes murdered nearly 110 million people from 1917 to 1987. For perspective on this incredible toll, note that all domestic and foreign wars during the 20th century killed around 35 million."

Here is a pictorial explanation of why the Muslims hate us.

Paragraph Farmer has an amusing story about a pathetic actress (Natalie Portman) who cannot even be politically correct when she tries.

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

Comments? Email me 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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BLOGS RIGHT AND LEFT

Fun! Thanks to Arthur Chrenkoff, I have just learned that some loony Leftist has put up a site called "Dissecting Rightism". It is a deliberate spoof of this site. As Arthur said to me: Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. The author has even gone to the trouble of copying my template -- which must have been a little bit of work. The "View Source" command gets you only so far and I don't think Pyra now circulate the original template on which mine was based. Anyhow, his work has just got him a link from me, though I doubt that any of my readers will log on more than once. The author of the site calls himself "Noel Chrotsky", which seems to be a reference to two very nasty Leftist hate-merchants -- Noam Chomsky and Leon Trotsky. I suspect that the author must be Australian. My site is a prominent one by Australian standards but is very small beer in any international comparison. I think an American Leftist would have spoofed (say) Powerline or LGF -- though I see that LGF does already have a Watch site.

This little episode has caused me to reflect a little on why Leftist blogs seem to have far more hits and far more commenters than conservative blogs do. Kos, for instance, gets around 400,000 hits per day compared to Instapundit's 200,000. I think the main reason is an obvious one: Leftist beliefs need a lot more propping up than do conservative ones. A conservative finds his views -- such as the belief that you have to be careful whom you will trust -- confirmed all around him every day, whereas a Leftist finds that his views -- such as the belief that no-one (except "Rednecks") is really evil -- constantly contradicted by events. So the Leftist needs all the help he can get to generate a distorted and selective view of reality that will keep him going. So he is far more active in seeking out supportive sites than conservatives generally are. And Noam Chomsky and Michael Moore have made a bundle out of catering to that need for confirmation of Leftist beliefs too, of course. The fragility of Leftist beliefs is also attested to by how abusive they become when questioned and the Stalinist way they do their best to keep all conservative thinking out of their university enclaves. Reality has to be kept at a distance by hook or by crook.

Generating a counter-factual view of reality takes some talent, however, so that also explains why right-leaning blogs seem to outnumber Leftist blogs by about 2 to 1. You have to be ingenious to defend Leftism whereas a conservative just has to point out the facts.

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ELSEWHERE

Lawrence Auster made the following brief comment on my post yesterday about his writings: "I thank Mr. Ray for his sympathetic and thoughtful overview of my writings. However, regarding his main criticism of me, I don't think I ever said that the belief in individual liberty was not part of the American conservative tradition. The difference is between those who understand liberty as being within a moral and constitutional order, and those who see liberty, or rather freedom, as essentially free of any constraints". Mark Richardson is another writer who often makes that sort of point. I find such a view incomprehensible. I know of NO conservative who denies that "rights connote duties" and I know of NO conservative who denies that we are in at least some ways constrained in what we do by "human nature". So the claim that there are conservatives who believe in some sort of absolute liberty is a total straw man.

Leftists still like the status quo: "No issue quite highlighted the left's reactionary impulse than when, during the campaign, Bush proposed redeploying American troops from their Cold War outposts around the world. Liberals immediately reacted negatively, making the argument, basically, that the troops should stay where they are, because they've been there for 40 years, and everyone is comfortable with it. It is in foreign policy that the new liberal orientation has been most stark. Liberals once believed in global change based on the advance of human rights. This was an admirable idea (if sometimes poorly implemented). Now it's been abandoned because Bush has picked it up, and liberals believe in little else in foreign policy except that whatever we attempt will fail".

For Australian readers, there is a great article here about cricket in Israel. Once again, it is the Indian influence. You can't separate Indians from their cricket. Because of India, cricket has a FAR bigger following than baseball. Cricket is the world's premier bat-and-ball sport, in fact. Some of the Indian allusions in the article may be a bit obscure so perhaps I should note that Maharashtra is the Indian State where the great commercial centre of Bombay (now Mumbai) is located. And Thane is a sort of outer suburb of Bombay. They make a very good beer there called "London" beer, in fact. And Maharastrans don't normally speak Hindi. They speak Marathi. But because of immigration there are now also lots of native Hindi and Gujurati speakers (among others) in Bombay.

New report highlights continued growth of privatization: "A new report from the Los Angeles-based Reason Foundation shows 2004 has been a banner year for privatization at the state level. A slowing economy and fewer new revenues opened the doors to more privatization as governors and legislatures across the country either expanded current initiatives or created new ones. The Council of State Governments (CSG) conducted a national survey of state government officials to identify recent privatization trends. That survey showed a continued increase in and reliance on privatization."

The greatest gift for all: "All Americans have a huge stake in Christianity. Whether or not we are individually believers in Christ, we are beneficiaries of the moral doctrine that has curbed power and protected the weak. Power is the horse ridden by evil. In the 20th century the horse was ridden hard. One hundred million people were exterminated by National Socialists in Germany and by Soviet and Chinese communists simply because they were members of a race or class that had been demonized by intellectuals and political authority. Power that is secularized and cut free of civilizing traditions is not limited by moral and religious scruples. V.I. Lenin made this clear when he defined the meaning of his dictatorship as 'unlimited power, resting directly on force, not limited by anything.'"

A good email from a reader: "The point you make about targets that the left choose for their outrage being arbitrary and inconsistent strikes a chord. A great example of this was the Anti Iraq War marches of 2003. Watching the news broadcasts of it, one of the most prominent banners was from CND. This struck me as odd indeed. At the time, the thrust of debate on the war was not that Saddam did not have WMD, but whether he was a threat to us. No one seemed to bat an eyelid that an organisation set up with the aim of riding the world of WMDs, was protesting against a war to force a country to disarm itself of WMDs! But of course CND was only about disarming the West of its WMDs. If CND were really about disarming the world of nuclear weapons, I would not expect them to exactly cheer leaders like George Bush, but they could at least have shown some ambivalence about the war -- instead of being part of the founding 'Stop the War' committee."

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

Comments? Email me 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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LAWRENCE AUSTER

I rarely comment on arguments put forward by my fellow conservatives, but I am going to make a small exception today to say a few words about the ideas of Lawrence Auster, a traditionalist Jewish writer who thinks that almost nobody these days is conservative enough. He has just put up on Frontpage an excellent article on the antiwar RIGHT that I fully agree with and recommend. He also has an excellent article here that explains why American Jews are so overwhelmingly Left-wing. He says that they are actually AFRAID of American Protestant Christians, who are -- as Auster points out -- in fact the very best friends that Israel and the Jews have. Auster does not say so but I think the Jews concerned can be forgiven their paranoia. It is a pity that they are not more up to date but Christians (including Protestants such as Calvin and Luther) DID persecute them for a very long time.

Some other Auster articles of the many I could mention are ones complaining that the Pope is too Leftist and that most modern conservatives are really Leftists. He also thinks that the "neocons" are a bad lot who have GWB in their hip-pocket and that America's largely open borders are a disaster.

I of course agree with SOME of those other articles. I do think the whole neocon conspiracy thing is just paranoia but, as an Australian conservative I am delighted that our government has just about stopped illegal immigration stone dead and that it locks up any illegal immigrants it catches -- as it would anyone else who defies our laws. And I agree that the Holy Father, like most of his predecessors, is not much of a conservative politically.

My disagreements with Auster arise from the fact that I am one of those villains whom he sees as having destroyed conservatism -- libertarians. He rightly notes that libertarian conservatism is one of the dominant forms of conservatism today (the other being Christian conservatism) and makes the correct point that Christian conservatives are pretty strongly influenced by individualistic, liberty-oriented thinking too. Unlike Auster, however, I do not see this as a particularly modern phenomenon. I have done an extensive historical survey showing that belief in individual liberty has always been central to conservatism. Auster, by contrast, seems to think that traditionalism is the main current. I actually see something more basic in conservatism that underlies both traditionalism AND belief in liberty -- a certain cautious pragmatism and mistrust of the goodwill of others. Because of this basic trait of caution, conservatives want as much freedom to make their own decisions as possible and they also like systems that have been tried and tested. But the liking for tradition is in the end just a tool -- a way of being cautious, not something that is compelling for its own sake.

So the basis of Auster's complaint is that modern conservatives are too liberty-oriented and value-free -- and he sees this as something that they have in common with the Left. A related complaint is that modern conservatives have no anchors -- they just go along with whatever seems to be working. The only thing I disagree with there is the idea that Leftists believe in liberty. They don't. They only believe in power. They advocate various liberties from time to time -- e.g. various sexual liberties -- mainly because it suits them as a way of disrupting existing society and thus hopefully getting themselves into power. But for the rest, I would claim that liberty and the good life are the only lasting values for secular conservatives and that going along with what seems to be working is the historic conservative modus operandi. And long may it continue! We have had more than enough of theorists telling us what to do!

I apologize to Auster for having to a degree caricaturized his views above but I was aiming only to give a quick impression of them. His own prolific writings give plenty of detail, explanation and nuance.

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ELSEWHERE

This article in "Spiked" sees the form of Islam that is currently plaguing us as being to a significant degree a Western creation -- largely a reaction to the loss of values only too effectively promoted by Western Leftists. It does seem to be Westernized Muslims who are the main problem.

David's Medienkritik reports a good interview from Germany which really chews up the childish attitude of Germans towards the United States.

Joe Sobran says that these are hard times for gay men. Why? "The reason the present age is difficult for gay people is that the word "gay" has been appropriated by homosexual activists. So real gay men have been driven into the closet, afraid to admit they're gay for fear of being misunderstood."

Sharansky's answer to the claim that democracy is impossible in Iraq: "It is important to remember that some of the most serious thinkers once thought that democracy was not compatible with the cultures of Germany, Italy, Japan, Latin America and Russia. The great historian Toynbee questioned whether democracy could ever flourish out of the Anglo-Saxon world or as he put it, in "alien soil.""

I often point out how much in common Nazism and Fascism had with Leninism and other forms of Leftism. Readers may therefore be interested to read another author's account of the history involved. For those with a high-speed connection, the original PDF is here and there are html copies here and here.

V.D. Hanson: "There is much talk of post-election reorganization and rethinking among demoralized liberals, especially in matters of foreign policy. They could start by accepting that ... the problems are fundamental flaws in their own thinking - such as the ends of good intentions justifying the means of expediency and untruth, and forced equality being a higher moral good than individual liberty and freedom. Whether we call such notions "political correctness" or "progressivism," the practice of privileging race, class, and gender over basic ethical considerations has earned the moralists of the Left not merely hypocrisy, but virtual incoherence.... So both here and abroad, the Western public believes that there is a double standard in the moral judgment of our left-leaning media, universities, and politicians - that we are not to supposed to ask how Christians are treated in Muslim societies, only how free Islamists in Western mosques are to damn their hosts.... What is preached in the madrassas on the West Bank, in Pakistan, and throughout the Gulf is no different from the Nazi doctrine of racial hatred. What has changed, of course, is that unlike our grandfathers, we have lost the courage to speak out against it."

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

Comments? Email me 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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"REDNECKS" AND "REPTILES OF THE PRESS"

In response to my post of two days ago about the Leftist use of the term "Redneck" I got a lot of email. Below is one I particularly liked:

"Thank you so much for your post about rednecks, and the "compassionate" left's contempt for them. It's not often that we country folk hear nice things about ourselves. Having grown up in a one-horse town as a poor minister's daughter, I've seen every aspect of "trailer trash" life. Rednecks certainly do have their problems in terms of money, but I've never met a liberal who would give you the shirt right off his back--and I've never met a redneck who wouldn't. What the left doesn't understand, it mocks. The left is comprised mainly of people who've never wanted for anything, so when they look at the poor but proud, they wonder what the heck it is that they're so proud of. What they're proud of, in a nutshell, is something liberals can never have or understand--compassion for each other. Thanks for stickin' up for the little guy."

A couple of readers have mentioned to me that many of the people described as "Rednecks" don't reject the label but instead apply it rather gleefully to themselves -- just as many blacks refer to one another as "niggers". In both cases however, the term is derogatory when used by outsiders. And someone who is really enjoying derogatory labels just sent me a Christmas greeting "from deep in the "red" heart of the "Great Satan"! That did give me a laugh. It rather reminds me of the phrase "reptiles of the Press". Somebody, somewhere once used that expression in an attempt to pour scorn on journalists but journalists now (at least in Australia and Britain) routinely use that expression to refer to themselves (as in "fellow reptiles" etc) -- obviously seeing the expression as great fun. And similarly there is now a lot of Redneck comedy etc. I have been trying for years to find out who coined the term "reptiles of the Press" but nobody seems to know, so if any of my readers can tell me, I would be much obliged.

Interestingly, two of the people who emailed me have the same surname as mine, which figures, as "Ray" is an old Celtic name found throughout the British Isles in various spellings and "rednecks" and "crackers" do seems to be mainly of Celtic (Scotch-Irish) origin. Here is part of one of the emails concerned:

"As you say, cracker and redneck just mean that you're a working-class white person in the south. We do have a sense of humor about ourselves, but OTOH we're the last group left that you can openly mock and criticize in the crudest of terms. The good news is, however, that Redneck Culture -- NASCAR, bluegrass and country music, pro wresting, Jeff Foxworthy and the like, are huge. We're taking over, no matter what they say about us"

The term "Redneck" seems to have had usages in Britain long before it was used in America and I am always amused by the fact that, among Afrikaners, the term "Rooineck" (meaning "redneck") refers to the English! And (for good reasons in their case) the Afrikaners don't mean it kindly, either. Given my fair skin, I guess I too would be a redneck if I spent much time in the sun.

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ELSEWHERE

There is some well-deserved sarcasm here about Federal Air Marshal Service Director Thomas Quinn, the subnormal who insists that America's air marshalls dress in a way that makes them easily detectable by terrorists. Where does GWB find these wackos?

Evil feminist mentality at work: "A city fire captain who had been accused - and then cleared - of raping his daughter will go back to work next month, city officials said. Michael Tecklenburg had been on administrative leave since he was arrested Sept. 14 and charged on suspicion of raping his 15-year-old daughter, who had run away from home. But the girl testified that she had been pressured by investigators into making the allegations. Last week, a San Joaquin County Superior Court judge dismissed the charges, citing insufficient evidence".

I have never freaked out at the idea of national ID cards the way some conservatives do so I was pleased to see some realistic comments on the matter by Dick McDonald. Opposition from both Left and Right killed off the idea of a national ID card for Australians some time ago now.

There is a rather amusing article here reporting that the Europeans are finally getting ants in their pants about all the Muslim immigrants in their midst. The wisdom of "Cowboy" GWB's war on militant Islam might soon start to get through to them. How embarrassing that will be!

Iran: "Few countries have a more paradoxical relationship than the US and Iran. While the Iranian regime continues to be belligerently anti-American, the Iranian people are overtly pro-American"

Accuracy in Media has a list of the top 20 under-reported stories of the year. A few of them: How liberals tried to use federal agencies to delay or censor Sinclair Broadcasting's airing of Stolen Honor, showing how John Kerry's anti-war testimony led to the torture of our Vietnam POWs.; How and why MIT's Dr. Richard Lindzen, perhaps the country's leading climatologist, doesn't accept the man-made global warming theory; How Senator John Edwards used "junk science" in some of the cerebral palsy lawsuits that made him rich; John Kerry's failure to release all of his military and medical records.

Fred Reed uses satire to highlight the underlying logic of homosexual marriage. He ends up deciding he will marry his desk.

Albanian Muslims making assholes out of themselves: "The [Greek] government asked its citizens not to retaliate against immigrants Thursday, a day after two Albanian gunmen hijacked a bus. The 18-hour standoff near Athens ended peacefully early Thursday after police successfully negotiated the release of 23 hostages. The gunmen, Gaz Resuli and Leonard Murati, 24-year-old Albanian immigrants who surrendered shortly after midnight, had demanded $1.33 million in ransom and safe passage out of the country." [Bill Clinton bombed Christian Serbia for the sake of ethnic Albanians].

A reader has sent in his own theory of Leftism which I have just put up here. It has some interesting points in it.

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

Comments? Email me 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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THE ARMY AND THE JAPANESE

I am still feeling pretty disgusted about the treatment of young Japanese women in Paris that I mentioned yesterday. Because I offer cheap accomodation and prefer Asians as tenants, I have met more than a few of the young treasures of Japan over the years and there is no way they deserve to be driven into hospital by foul treatment. Partly because I am a former Army man myself, I have met and talked to many "old Diggers" (Australian Army veterans) from WWII over the years and I share their disgust about what "the Nips" did to prisoners and others in that war. To this day, many of them would not consider buying a Japanese car. But because of their experiences, if nothing else, those men are true gentlemen and I can guarantee you that not one of them would be rude to a young woman just because she was Japanese. But ethics have always been something of an afterthought to the French from what I can see.

While I am thinking of the Army, I also want to record my disgust at the way Leftists commonly disparage the armed forces. To me the profession of arms is the noblest profession there is. Who else volunteers to lay down his life for his fellow-citizens?

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HISTORY CORNER

There is a rather silly article here which compares GWB to Teddy Roosevelt on the grounds that both Presidents have sent U.S. armed forces to intervene in foreign countries. Although TR was a Republican President, neither the Republicans nor the Democrats were clearly Leftist or Rightist in TR's days and TR was a notable supporter of the "Progressive" (Leftist) wing of the GOP. He even left the GOP at one stage and set up his own "Progressive" party. And his actions abroad were thoroughly imperialistic -- under a very thin cloak of righteousness. They were certainly not driven by defence needs. GWB, by contrast, is simply responding as best he can to the war on America declared by the Islamic extremists. And the difference between a defensive war and a war of expansion is surely of considerable importance. As is shown here American wars abroad are normally the work of the American Left. It is only the needs of defence that have got GWB into such wars. (Thanks to PID for the links).

There is a site here which points to the remnants of America's Christian heritage still engraved on major American public buildings despite all that the ACLU has so far done to stop that. There is however another site here which points out that the various depictions of the Ten Commandments are mostly blank so could in fact represent other things -- such as the Bill of Rights. On occasions where Moses is shown holding the tablets of stone, however, that is a pretty feeble criticism.

There is an article here giving background to the recent 150th anniversary of Australia's "Eureka Stockade" uprising. The Left always seem to think it vindicates them in some mysterious way. How a revolt against a tax by self-employed people does that, however, has always been a mystery to me. There should be more tax revolts in my opinion. If people started rebelling against most of their taxes being spent to feed millions of bureaucrats and paper-shufflers, we might get some real sanity in public life.

Von Mises in 1940 knew that Fascists and Communists were all socialists: "Hitler, Stalin, and Mussolini constantly proclaim that they are chosen by destiny to bring salvation to this world. They claim they are the leaders of the creative youth who fight against their outlived elders. They bring from the East the new culture which is to replace the dying Western civilization. They want to give the coup de grace to liberalism and capitalism; they want to overcome immoral egoism by altruism; they plan to replace the anarchic democracy by order and organization, the society of "classes" by the total state, the market economy by socialism."

An interesting email from a reader: "I thought you would find this interesting as we share the belief that presenting the Nazis as 'conservative' is one of the biggest leftist lies of the 20th century. I am reading Iris Chang's book 'The Rape of Nanking' and in one chapter she talks about John Rabe, a high-ranking Nazi official living in Nanking who selflessly saved and protected many people. While trying to reconcile how a devoted Nazi official could be so kind and helpful, known as the 'living Buddha of Nanking', his granddaughter explained that Rabe saw the Nazi Party primarily as a socialist organization and did not support the persecution of Jews and other ethnic groups in Germany. It also says that Rabe repeatedly summed up his Nazi philosophy in socialist terms: "We are soldiers of work, we are a government of workers, we are friends to the worker, we will never leave the worker's side in times of crisis." (p109-100)

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ELSEWHERE

Love it! "A former Claremont McKenna College psychology professor convicted of falsely reporting her car was vandalized and spray-painted with racist and anti-Semitic slurs was sentenced Wednesday to a year in state prison."

Sean Gabb has an interesting article on why he thinks that drink driving (DUI) should not be a crime. He says however that causing harm while drink driving should be severely punished.

Joe Cambria has replied to Prof. Quiggin's accusations about him. See here.

Amazing: Some Iranians are trying to convert to Judaism both as an expression of distaste for the Islam of the Ayatollahs and as a way of getting out of a decaying Iran.

Peggy Noonan has an amusing column up in which she tells the Democrats that they could win back a lot of supporters if they came out and supported Christmas and displays of faith in public life. She's right and I am sure they know she is right but the haters who are their main supporters won't allow it, of course. What a bind for them!

GWB just gave the perfect reply to the outsourcing worriers: "Bush told reporters the trade deficit was "easy to resolve. People can buy more United States products if they're worried about the trade deficit."" Exactly. If the Democrats are so worried about us buying things from abroad, let THEM pay more to buy their products instead of trying to force that on all of us. The whole speech was pretty amusing. He also said "The policy of my government is a strong-dollar policy" Seeing that the "weak" dollar is good for American business and bad for European business, one wonders how he kept a straight face while saying that.

Amusing: European gloom about their stagnant economy and problematical future means that individual Europeans save rather than spend -- thus depressing their economy even further.

Conservative scholarship is under attack at Princeton's Department of Near Eastern Studies -- which mainly studies Islam.

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

Comments? Email me 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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"REDNECKS" FOLLOW-UP

A good comment from a reader about my post yesterday on "Rednecks": "Something I have observed for a while that I don't think I have seen in any of your writings is the Right's ability to laugh at themselves -- while the left seems to have no tolerance what-so-ever for anyone making fun of them. The Redneck comedy is a good example - but even better is a classic TV show called All In The Family. The series was created by a super Liberal, Norman Lear, and although his intention was to mock conservative views, it became a big hit among conservatives, and I guess among liberals too. The fact is, it's just damn funny... but somehow I don't think it would have ever made had it been mocking liberal views.

Another reader thinks I should have mentioned "cracker" as another bigoted term often used by Leftists. He summarizes: "Cracker is a pejorative term used by Northerners (Yankees, aka blue states) to describe people of the South (red states). It is ante-bellum in origin. The civil war between the North and South was more a conflict of cultures than anything else and was a conflict that was already centuries old at the Revolution (see the Mel Gibson movies Braveheart or The Patriot), it being the conflict between the Anglo-Saxon English and the Celtic peoples or Scotland, Ireland, Wales, etc. The Yankees being predominantly of English stock considered themselves to be industrious, well bred, civilized people. They considered the people of the South to be a temperamental, emotional lot who would rather spend their days screwing their women and running through the woods with their hound dogs than working. This idea of Southerners remains to this day."

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FROM BROOKES NEWS

More on immigration, wages and other myths, part II Does immigration drive up profits while driving down wages?
The Age slimes the free market - again Tim Colebatch and Kenneth Davidson must be among the worst of Australia's economic commentariat - and that's saying something
Unions, wages and labor surveys Outworkers are not the victims of callous market forces and greedy capitalists. They are the victims of callous ideologically motivated economic illiterates
Professor John Quiggin slimes Windschuttle John Quiggin's specialty appears to be moral posturing, character assassination and personal abuse
Holland and Islamic terrorism: Disaster in waiting How ludicrous that the legislators of Holland are so afraid of the violent Arabs, who are taking over their community, that they can't sleep safely in their homes for fear that one of them might come in and behead them

Details here

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ELSEWHERE

There is an excellent article here on the multiple links between the far Left and the Islamists. Such links make no logical sense at all given the way Islamic attitudes to women and to sexual licence run directly against long-cherished Leftist causes but, as usual, Leftist attitudes can only be understood psychologically rather than logically and the alliance makes great sense psychologically. Both Leftists and Islamists want to tear down existing society and put themselves in the drivers' seat instead. So at a basic level the two groups have identical aims. It is only power that Leftists really want. All the rest of what they say is just posturing -- and there could be no clearer evidence of that than the way they have abandoned the various "rights" they have always stood for by co-operating with the world's most notable opponents of such rights.

This is pretty disgusting. Young Japanese women living in Paris get so shocked by constant French rudeness towards them that some of them end up hospitalized with depression. I am sure my own manners are a bit rough at times but I always try to treat the invariably polite people of Asia with the courtesy that such politeness deserves. But like all elitists, the French think everyone else is scum, particularly Americans of course.

Lots of young educated Arabs LIKE George Bush! "The same ideas came up again and again: he is a strong leader, an honest man, and, most of all, a believer. Like the winning margin of American voters this year, these Middle Easterners related to Bush's sense of religious conviction and his confident steering of a nation and culture they admired... In addition, some of the most articulate students expressed intense misgivings about central Democratic electoral platforms, including gun control, limitation of the death penalty and especially abortion and gay rights. Just the word "homosexual" made many of them cringe and click their tongues in that uniquely Arab way of showing disapproval. A final piece of the puzzle fell into place when I learned that more than half of the students in my advanced class, among them a third-year medical student and daughter of a Western-based diplomat, rejected the theory of evolution. "I just can't believe that we came from monkeys," she said".

Mobsters have a point "Italian mobsters jailed on the island of Sardinia, apparently outraged by terrorism, beat up an Algerian terror suspect and threatened to kill him unless he got himself transferred to a new prison. The same threat was made against at least one other Algerian inmate. "You guys set off bombs and do massacres. If you don't change prisons, you're dead," the criminals were reported to have told Saadi Nassim"

A good post on the British welfare State. One excerpt: "State education began in 1870 with the Forster Act, which allowed the creation of government schools. Its purpose was not to wipe out the existing private and charitable schools. The whole idea was to catch those few people who were missing out. It was reckoned in 1861 that 95 percent of children were getting between five and seven years of education. State education was started to save that missing 5 percent or less. Now, 134 years later, with the state dominating education, a government survey reveals that 20 percent of the adult population is functionally illiterate. State education, instead of saving the bottom 5 percent, has quadrupled the number of those left out"

Watching the signs: "Not since 1952 has a presidential election lacked a sitting president or vice president as a contestant, and Ike was about as close as one could get to non-official incumbent. Before that, it was the 1928 race, and there, too, Herbert Hoover was, like Ike, a figure of towering popularity. In other words, there has never not been a front-runner in at least one party in the modern scrambles for the presidency. Here is a bit of evidence that the race for 2008 also has a leader, one along the lines of Eisenhower and the Great Engineer.... Giuliani swept more than three-quarters of the votes"

The Carnival of the Vanities is up again with enough good reading to keep you busy for a long time.

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

Comments? Email me 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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"REDNECKS" AND "TRAILER TRASH"

In the great outpouring of Leftist hatred towards conservatives (some of it recorded on Leftists as Elitists) that followed the recent Presidential election, one of the most frequent terms of disparagement of conservative voters was "Rednecks", and, to a lesser extent, "White trash" or "Trailer trash". All three terms are extremely derogatory in American life and I am frankly amazed that Leftists use them at all. These self-proclaimed heroes of tolerance reveal themselves thereby to be in fact most viciously prejudiced and ignorant.

When we strip away the abusive component, after all, what really are rednecks? They are simply country people, probably farm workers, with necks red from working in the sun. They like simple recreations such as shooting and they are far more likely to be practically inclined than intellectually inclined and they don't have much time for others who don't pull their weight but how is that in any way deserving of condemnation? I grew up in a small Australian country town and I have since then seen quite a bit of country people both in Australia and the USA and I have no hesitation in saying that to my mind country people are the salt of the earth. If you want humble, kind, generous, trusting people you can't go past them. They make lots of city people look very degraded indeed. And I know that I am far from alone in that assessment of country people. So in my view abusing them as "rednecks" is grossly offensive, prejudiced and ignorant and those who use such terms just show what ignoramuses they themselves are.

And the allied term "Trailer Trash" is, if anything, more offensive. People who live in trailers (we call them "caravans" in Australia) generally do so because they are poor but how does that make them contemptible? I have seen a fair bit of Australian caravan parks over the years so I know what the people who live there are really like. I am not relying on popular stereotypes. And I have no hesitation in saying that the great majority of people who live there are thoroughly decent people who do very well on their limited resources. They may drink a bit but they are not alone in that. And there are certainly some rowdy and ignorant types there but such types are far from typical and there is plenty of worse morality to be found in many upmarket bars and nightclubs. So the only thing that really sets trailer-dwellers apart is their poverty, and Leftists are always pretending "compassion" for the poor. I doubt that they do in fact feel any compassion for anyone but themselves. It is certainly their contempt that is more evident. And such contempt is grossly offensive to many good people who are getting by as best they can and generally doing pretty well.

It is the prejudiced Leftist haters who deserve contempt.

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ELSEWHERE

A current campaign by PETA is to get clothing stores to boycott clothing made with Australian wool. The "sex sells" crowd at Abercrombie & Fitch seem suddenly to have discovered morality -- or at least the PETA version of it -- and have fallen into line. This article has a good idea: Boycott Abercrombie & Fitch. I'm guessing that there are a lot more Americans who approve of Australia than approve of PETA. If it all happened it could really spike the guns of PETA for a long time.

There is an excellent article here on the Buttiglione affair -- where a devout Cathoic was denied a position in the adminstration of the EU because of his beliefs -- even though he made clear that his beliefs would have no influence on how he did his job. If he had been a Muslim, of course, they would have given him the job by acclamation. The article defines "secularist" as a religious skeptic who is intolerant of religion. I like that definition. It does make it clear that we were dealing with bigotry in the Buttiglione affair. I am myself an atheist but I am always pleased to deal with Christians. I think that having God in charge of quality control is a distinct advantage to me.

The famously Bush-hating Jonathan Chait has an article in which he defends the overwhelming Leftist bias in academe. He rejects the notion that underrepresentation implies bias, though he realizes that Leftists like himself normally make the opposite argument where blacks are concerned. That does rather highlight the difficulties that the dishonesty of Leftists gets them into. Chait in fact is forced to admit that conservatives are right and that lack of proportionality does not imply bias! A major backdown for a Leftist, it seems to me. He also has a point in saying that academe is not a natural career choice for a conservative, though I disagree with his reasons. Academe is a stuffy bureaucracy and conservatives prefer the more free-wheeling and wide-open business world. I was in academe for many years and I am in no doubt that most of my colleagues would not last 5 minutes in business. My own combination of actual success in both academe and business is certainly extremely rare. There are however many conservatives with academic ambitions and Chait ignores what almost every one of those people could tell him -- that you virtually cease to exist in academe once your conservative views are known. Like most conservatives who do make it into academe, I got an academic job before my political views were known but once they were known, the roadblocks put up to my further progress in academe were almost amusing in their compulsiveness and violation of academic principles. Chait is just not acknowledging the facts, which is what I expect from Leftists. I have more on the Leftist nature of academe here and Prof. Bainbridge also gives Chait a serve.

Soviet Britain: You can have as much free speech as you like in Britain as long as it is within prescribed bounds. Joe Stalin would agree. "Nick Griffin, the leader of the British National Party, has been released on bail after his arrest in connection with an investigation into inciting racial hatred. It follows a television documentary exposing the extent of alleged racism in the organisation. Earlier it was revealed that the party's founding chairman John Tyndall had been held on Sunday."

There have been a few articles lately about how the Left is breeding itself out of existence. here is a summary.

At last! A bureaucracy dies: "State government rarely shrinks, but last week California's 3-year-old public power authority disappeared. Created by Democratic lawmakers in the tumultuous days of blackouts and price spikes, the agency sputtered to a halt after Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed its funding. ..."

Tom Barrett: "I have long believed that the United Nations is the most dangerous organization on our planet. The corruption that has been revealed there over the last few years has only reinforced my opinion. Now it is becoming apparent that the rampant corruption at the UN starts at the very top. More than any thing, the UN is a savagely anti-United States propaganda outlet. It is made up primarily of nations that hate or are jealous of the US..... "

There is an interesting contrast here between the way two poor countries -- India and Indonesia -- deal with Muslim violence. The terrorists mostly get a free pass in Indonesia but India prosecutes energetically. The British origins of India's legal system no doubt have a lot to do with it.

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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TUESDAY ROUNDUP

From the emails I receive, many people get quite a lot out of my blogs. Since I have seven regular blogs at the moment, however, it seems obvious to me that very few of my readers would read them all. So I thought it might be useful if I were to highlight what I thought were the most interesting posts on each of them once a week. That way everyone who reads this blog will get some idea what is on all of them. So here goes:

On Dissecting Leftism, I discuss America's most offensive four-letter word.

On Leftists as Elitists, I discuss the Hollywood elite.

On Political Correctness Watch, I note that winners are now frowned on in Canadian school sports.

On Greenie Watch I note that global warming is now said to be racist(!).

On Socialized Medicine, I note that drug price-controls are bad for your health.

On Education Watch, I note that educational attainments went up in Florida schools when social promotion was ended.

Gun Watch has some pithy sayings about the usefulness of guns.

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