Does the study of economics tend to make people conservative?

Greg Mankiw comments:

I believe the answer is, to some degree, yes. My experience is that many students find that their views become somewhat more conservative after studying economics. There are at least three, related reasons.

First, in some cases, students start off with utopian views of public policy, where a benevolent government can fix all problems. One of the first lessons of economics is that life is full of tradeoffs. That insight, completely absorbed, makes many utopian visions less attractive. Once you recognize, for example, that there is a tradeoff between equality and efficiency, as economist Arthur Okun famously noted, many public policy decisions become harder.

Second, some of the striking insights of economics make one more respectful of the market as a mechanism for coordinating a society. Because market participants are motivated by self-interest, a person might naturally be suspect of market-based societies. But after learning about the gains from trade, the invisible hand, and the efficiency of market equilibrium, one starts to approach the market with a degree of admiration and, indeed, awe.

Third, the study of actual public policy makes students recognize that political reality often deviates from their idealistic hopes. Much income redistribution, for example, is aimed not toward the needy but toward those with political clout. This Dave Barry column, which is reprinted in Chapter 22 of my favorite economics textbook, describes a good example.

For these three reasons, many students in introductory economics courses become more conservative--or, to be precise, more classically liberal--than they began. Nonetheless, studying economics does not by itself determine one's political ideology. I know good economists who are distinctly right of center and good economists who are distinctly left of center. In my department at Harvard, I would guess that Democrats outnumber Republicans among the faculty (although there is surely more political balance in the economics department than in most other departments at the university).

Source

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The Hispanic underclass

Many of the police and youth workers blame the increase in gang appeal on the disintegration of the Hispanic family unit . . . and it's worsening by the day - especially for U.S.-born Hispanics. Fifty years ago, 70 percent of the children of U.S.-born Hispanic parents lived in an intact family. By 1999 that number had dropped to 56 percent. The percentage of Hispanic children living with a single mother rose from 18 percent to 35 percent. Single parent households constituted 25 percent of all Hispanic households with minor children in the 1970s. By 2005 the proportion had jumped to 37 percent.

Teen parenthood - the marker of underclass behavior - has affected the crime and gang rate. In 2002 there were 83.4 births per 1,000 Hispanic females between ages 15 and 19. Today the figures are out of sight. Hispanic mothers have higher birth rates, and here in California, most newborns are of Hispanic origin. Parenthood is all but forgotten with teen youngsters giving birth while they are little more than children. Many of these teenage Hispanic girls are having four, five, and even six babies by their mid-20s. Many of the fathers simply disappear. And 80 percent of teen births to Latinas in 1999 were to unmarried girls.

The crime rates are soaring and these young Spanish offspring drop out of school and resort to gang activities. And, tragically, many of these young Hispanics are unable to communicate in either Spanish or the English language. Impoverished youth become lethargic and obese with little or no drive and end up on the streets, and the easy way out for them is criminality. Much to our dismay, with teen pregnancies out of control and the crime and gang rate running rampant, we have developed a complete third world underclass America - a ghettoized Hispanic subgroup in terms of welfare use and out-of-wedlock child-rearing.

More here

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ELSEWHERE



There is an amusing dismissal of blogs by an orthodox newspaperman here -- who sounds like he read three blogs two years ago and now thinks he knows all about them. His generalizations are wild and one in particular is most amusing. He accuses blogs of "leaving underexamined more fundamental issues, say, Iraq". Iraq underexamined! Never have so many written so much as bloggers have written about Iraq! Maybe our dyspeptic newspaperman has just been dumped by his girlfriend. That would both explain and be consonant with his sourness about the world. Another indication of his systemic sourness is that his judgment of his own MSM is that it "is not wholly imperfect". Poor man!

There is a superb example of arrogant Leftist ignorance here -- a video of a protest by charity group Oxfam against the Starbucks coffee chain. Their basic point seems to be that the third world-farmers who grow the coffee beans get only a tiny percentage of the final price of a cup of coffee. But ALL farmers get only a small percentage of the price of the final product. What percentage of the price of a loaf of bread do these ignoramuses think American or Australian wheat farmers get? I am sure the boneheaded "protesters" have never even asked that question. The final price of ANY product is built up mainly by transport costs and processing costs. Do the boneheads think the Starbucks waiters work for nothing? THAT is the main factor in Starbucks' costs. And no doubt landlords give Starbucks use of their expensive central city premises for nothing too!

Flushing Congress from the toilet industry: ""Every time I have to flush a toilet twice, I think of Congress. No, I'm not crazy. It's actually Congress's fault. Well, I may be crazy, but in this case my point is: it really is the fault of our legislative wonders in Washington. After so many decades of we citizens taking our toilets for granted, well, Congress wandered into the toilet regulation business. And now I'm buying plungers."

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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YOUR CHRISTMAS CARD

Merry Christmas and a happy new year!



This is your Christmas card from me. Since I started blogging, I have received a huge number of emails -- nine out of 10 of which were encouraging. For a long time I kept a file of the email addresses of those who wrote positive things to me and used it to send out a Christmas greeting at this time of the year. This year, however, with 10 blogs to post to daily (and membership of some group blogs as well!) I was too snowed-under to keep my file of addresses up to date. So I hope all those who have been supportive towards me will be reading this.

I have no connection with the lady above but she did look pretty Christmassy to me. Definitely better than Rudolf the red-nosed reindeer.

Christmas cards often include a Christmas letter detailing all the news of the year about the sender. My version of that is here.

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THE JUDEO-CHRISTIAN MESSAGE IS MORE CONSERVATIVE THAN YOU MIGHT BE AWARE OF

This time of the year is an appropriate one to reflect on the Christian message so regard the comments below as the inside message of your Christmas card:

Although I am an atheist, I grew up steeped in the New Testament so reading the Bible is for me like visiting an old friend. I do not however know the Old Testament as well as I should so I recently read right through the Book of Deuteronomy. Its main theme is avoidance of false gods and when I think of the many false Gods around today -- socialism, global warming, anti-"obesity" etc. -- it is clear that people have not changed much and we do still need to be alert against false gods.

Another prominent theme in Deuteronomy however is what some might call "Christian" charity. There are frequent instructions to be kind, forgiving and generous to the poor. The compassion and concern for the outcast shown by Jesus was very Jewish.

But giving the poor your OWN goods is very different from giving the poor OTHER people's goods, which is what the Leftist wants to do and which would once have been called robbery.

And the Torah does make clear that abstract justice is an absolute -- a duty. Where PUBLIC matters are concerned (as distinct from deeds in private life), you are NOT allowed to favour the poor. Exodus 23:3 is clearest about that. The NIV probably gives the most accurate interpretation of the text. It says: "Do not show favouritism to a poor man in his lawsuit". So, just because a man is poor, the law is not allowed to be biased in his favour. Moses was clearly not a Leftist.

I probably should leave it at that but the pedant in me causes me to note further that the Hebrew word rendered as "lawsuit" above has a rather broader application than that in the original. The KJ renders it as "cause" and it could refer to any controversy. So again we see that special favour towards the poor in any public way is OUT. Private charity is the proper response to the poor.

Being a bit of a language freak, I wrote about the interpretation of Exodus 23:3 to David Boxenhorn, an Israeli who often blogs about the interpretion of Hebrew and the Hebrew scriptures. I received his comments after I had written the above and his comments would seem to broaden even my interpretation. He wrote (inter alia):

"That quote refers to favoring the poor in court, one of many possible dangers to justice cited in the Bible - see previous and following passages. Not distorting judgment is a major theme of the Bible....

But the word translated as "poor" - dal - is probably better translated as "weak", the usual Biblical word for poor is evyon, as you see three verses down in 23:6. Also, the word translated as "cause" - riv - is more simply translated as "argument", and the word "favor" - tehdar - I might translate as "make more wonderful or enhance". So I might translate the passage as: "and you will not enhance [the testimony] of the weak, in an argument"

So it is the disadvantaged generally that the passage applies to and it is arguments generally that the passage applies to. So you are not allowed to glorify the disadvantaged beyond what reality shows -- no absurd accounts of the glories of African history, for instance. Truth is paramount -- not the distorted and selective truth that is the stock in trade of the Left (Noam Chomsky take a bow).

You can see the original Hebrew (with accompanying translation) here.

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ELSEWHERE

Public statement by Melbourne orthodox Jews: "The Adass Israel Congregation, a community founded by Holocaust-survivors, joins worldwide Jewry in publicly denouncing the nefarious and totally irresponsible handful of Jewish charlatans, who attended the recent "Holocaust-denial" conference of Jew-haters in Teheran. These individuals who have been depicted in local and international media embracing fanatical anti-Semites bring shame and pain to our people. We hereby reiterate and declare that Charedi/Chassidic/Orthodox Jews everywhere are disgusted and repelled by the treacherous and contemptible conduct of this deranged and reviled group of misfits and Mechallelei Hashem [desecraters of G-d's Name], who in their boundless and obsessive craving for publicity habitually raise their ugly heads and besmirch the reputation and honour of all observant Jews. We join communities the world over in denouncing them and fully endorse and applaud the severe sanctions and sharp condemnations that have been issued by every single major Charedi community in Jerusalem, New York, Antwerp, London and Manchester."

Stupid British "security" again: "The circumstances surrounding the murder of PC Sharon Beshenivsky would be disturbing at the best of times. She was shot by a gang whose members (foreign nationals) had extensive criminal records; they were considered for deportation but were allowed to stay in Britain because their homeland - Somalia - was determined to be too dangerous a place to which to send them back. If no other information about this killing had surfaced, questions would and should have been asked about the balance to be struck between law and order and deportation. Yet, as we report today, matters are worse than they appear. One of those who was wanted for this murder - Mustaf Jama - is believed to have fled Britain in the days after the shooting, disguising himself as a veiled woman. His brother was one of five other men left to be tried and convicted of murder or manslaughter. Jama was able to sneak on to an international flight at Heathrow dressed in a niqab despite extensive publicity about this murder. His photograph had been circulated to every police force, port and airport in the country. Had he been asked to reveal his face he would have been detected in a moment. He is instead now believed to be at liberty in a region of Somalia where his family wields much influence - the very same Somalia that had been too dangerous for these criminals. This shocking affair reveals fundamental lapses in what should surely be considered elementary security measures."

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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Charles Murray on Immigration

Some succinct thoughts from a scholar who is not afraid to call a spade a spade

Regarding illegal immigration:

1. Making laws about who gets to become a citizen, under what circumstances, is a legitimate function of the state.

2. Protecting borders is a legitimate function of the state.

3. Enforcing the law is a central function of the state.

4. Immigration reform must begin first with enforcement of existing immigration law. If it takes a wall, so be it.

5. And while I'm at it, I'll mention that English should be the only language in which public school classes are taught (except for teaching English as a foreign language) and in which the public's business is conducted.

Regarding legal immigration:

1. Immigration is one of the main reasons-I'm guessing the main reason apart from our constitution-that we have remained a vital, dynamic culture, but immigration of a particular sort: Self-selection whereby people come here for opportunity. That self-selection process used to apply to everyone. It still applies to the engineers and computer programmers and entrepreneurs who come here from abroad, but it is diluted for low-job-skill workers by the many economic benefits of just being in the United States. Most low-job-skill immigrants work very hard. But Milton Friedman was right: You can't have both open immigration and a welfare state. The tension between the two is inescapable.

2. Massive immigration of legal low-skill workers is problematic for many reasons, and some of them have to do with human capital. Yes, mean IQ does vary by ethnic group, and IQ tends to be below average in low-job-skill populations. One can grant all the ways in which smart people coming from Latin American or African countries are low-job-skill because they have been deprived of opportunity, and still be forced to accept the statistical tendencies. The empirical record established by scholars such as George Borjas at Harvard cannot be wished away.

3. I am not impressed by worries about losing America's Anglo-European identity. Some of the most American people I know are immigrants from other parts of the world. And I'd a hell of a lot rather live in a Little Vietnam or a Little Guatemala neighborhood, even if I couldn't read the store signs, than in many white-bread communities I can think of.

4. When it comes to the nitty-gritty, I would get rid of reuniting-families provisions, get rid of the you're-a-citizen-if-you're-born-here rule, and make immigrants ineligible for all benefits and social services except public education for their children. Everybody who immigrates has to be on a citizenship track (no guest workers). And I would endorse a literacy requirement. Having those measures in place, my other criteria for getting permission to immigrate would be fairly loose. Just having to get through the bureaucratic hoops will go a long way toward reinstalling a useful self-selection process. But, to go back to basics: None of this works unless illegal immigration is effectively ended.

Source

Although I am extremely glad of my Anglo-Celtic heritage, I am inclined to agree with point 3 immediately above. I certainly feel safer in a roomful of Chinese or Indians than I do in a roomful of my fellow Anglo-Australians. Most Asians just seem more civilized

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ELSEWHERE

Pentecostals flourishing in Britain: "Pentecostals are the fastest-growing group of Christians. Attendance at their services has moved into third place behind Anglicans and Roman Catholics in England, according to research published today. Once regarded as a fringe sector, they outnumber Methodists, although it is not strictly fair to compare the two. Methodists belong to one church while Pentecostals tend to gather in independent churches or groups of churches.... Figures show that worshippers in half of the Pentecostal churches in England are predominantly black. In addition, half of all Pentecostal churches in Britain are in London. But many evangelical, predominantly white churches also have Pentecostal elements to their worship, in particular prophecy and speaking in tongues. The Methodist Church closed 264 churches between 1998 and 2005, more than any other denomination, as attendance declined by a quarter. By contrast, Pentecostal numbers grew by a third and many new churches have opened"

Chavez and the fascist left in Latin America: "To many the bumptious Chavez, who ceaselessly spouts phrases from Fidel, Mao Zedong and Simon Bolivar, seems something special, but mostly he is just a typical big-mouthed caudillo of the sort that has for centuries enthused and betrayed Latins who want solutions to perennial problems. He is different from most caudillos in his international orientation and the fact that his arrogance is funded by multi-billions of dollars pouring in from oil sales to energy addicts worldwide, much of which he passes out to supporters at home and abroad."

India rising: "As its relationships with the United States, Japan, and China show, India has reemerged as a geopolitical swing state after decades of marginalization as a consequence of the Cold War, its own crippling underdevelopment, and regional conflict in South Asia. Although its status as a heavyweight in the globalized world of the 21st century is new, India's identity as a great power is not: It was for centuries one of the world's largest economies and, under British rule, a preeminent power in Asia. Today, a rising India flush with self-confidence from its growing prosperity is determined not to be left behind by China's economic and military ascent. 'The [Indian] elephant,' says an admiring Japanese official, 'is about to gallop.'"

When do Democrats cut tax? When it affects them: "Already called into question is the alternative minimum tax, or AMT, which was designed 35 years ago to make sure wealthy people could not use loopholes to avoid paying taxes. Since then, the AMT, which was not indexed to keep up with inflation, has bumped up against the incomes of about 20 million American taxpayers and the number affected by the tax is growing each year. "AMT is certainly a priority," said Beck. "If we don't do anything next year it will hit 23 million families." While lawmakers on both sides of the aisle agree that the AMT is unfair to middle income wage earners, the big price tag -- an estimated $1.3 trillion in lost revenues over the next 10 years -- has made the issue of tossing the tax more complicated. So far, Congress has responded by doing annual fixes -- extending exemption levels to reduce the number of people who have to pay AMT. The latest exemptions are set to expire at the end of the current tax year... "Politically, the Democrats cannot let [AMT] get out of control," said Mike Franc, congressional expert with the Heritage Foundation. "It is mostly an exclusively blue state tax. Like it or not, this has the potential to crowd out the rest of the agenda." One Democratic aide who did not want to be named, said Democrats are determined to reform the AMT as an early priority.

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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Jim Flynn gets one thing right

It always seemed obvious that the 20th century rise in measured IQ was due to a reduction in environmental barriers (such as minor brain damage due to poor obstetric procedures) to the realization of full genetic potential. The interesting and unresolved question has always been which were the main environmental barriers. That IQ has now largely stopped rising (in statistical terms: "approached an asymptote") confirms the defining role of genetics. Jim Flynn has all sorts of his usual Leftist waffle about what the implications of the asymptote are but appears not to have mentioned the genetic elephant in the bedroom. Excerpts below from "The Times":

It is a common refrain, repeated in response to every new television reality show and every bumper crop of school exam results: society is dumbing down. Scientists have long argued the opposite, pointing to the now widely accepted "Flynn effect", which shows that over the past century average IQ scores have improved across the developed world, irrespective of class or creed. Now the man who first observed this effect, the psychologist James Flynn, has made another observation: intelligence test scores have stopped rising.

Far from indicating that now we really are getting dumber, this may suggest that certain of our cognitive functions have reached - or nearly reached - the upper limits of what they will ever achieve, Professor Flynn believes. In other words, we can't get much better at the mental tasks we are good at, no matter how hard we try....

In a lecture in Cambridge yesterday, he said that the study of intelligence has for too long been asking the wrong question: "The questions are not `Are we getting smarter?' and `Are our children really smarter than we are?' If the rise in IQ scores meant that we were smarter, that would mean our grandparents were dull and our great grandparents idiots, which is clearly not the case. The question should be, `Have certain cognitive skills risen?' And the answer to that is yes."

What accounts for our rise in intelligence test scores, Professor Flynn believes, is social and environmental changes that have given us the opportunity to exercise the kinds of skills that IQ tests measure. We increasingly fill leisure time with cognitively demanding pastimes, such as puzzles and computer games. We have also developed a more scientific way of viewing the world. "In 1900 if you'd asked a child what do a dog and a rabbit have in common, they might have replied with a concrete answer like, `Dogs are used to hunt rabbits'. Today a child would be more likely to say, `They're both mammals'. We classify things scientifically."...

Professor Flynn believes there is no reason to believe IQ gains will go on for ever. He points out that although gains are still robust in America, they have stopped in Scandinavia. "Perhaps their societies are more advanced than ours and their trends will become our trends," he told his audience at the Cambridge Assessment Psychometrics Centre.

More here

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A REALISTIC IRAQ WINNING PLAN TO BE ADOPTED?

There would be nothing as realistic as partitioning Iraq into three separate States for the three separate ethnic groups but partition of any State appears to be the great no-no of modern politics -- as the unfortunate Ibos of Nigeria found out some decades ago. Czechoslovakia shows that it can successfully be done, however.

Last Monday Bush was, at last, briefed on an actual plan for victory in Iraq, one that is likely to be implemented. Retired general Jack Keane, the former vice-chief of staff of the army, gave him a thumbnail sketch of it during a meeting of five outside experts at the White House. The President's reaction, according to a senior adviser, was very positive. Authored by Keane and military expert Frederick W. Kagan of the American Enterprise Institute, the plan (which can be read at aei.org/publication25292) is well thought out and detailed, but fundamentally quite simple.

It is based on the idea - all but indisputable at this point - that no political solution is possible in Iraq until security is established, starting in Baghdad. The reverse - a bid to forge reconciliation between majority Shia and minority Sunni - is a non-starter in a political environment drenched in the blood of sectarian killings.

Why would the Keane-Kagan plan succeed where earlier efforts failed? It envisions a temporary addition of 50,000 troops on the ground in Iraq. The initial mission would be to secure and hold the mixed Baghdad neighbourhoods of Shia and Sunni residents where most of the violence occurs. Earlier efforts had cleared many of those sections of the city without holding them. After which the mass killings resumed.

Once neighbourhoods are cleared, US and Iraqi troops in this plan would remain behind, living day to day among the population. Local government leaders would receive protection and rewards if they stepped in to provide basic services. Safe from retaliation by terrorists, residents would begin to co-operate with the Iraqi Government. The securing of Baghdad would be followed by a full-scale drive to pacify the Sunni-majority Anbar province.

The truth is that not all of Iraq needs to be addressed by an increased US presence. Most of southern Iraq and all of the Kurdish north are close to being free of sectarian violence. It's Baghdad that has become the centre of gravity for the insurgency, according to Keane. And it could be brought under control by the end of 2007.

The Keane-Kagan plan is not revolutionary. Rather, it is an application of a counterinsurgency approach that has proved to be effective elsewhere, notably in Vietnam. There, Creighton Abrams cleared out the Viet Cong so successfully that the South Vietnamese government took control of the country. Only when Congress cut off funds to South Vietnam in 1974 were the North Vietnamese able to win.

More here

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ELSEWHERE

Obama sagging: "The hottest potential contender for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination, Barack Obama, has been drawn into his first scandal, coming under scrutiny for links to a shady businessman over the purchase of his $US1.65million ($2.1 million) family home in Chicago. After winning extraordinary adulation, the Illinois senator's honeymoon period is coming to an end. Senator Obama, a relative political novice, is being mocked for his middle name, Hussein - "like the dictator", as a member of his staff helpfully put it - and pilloried as Odumbo the elephant because of his jug ears. The public is beginning to learn that the charismatic senator took drugs, including cocaine, as a young man and that he still smokes cigarettes. And his left-wing voting record in the Senate is being picked over" [If he is typical of blacks, there will be plenty of lawbreaking to be found in his background].

Real Christians desert the Church of Homosexuality: "Two of the most prominent Episcopal parishes in Virginia voted overwhelmingly yesterday to leave the Episcopal Church and join fellow Anglican conservatives to form a rival denomination in the United States. Truro Church, in Fairfax, and The Falls Church, in the city of Falls Church, plan to place themselves under the leadership of the Anglican Archbishop Peter Akinola, of Nigeria, who has called the acceptance of gay relationships a "satanic attack" on the Church. Martyn Minns, Truro rector, was consecrated a bishop by the Church of Nigeria this year to lead Archbishop Akinola's Convocation of Anglicans in North America. "This has been our spiritual home, so separating is very hard," he said... Four other Virginia parishes have left, and eight more are voting or will vote soon on whether to follow."

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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Killers! Not "Senior Hamas Intelligence officers"!

Arlene Peck calls a spade a spade:

I usually avoid the L. A. Times like the plague, mainly because I find them to be as favourable to the Jews and Israel as Mel Gibson and Jimmy Carter. However, needing something to wrap the trash recently, I came across a recent glaring front page banner which got my attention. "Killings Put Gaza on Edge" (Frankly I was hoping for "Gaza to be put on the Edge of a Cliff". The lead line said, "The gunning down of a Palestinian official's sons inflames tensions between rival factions." The latest 'incident' from a very long line, brought to us almost daily by these barbaric savages, means Hamas and Fatah are at it again.

Wow! Do you think the security fence our anti-Semitic "former President" Carter described as being part of the "apartheid" of these poor downtrodden Palestinians, (all Israel's fault, of course), was the cause? They weren't able to cross over into Israel proper and so now are killing their own, because they can't reach the Jews as easily anymore? Besides, killing for the sake of killing is just part of the Arab mindset.!

Relax everyone! This latest rampage through the streets of Gaza is only one more of their daily OK Coral-style shoot-out rituals in the middle of the snake pit called Gaza, referred to by our state Dept. and President Bush as the homeland of the Palestinian. We all know there will be more to come; it's what Muslims do!

Actually, what I would really like to see now are more photo-ops of Carter, except this time showing him signing his book in downtown Gaza bookstores. Oh! wait, I forgot... this bunch doesn't read anything but the Koran and the idea of a bookshop, where people could possibly learn how to improve their lives, is laughable, given they can't yet build a Hospital or control their sewage.

Don't you find it is ever so cute when these flesh-eaters and body mutilators of bodies are referred to in media reports as "Senior Palestinian intelligence officers?" What is a person to think; that this is an acceptable face of Government? Perhaps to post-modernist leftist, culture-haters, it is. Never seems to matter either if they are the ones who are riddling cars and nearby children with bullets or are the ones being riddled. It's what Muslims do, and we have grown so used to it, it passes for normal. Even the weekly be-headings barely get a response. No, the new-speak is to always refer to them, as does the LA Times, as "Senior Palestinian intelligence officers." Or, to lovingly refer to them in their preferred term, "freedom fighters.! Just don't tell the truth. Might upset someone.

More here

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Why they deny the Holocaust: On top of nearly constant anti-Semitic propaganda, much of the Muslim world hasn't even heard of it.

By Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somali immigrant who served in the parliament of the Netherlands until earlier this year

One day 1994, when I was living in Ede, a small town in Holland, I got a visit from my half-sister. She and I were both immigrants from Somalia and had both applied for asylum in Holland. I was granted it; she was denied. The fact that I got asylum gave me the opportunity to study. My half-sister couldn't. In order for me to be admitted to the university I wanted to attend, I needed to pass three courses: a language course, a civics course and a history course. It was in the preparatory history course that I, for the first time, heard of the Holocaust. I was 24 years old at that time, and my half-sister was 21.

In those days, the daily news was filled with the Rwandan genocide and ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia. On the day that my half-sister visited me, my head was reeling from what happened to 6 million Jews in Germany, Holland, France and Eastern Europe. I learned that innocent men, women and children were separated from each other. Stars pinned to their shoulders, transported by train to camps, they were gassed for no other reason than for being Jewish. I saw pictures of masses of skeletons, even of kids. I heard horrifying accounts of some of the people who had survived the terror of Auschwitz and Sobibor. I told my half-sister all this and showed her the pictures in my history book. What she said was as awful as the information in my book.

With great conviction, my half-sister cried: "It's a lie! Jews have a way of blinding people. They were not killed, gassed or massacred. But I pray to Allah that one day all the Jews in the world will be destroyed." She was not saying anything new. As a child growing up in Saudi Arabia, I remember my teachers, my mom and our neighbors telling us practically on a daily basis that Jews are evil, the sworn enemies of Muslims, and that their only goal was to destroy Islam. We were never informed about the Holocaust.

Later, as a teenager in Kenya, when Saudi and other Persian Gulf philanthropy reached us, I remember that the building of mosques and donations to hospitals and the poor went hand in hand with the cursing of Jews. Jews were said to be responsible for the deaths of babies and for epidemics such as AIDS, and they were believed to be the cause of wars. They were greedy and would do absolutely anything to kill us Muslims. If we ever wanted to know peace and stability, and if we didn't want to be wiped out, we would have to destroy the Jews. For those of us who were not in a position to take up arms against them, it was enough for us to cup our hands, raise our eyes heavenward and pray to Allah to destroy them.... For generations, the leaders of these so-called Muslim countries have been spoon-feeding their populations a constant diet of propaganda similar to the one that generations of Germans (and other Europeans) were fed - that Jews are vermin and should be dealt with as such

More here

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The True Source of Arab Hatred of Israel

Weak Arab egos. They cannot bear to recognize their own mediocrity. Post below lifted from Stefan Karlsson

I've always been amazed at the breath-taking hypocricy of Arab accusations against Israel. How could someone actually raise the issue of a [probably accidental] killing of 18 Arabs in Gaza into a proposed (but by the US vetoed) UN Security Council -resolution and a UN General Assembly resolution (opposed only by Israel, the US, Australia and a few pacific island states) when Arabs are slaughtering each other and Muslim blacks in for example Iraq and Sudan by the hundreds every day? And a lot more amazingly, how come most of the world is falling for this?

Well, the latter question will remain a mystery. But for long it has been obvious to me the answer to the former question. The truth is, that Arab representatives don't really care particularly much when fellow Arabs kill other Arabs, much less when Arabs kill non-Arabs, like they do in Sudan's Darfur province. It is all a propaganda hoax to fool gullible infidels into supporting jihad. I've pointed out for a long time that the basis of Arab hatred against Israel is that the very existence of a Jewish state in what once a Muslim land represents a insult to the teachings of Islam (which says that any land which was once Muslim must remain so forever) and Arab pride.

People who believe a few concessions from Israel will create peace, like the person who was refered to as history's greatest monster in a Simpson's episode believe, are either hopelessly naive or dishonest.

And so now, Via Johan Norberg I see this rather revealing interview with Al-Jazeera´s editor-in-chief Ahmed Sheikh. In it, he reveals the true reason for Arab hatred of Israel (and bizarrely attributes all Arab shortcomings on it):

"Do you mean to say that if Israel did not exist, there would suddenly be democracy in Egypt, that the schools in Morocco would be better, that the public clinics in Jordan would function better?

I think so.

Can you please explain to me what the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has to do with these problems?

The Palestinian cause is central for Arab thinking.

In the end, is it a matter of feelings of self-esteem?

Exactly. It´s because we always lose to Israel. It gnaws at the people in the Middle East that such a small country as Israel, with only about 7 million inhabitants, can defeat the Arab nation with its 350 million. That hurts our collective ego. The Palestinian problem is in the genes of every Arab"

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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BLAIR'S LEFTISM SHOWS: THE END JUSTIFIES THE MEANS

Even if the means is abandonment of the historic rule of law in Britain. Comment below by Daniel Mandel. A more extended comment is available from from Oliver Kamm

In his book The Closed Circle: An Interpretation of the Arabs, David Pryce-Jones writes at length of the time-honoured "extension into the West of [Saudi] money-favouring" - a subject now in the British headlines for a startling instance of its power: the halt called in Britain to the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) investigation into a 60 million pound slush fund for Saudi royals. The SFO was investigating payments to the Saudis in the form of lavish holidays, luxury cars and rented apartments which were apparently made to guarantee Saudi commitment to Britain's largest ever defence contract, the so-called Yamamah deal.

Under this deal, Saudi Arabia agreed in 1985 to buy from BAE Systems, Britain's biggest military contractor, 72 Tornados and 30 Hawk fighter aircraft, plus a further 48 Tornados in 1993. This year Saudi Arabia agreed to pay 10 billion pounds for 72 aircraft, part of a package that was expected to grow. The agreement has kept BAE in business for 20 years.

However, Saudi displeasure and British loss of nerve has resulted in a spectacular climb-down: following a Saudi threatened rupture of ties and loss of future contracts (worth 2.5 million pounds annually), the Attorney-General, Lord Goldsmith, has announced the suspension of the SFO's investigation. The SFO says it called off its investigation after representations made "both to the Attorney General and the Director [of the SFO] concerning the need to safeguard national and international security … It has been necessary to balance the need to maintain the rule of law against the wider public interest."

That is a statement of forensic significance. The rule of law is the special achievement of democratic society and its purpose, among other things, has always been the protection of what the SFO calls "the wider public interest." How is it possible, then, that protection of the "wider public interest" is now deemed to lie in the suspension of the rule of law under foreign pressure?

More detail of this disquieting episode is available on Pryce-Jones' blog.

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Leftists as misfits

An interesting post lifted from New Zeal

Spirit of 76 asked: "In terms of the Western countries, where do all of these commies come from ? Who indoctrinates them ? When I was a union delegate 12 years ago, hearing Karl Andersen spout his beliefs, I honestly thought he was taking the piss ! Why do people still adhere to a political system that has done nothing apart from advertise itself as an abject failure ?

These are questions that have interested me for a long time. Ever since I was a bit pink myself, I've wondered why many intelligent people can invest their whole lives into a project that is so clearly nonsensical.

I remember a conversation with US former socialist Tammy Bruce, when she visited NZ last year. I asked Tammy exactly why she thought people devoted their lives to socialism.

Tammy, had been at the pinnacle of the US left/feminist establishment. She knew hundreds of senior socialists. She is a lesbian, who herself had a pretty tough upbringing and her share of personal tragedy.

Tammy's theory was that socialists tend to be "damaged" people and/or misfits. They are people on the "outside"-whether through personality defects, such as intense jealousy and envy, a deep sense of inadequacy or something that sets them apart from the "mainstream", homosexuality, physical disability, belonging to a persecuted minority etc.

Most of us have some of those or other problems in our lives. We try to cope, to overcome our shortcomings and get on with our lives.

Others can't handle the thought that they are the odd one out, or that they should work to address their personal faults. Socialism appeals to such people, because socialism claims that all problems are caused by external factors and can be addressed, not by confronting oneself, but by altering the world.

In other words, socialists tend to be damaged people who are driven to "fit in" by changing the world to suit their particular shortcomings. They want to make the world fit their faults-not as most of us do, try to fix our own shortcomings first. Socialism, is in short a manifestation of mental illness or major character deficiency.

This is perhaps why universities are the main recruiting ground for socialism these days. At university you can theorise a better world according to any preference you like. In the real world of the marketplace, bad ideas lead to heartache and bankruptcy. In universities they lead to tenure, overseas conferences, fawning sycophants and good salaries.

I remember one US socialist saying something like "communism is a system of political economy-not a character deficiency". I think he was 100% wrong.

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ELSEWHERE

The Church of Multiculturalism: "The thirteenth Anglican Archbishop of Melbourne will be enthroned in a multicultural ceremony at St Paul's Cathedral today. Representatives of 38 denominations and faiths will attend the ceremony including the Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne, Denis Hart, who will say a prayer for church unity. The Wurunjeri people will welcome the attendees with a dance and didgeridoo performance. Representatives of Melbourne's Chinese, Sudanese, and Tamil communities will also attend. Federal Treasurer Peter Costello and Employment and Workplace Relations Minister Kevin Andrews will represent Prime Minister John Howard. Victorian Governor Professor David de Krester will read one of the lessons.

The odious Jimmy Carter: "Earlier this month in a Washington Post Op-Ed article Jimmy Carter blamed the current violence in Lebanon and Gaza on Israel, which had purportedly violated “key U.N. resolutions…by occupying Arab lands and oppressing Palestinians.” He got through an entire article without ever mentioning that Lebanon had failed to comply with the 2004 United Nations Security Council Resolution 1559, which called on Lebanon to disarm the terrorist group Hezbollah whose members now sit in its legislature and cabinet.... Concerning the Carter Peace Prize and word that it was given to denigrate President George W. Bush’s pro-Israel, anti-Iraq policies, editorialized the otherwise-liberal New York Daily News, “Excuse us if we detect a whiff of anti-Semitism wafting from Oslo. It wouldn’t be the first time, Norwegian Nazis having happily collaborated with Hitler.”... Jimmy Carter has won the Nobel Prize he lobbied for, so the only prize left he has to fight for is his place in the history books. Perhaps he wants fellow Leftists to win the ongoing historical struggle so that his history will be written favorably. This may be why Mr. Carter obsessively scapegoats Israel and undermines America.

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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Far from being an evil dictator, Pinochet rescued Chile

Historian James Whelan says that, contrary to conventional wisdom, former Chilean autocrat Augusto Pinochet averted civil war and saved millions from the destruction of socialism

Six months before Salvador Allende was overthrown on September 11, 1973, Volodia Teitelboim told an interviewer for the Communist Party daily newspaper in Santiago that if civil war were to come, then 500,000 to one million Chileans would die. Teitelboim knew whereof he spoke. He was then the No.2 man in the Chilean Communist Party, the third largest in the Western world (after France and Italy), and a senior partner in Allende's Marxist-Leninist government. The Communists were then planning to seize total power in the country, though they were not in as much a hurry to do so as the Socialists, the principal party in the Allende coalition and one passionately committed to revolutionary violence. So the Communists and the Socialists shared the same goal - ending once and for all the bourgeois democratic state - but differed on methods. Allende, a Socialist, was somewhere in between, wavering between his own bourgeois tastes and the totalitarian temptation.

Allende had come to power in September 1970 with not enough votes to win outright election - only 40,000 more than the conservative runner-up - and so had to be voted in by Congress in exchange for a statute of guarantees drawn up by the Christian Democrat majority. A few months later, Allende told fellow leftist Regis Debray that he never actually intended to abide by those commitments but signed just to finally become president, having failed in three previous runs for the office.

In those first 2 1/2 years, Allende had plunged Chile into hell-on-earth chaos. Former president Eduardo Frei Montalva - the man more responsible than any other for Allende's ascent to the presidency - called it "this carnival of madness". Violence, strikes, shortages and lawlessness stalked the land. The Supreme Court declared Allende outside the law. So, too, did the Chamber of Deputies in August 1973 in a resolution that all but demanded the armed forces seize power to rescue Chile from the inferno. So, when the armed forces finally did act on September 3, they did so in response to the clamour of an overwhelming majority of Chileans and not as the jackboot power bandits of typical Latin American revolts. News stories about what happened on that Tuesday in September routinely speak of the bloody coup. It was no such thing. About 200 people died in the shooting on September 13 and a little more than 1000 in the first three months of virtual civil war.

But not the civil war the Communists were perfectly prepared to accept as their price for power: 500,000 to one million. Indeed, in all 17 years of military rule, the total of dead and missing - according to the only serious study - was 2279. The Chilean Revolution thus was, by far, the least bloody of any significant Latin American revolution of the 20thcentury, though you would never guess that from reading or watching news reports.

The Chilean revolution was different from other Latin American revolutions in another respect: it left the country far better off than the one it found. Indeed, Chile is the envy of the entire region for its spectacular economic progress and for the solidity of the institutions the military government created. Consider: Inflation was slashed from 600 percent to 6 percent; infant mortality rates came down from 66 per 1000 to 13 per 1000; urban access to drinking water increased from 67 per cent to 98 per cent; and living standards more than doubled.

Pinochet et al realised, from the start, that the country they had agreed to rescue was in an institutional shambles. More than half a century of cheap politicking had - in the phrase of Chile's leading historian - so rotted the country's institutions as to bring about their death. A brand new beginning was needed. Crafting the new constitution and other institutions was complicated by the presence in the country of thousands of foreign and local terrorists. Indeed, as late as 1986, Fidel Castro shipped 25 tonnes of arms to Chile: the largest clandestine arms shipment in history, sufficient to arm 5000 terrorists. (News reports routinely refer to these people as political opponents. The overwhelming majority of the dead and missing were, in fact, either outright terrorists or those who were sheltering, financing and supporting them.)

More here

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ELSEWHERE

Homosexuals need to lose a little something: "Circumcising men cuts their risk of being infected with the AIDS virus in half, and could prevent hundreds of thousands or even millions of new infections, researchers say. Circumcising men worked so well that the researchers stopped two large clinical trials in Kenya and Uganda to announce the results today, although they cautioned that the procedure does not make men immune to the virus."

Censure Israel-hating Jimmy: "The past few weeks the news media has been fixated on discussions of efforts by Democrats to either impeach or censure President Bush. Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., has made the push to censure President Bush for the administration's wiretapping of suspected terrorists. Meanwhile a group of activist liberals has launched ImpeachPAC, which is raising money to support congressional candidates who favor impeachment proceedings against Bush for taking the fight to the terrorists in Iraq. I have a better idea, how about censuring a president who has increasingly led an effort to undermine American foreign policy and who has embraced terrorist organizations and urged international funding for them. How about censuring former president Jimmy Carter? While the mainstream news media has portrayed Carter in a saintly light, preoccupied with building homes for the underprivileged, Carter has devoted most of his time to condemning the United States to any audience who will have him. The man who sat impotent while Iranian radicals stormed the American Embassy in Tehran has been busy appeasing America's enemies since he left the White House."

The cure for poverty: "Countless studies have shown that children raised in a two-parent family are less likely to be raised in poverty, less likely to do drugs, less likely to be criminals later in life, and more likely to graduate from and do well in school. Married people tend to take care of themselves better and live longer. They typically eat better, have more settled lives with less stress and fewer risky habits, monitor each other's health, and are quicker to seek medical attention for problems that arise. Married people, particularly those with children, seem to be motivated to save and invest more for the future and to live longer to enjoy their savings and their children's future. Out-of-wedlock births increase the national incidence of: lowered health for newborns; retarded cognitive, and especially verbal, development of young children; lowered educational achievement; lowered job attainment as young adults; increased behavioral problems; lowered impulse control (aggression and sexual behavior); and increased anti-social development. It's been said you need only do three things in this country to avoid poverty: finish high school, marry before having a child and marry after the age of 20. Among those who follow such advice, only 8% are poor, while 79% of those who do not are poor. The consequences of this trend are crime rates higher than they should be, graduation rates lower than they should be and a treasury depleted in the name of trying to solve both problems by throwing more money at them. No culture can remain healthy with illegitimacy rates like these. And it is simply impossible to understate the socially catastrophic consequences of America's crisis of illegitimacy. The family is still the best department of health, education and welfare ever invented."

How pesky for the Left: "Though Americans are increasingly pessimistic about the war in Iraq, the Pentagon said Tuesday it is having success enlisting new troops. The Navy and Air Force met their recruiting goals last month while the Army and Marine Corps exceeded theirs, the Defense Department announced. The Army, which is bearing the brunt of the work in Iraq, did the best. It signed up 6,485 new recruits in November compared with its target of 6,150 - meaning 105 percent of its goal. All the services turned in similar performances in October as well, meaning they so far are meeting their goals for the 2007 budget year that began Oct. 1. "The services are starting off well," said Maj. Stewart Upton, a Pentagon spokesman."

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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The Real Hanukah: A Celebration of the Religious Right

By Michael Medved



Who are the bad guys in the Hanukah story? And who are the good guys? These are serious questions with serious consequences.

Most Jews (and certainly most Christians) dismiss the winter holiday as a trivial, feel-good festival about candles, potato pancakes, spinning tops (dreidls),and eight nights of gifts, without coming to terms with its serious, relevant and distinctly uncomfortable messages. While frequently (and fatuously) described as a "celebration of tolerance," Hanukah is more properly designated as an annual re-dedication to the values of the Religious Right.

No wonder that so many American Jews (with their reflexive, often ignorant liberal instincts) refuse to acknowledge the real Hanukah and its politically incorrect messages. In last week's Washington Post, a householder from Potomac, Maryland named Kenneth Nechin proudly explained that his home attempts to honor the "deeper meaning" of the holiday: "Religious tolerance, the freedom to practice religion, minorities overcoming majorities who are trying to take your rights away."

Actually, far from celebrating "diversity" or "tolerance" or "respect for every faith," Hanukah (the name means "dedication" in Hebrew) marks a singular display of intolerance-- when religious zealots, exalting the values of "that old time religion," came into the Temple in Jerusalem and drove out all alternate, "creative" forms of worship. In the "For the Miracles" (Al HaNissim) prayer recited at least three times a day by religious Jews during the eight days of the festival, we salute this uncompromising assertion of absolute truth: "Your children came to the Holy of Holies of Your House, cleansed Your Temple, purified the site of your Holiness and kindled lights in the Courtyards of Your Sanctuary." No, the fervently faithful rebels did not assign a special area for other religious impulses as part of some ancient commitment to multiculturalism....

The bad guys of the Hanukah story weren't so much foreign occupiers as they were indigenous traitors who junked the demanding faith of their forefathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, for the trendy, hedonistic, easy-going relativism of Aristotle, Alexander and Antiochus. By placing Greek gods in the Temple in Jerusalem, the Hellenist Jewish leadership didn't try to exclude or prevent the old worship - they meant to open up the Holy of Holies to worshipers of every nation and of every deity in a grand celebration of diversity.

Anyone who takes even ten minutes to read the actual history of the Maccabean revolt will see similarities between its priestly leaders (most conspicuously, the great commander Judah Maccabee, son of Mattathias) and today's prominent figures in the Religious Right. The Maccabees insisted on re-affirming ultimate right and wrong, and saw their battle as part of a timeless struggle of good and evil. They demanded a return to the old ways, to the authentic, uncompromising laws of God and the Torah, and they felt only contempt for the Hellenizing modernists who fought against them. The rebels represented the common people - the poor and the humble artisans and the struggling farmers who remained loyal to the ancient faith - while their enemies represented the pampered urban elites, over-educated in the cosmopolitan ways of Judea's Greek overlords.

More here

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ELSEWHERE

Dumb Democrats: "He is expected to have a deep understanding of terrorist groups and their threats to the US. But the incoming chairman of a US congressional intelligence committee was struggling yesterday to explain his ignorance of al-Qa'ida and Hezbollah. Silvestre Reyes, the Democrat chosen to head the House of Representatives committee, was asked whether members of al-Qa'ida came from the Sunni or Shia branch of Islam. "Al-Qa'ida, they have both," he answered, adding: "Predominantly probably Shi'ite." In fact, al-Qa'ida was founded by Osama bin Laden as a Sunni organisation, and views the Shia Muslims as heretics. And Sunnis dominate the militias and death squads in Iraq. A reporter for Congressional Quarterly, Jeff Stein, then put a similar question about Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shia group. "Hezbollah. Uh, Hezbollah," replied Mr Reyes. "Why do you ask me these questions at five o'clock?" he said. "Can I answer in Spanish? Do you speak Spanish?" Go ahead, said Mr Stein. "Well, I, uh ...," said the congressman. His apparent ignorance of the basic facts raised fresh questions over his suitability for the key intelligence post - as well as the judgment of Nancy Pelosi, the new Speaker of the House, who picked him for the job".

High achievers leaving France: "After failing to become a Belgian, Johnny Hallyday, France's biggest rock star, is planning to move his residence and his money to Switzerland, it emerged yesterday. The imminent exit of the country's most popular singer was used by ministers to bolster a promise by Nicolas Sarkozy, the centre-right candidate, to cap France's crippling taxes on the wealthy. Hallyday, 63, is an active supporter of the presidential campaign of Mr Sarkozy, who is Interior Minister and leader of the Union for a Popular Movement. Le rockeur national, who has sold 80 million records since 1961 and is still touring and topping the charts, was reported by L'Express magazine to be aiming to settle in Gstaad, the mountain resort. It is assumed that he wants to join the 100,000 other rich French citizens who have fled their country's annual wealth tax. Like Belgium, Switzerland imposes no wealth tax and it taxes only part of the annual income of rich foreigners."

Plenty of money for Britain's ballooning bureaucracy: "Gordon Brown's claims to be getting to grips with the ballooning government workforce took a battering yesterday from official figures. Far from taming the public sector jobs juggernaut, the figures suggested there has been a resurgence in hiring of state workers this year. The Office for National Statistics reported that the number of public sector workers rose by 7,000 to 5.86 million in the six months since March this year. The rise is mainly down to hiring by local authorities. The figures clash with claims by the Chancellor earlier this month that he is successfully taking an axe to public payrolls. Mr Brown has promised to shed tens of thousands of posts by 2008 as he tries to cut back black hole in the public finances, and in his Pre-Budget Report he claimed to be well on the way. Official figures show that state hiring has accounted for a third of overall job creation since 1998, the year after Labour came to power"



Amazing. Competition between London's airports coming: "Gatwick Airport could be for sale within weeks with a price tag of up to 3 billion pounds after the break-up of BAA's London airport monopoly was signalled by the UK's competition authorities. With BAA's control of 90 per cent of the London market through its ownership of Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted set for a probe by the Competition, industry insiders believe BAA's new Spanish owner Ferrovial could be set to hatch a Gatwick sale plan... In a stinging attack on the BAA monopoly - also seen as a rebuke to a Labour Government that has allowed the company to keep ownership of the UK's three busiest airports - the Office of Fair Trading said BAA should be subjected to a full-blown investigation by the Competition Commission. Citing poor passenger ratings for its London airports, OFT chief executive John Fingleton said: 'Greater competition [between airports] could bring significant benefits for passengers.

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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The backlash against the illegal immigration flood is at full boil in Tennessee

You can push people too far

Kit Brewer doesn't like immigrants. "While America was harnessing electricity, while America was winning World War I, winning World War II, inventing the computer, inventing nuclear weapons [and] breaking the DNA code, what were the Mexicans doing?" he asks. "They were making tacos." He pauses to clarify. "By Mexicans, that's kind o' a generic term for me that also includes Salvadorans, Hondurans, etc.. I don't want any immigrants from the Third World." He also mentions Iraq and Sudan.

Brewer used to live in Antioch-which he calls "Hispanioch," because of its large Hispanic immigrant population-but moved after getting tired of his child "having to step over drunk Mexicans in a ditch to get to the school bus." "Thank God I got out," he says. "While I could still get something for my house."

Brewer insists that he doesn't have a problem with all immigrants, just the "Third Worlders." "If somebody wants to come here form Western Europe, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, that's fine. I would have hated to turn away Albert Einstein," he says. "I don't think that the next Albert Einstein is going to come from the Sudan, Mexico or Honduras."

Brewer also thinks that Americans are inherently better and smarter people than those from other nations. "Like it or not, their I.Q.s, except for Orientals, average seven to 20 points below the average American white." When asked how and where he found such a statistic, Brewer cites "the Internet." [See here]

Unlike some other people who have strident opinions about immigrants and the impact that they're having in the U.S., Brewer doesn't differentiate between most legal and undocumented immigrants. "A legal immigrant from the Third World is just an illegal immigrant with a green card," he says.

Kit Brewer is not alone in his isolationist leanings. Throughout Tennessee in recent months, there have been many public and private displays of sentiments that closely echo Brewer's.

More here

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OBAMA AS A RORSCHACH INKBLOT

If you love Barack Obama, as almost everybody interested in U.S. politics does right now, ask yourself this simple question: What do you know about his opinions on any subject? You probably remember he gave a masterful speech at the 2004 Democratic Convention. You recall how he spoke and that it was he who spoke: a poised and handsome black man with a deep voice that's reassuring and commanding at the same time.

But what did he say? Admit it. You don't really care. Obama is an uncommonly opaque rock-star politician, though not through any fault of his own. He's written and published two wildly successful books, a memoir and a rumination on politics and policy. But of the million or so people who've bought his books, I'd wager only a tenth have sampled more than a few pages. They don't need to read Obama to love him. They love that he writes and he publishes. They love how he speaks. They love the fact that he exists. They love the way he makes them feel.

This is the key to his appeal, and it places Obama in a very unusual position for an elected politician: He is now the semi-official Rorschach Candidate of 2008. The Rorschach Candidate is the one who provokes enthusiasm not because of the positions he takes but because of who he is. He doesn't seem like a politician; he seems to be better than a politician - fresh, new, different. The Rorschach Candidate is especially exciting because under normal circumstances he couldn't possibly take the nomination, and his race for president would seem like a revolutionary and transformative act in itself. Rorschach Candidates have hovered around presidential contests for the past couple of decades....

Obama is a different kind of Rorschach Candidate, because he's actually run for office and won. A sitting senator, albeit one with only two years under his belt in Washington, he's already cast hundreds of votes - and his votes suggest only that he is a down-the-line liberal Democrat with nothing remotely unconventional about him. Indeed, his close relationship with a crooked Illinois fund-raiser - a relationship that will surely become clearer and more public if he runs - suggests he is a conventional politician in another, more distressing way.

More here

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There is a very good bit of sarcasm here about the media hatred of the too-successful Chilean General Pinochet. It is often forgotten that the world-transforming free market reforms instituted by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher were in fact pioneered some years earlier by Augusto Pinochet. It is also usually forgotten that Pinochet overthrew the Marxist President Allende in response to a request from the Chilean Parliament -- not unlike the way Cromwell and Fairfax overthrew the tyrannical King Charles I in response to a request from the English Parliament (You won't read THAT in the newspapers!). I also have an article about Pinochet on Political Correctness Watch today.

A new monument in France -- to French decay: "This one was unveiled at the end of October in Clichy-sous-Bois. If that name rings a bell, it’s the bell on the fire truck racing through the streets to douse the flaming Citroens and Renaults in last year’s riots. They began when two of France’s legions of — what’s the word? — “youths” were fleeing the cops and decided to hide out in an electrical substation. Bad choice. They were electrocuted. Their fellow “youths” blamed the police and launched a three-week orgy of destruction. Now Clichy-sous-Bois has put up a monument to the unfortunate Zyed Benna and Bouna Traore. As in Arizona and London, this is an official memorial. That’s to say, the mayor of Clichy-sous-Bois unveiled the monument to Messieurs Benna and Traore in the front of their school and then led a “silent march” to the substation where he laid a wreath commemorating their death — or, indeed, manslaughter, if some of the complaints against the pursuing gendarmes come off.

Chris Brand has just done a new lot of posts -- including a big coverage of Tony Blair's recent watering down of official British multiculturalism.

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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THE KATRINA DISASTER .... WHOSE FAULT?

An interesting comment from Boortz

Are you starting to get an idea just why the people of New Orleans were so messed up by Katrina? Are you starting to understand that most of the problems were of their doing, not the fault of FEMA or George Bush?

This idiots down there have reelected William Jefferson as their congressman. This is the crook that was found with $90,000 in cash in his freezer, cash that is believed to have come from a $100,000 bribe he took. He is most likely headed to an indictment in the next few months, and these idiots voted him back in office.

Now we know that a huge portion, perhaps a majority of the people who live in this congressional district are completely lacking in any sense of right-and-wrong. It's a welfare district and Jefferson delivered the goods ... both to himself and his district. It should come as no surprise at all that people who would send a crook like this back to congress would be unable to care for themselves in the face of a hurricane.

Boortz also has a rather amusing picture of arrogant Leftist Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney. It reminds me of the old British "Golliwog" caricature:



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"LAME DUCK" CONGRESS HAS SOME FUN

In a final, late-night surge of legislating, the 109th Congress passed $45 billion in tax cuts and a trade package affecting at least 150 developing nations, as well as a range of smaller bills on issues from healthcare to energy. But they left most of the current fiscal year's spending decisions to the next Congress...

The 11th-hour output includes popular tax extenders, such as the research and development tax credit for businesses and the tax break for college tuition. It also includes more controversial provisions, such as opening some 8.3 million acres along the Gulf Coast to oil and gas drilling, and a trade deal with Haiti that could hurt US textile interests....

As late as Friday, eight senators from textile states were threatening to block the omnibus trade and tax bill unless a proposal to lift tariffs on clothing manufactured in Haiti was removed. They said it would open US markets even further to unfair competition from China, but they fell short of the votes needed to prevail. "It's stunning that the House leadership and Senate as its last act before it adjourns is going to ramrod a job-destroying trade bill past the Congress," said Auggie Tantillo, executive director of the American Manufacturing Trade Action Coalition, before Friday's vote. In response, backers said the trade package, including permanent normal trade relations with Vietnam, will lower costs for US manufacturers and consumers. "This legislation will help to create stronger trading partners for the future, while also recognizing our responsibility as having one of the world's strongest economies to help developing countries grow," said House Ways and Means Chairman Bill Thomas (R) of California in a statement after the 212-to-184 House vote.

The 109th Congress also voted to postpone completing nine of 11 FY 2007 spending bills until Feb. 15, forcing Democrats to take up divisive spending issues as they are ramping up in the next Congress. "It's real act of defiance by the lame-duck Congress and a conscious attempt to set up a political problem for the next Congress," says Julian Zelizer, a congressional historian at the Boston University. "It's more than just leaving a budgetary mess. It's creating a huge problem in how Democrats will solve the tension within their party between fiscal conservatives and those who want to start new spending initiatives and how Democrats will deal with corruption and whole pork-barrel issues," he adds.

More here

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Brookes News Update

President Bush's tax cuts and the Democrats' economic illiteracy: Filthy rich Democrats like Pelosi, Kerry and Kennedy need to explain why tax cuts that promote capital formation and raise real wages and living standards manage to benefit only the rich
Is falling unemployment bad news for the Australian economy?: Australia has been running an unsustainable monetary boom that can only result in recession. The Reserve Bank's reckless monetary policy has created a mass of imbalances, including the current account deficit. This means that sooner or later the bank must apply the monetary brakes
Democrats and the two Robin Hoods: Nancy Pelosi's former chief of staff announced this week the Dems' intention to demonize Big Business, harassing corporations with investigations and hamstringing their capacity to produce. It's all the same classic pander to envy as an excuse to gain more power over people's lives and fortunes
Giving away the Israel and the candy store: What is wrong with the Israelis? What have we become? I know one thing: despite all, Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East. Ariel Sharon taught his protege, Olmert, well: the country is your personal candy store
The utter nonsense of the Iraq strategy: The pure lunacy of the Iraq debate is only understood when one arrives at the understanding that the collective we in the West are not really a part of this mislabeled 'War'
Gullible Jews and the Jewish press : Contrary to the common belief of anti-Semites that Jews are shrewd, we are quite a trusting people and naivee leader of the free world

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AFL-CIO wants to eliminate low-skilled jobs and low-cost consumer goods: "As the AFL-CIO gathers in Washington today for a post-election organizing summit, the labor movement is assured of a seat at the table in the new Democrat-controlled Congress, and it has an ambitious agenda: raising the minimum wage, restricting trade agreements, beefing up worker health and safety protections and rewriting the National Labor Relations Act to make it easier to organize unions."

The Dec. 11 post here has a nice bit of sarcasm about the awful sin of being a white male.

For more postings, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and EYE ON BRITAIN. (Mirror sites here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here).

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"All the worth which the human being possesses, all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State." -- 19th century German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel is the most influential philosopher of the Left -- inspiring Karl Marx, the American "Progressives" of the early 20th century and university socialists to this day.

The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialistisch)

Comments? Email me here (Hotmail address). If there are no recent posts here blame Blogger.com and visit my mirror site here or here. My Home Pages are here or here or here.

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