"Did you really think that we want those laws to be observed?" said Dr. Ferris. "we want them broken. There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. When there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. Who wants a nation of law-abiding citizens? What's there in that for anyone? But just pass the kind of laws that can neither be observed nor enforced nor objectively interpreted--and you create a nation of law-breakers -- and then you cash in on guilt. Now that's the system, Mr. Reardon; that's the game and once you understand it, you'll be much easier to deal with."
Although Dr. Ferris of the State Science Institute speaks these words to Hank Reardon in Ayn Rand's famous philosophical novel
Atlas Shrugged you'd think it was something that Ted Kennedy would say to Bill Gates.
"When there aren't enough criminals, one makes them." If one tries just a little bit one can think of the following actual examples of how we are made to be criminals: substance abuse laws, antiporn laws, taxation laws, licences, racial quotas, environmental laws, or what about the biggest doozie of them all the antitrust laws. I'm sure you could come up with more off the top of your head if you really tried. A popular one today are the imminent new immigration laws.
What's going on in Washington with their firebreathing rhetoric on how Mexicans are pouring in here to work you'd think that work will be outlawed next. I know Mexicans, Colombians, and other South Americans who are more hard-working than many born and bred Americans and yet we would brand them criminals as well as the business owners who hire them for the mere desire to earn a decent living working in America. This is nothing but another form of power grabbing by our corrupt politicians who seem to have forgotton that our nation IS a country of immigrants.
This is how politicians gain ever more and more power - by creating a nation of law-breaking people. Pretty soon you wake up one day and find it hard just to get through the day without breaking some law. Sounds like Nazi Germany doesn't it?
Saturday, May 13, 2006
Open Immigration by Harry Binswanger
This is a defense of phasing-in open immigration into the United States. Entry into the U.S. should ultimately be free for any foreigner, with the exception of criminals, would-be terrorists, and those carrying infectious diseases. (And note: I am defending freedom of entry and residency, not the automatic granting of U.S. citizenship).
An end to immigration quotas is demanded by the principle of individual rights. Every individual has rights as an individual, not as a member of this or that nation. One has rights not by virtue of being an American, but by virtue of being human.
One doesn't have to be a resident of any particular country to have a moral entitlement to be secure from governmental coercion against one's life, liberty, and property. In the words of the Declaration of Independence, government is instituted "to secure these rights"--to protect them against their violation by force or fraud.
A foreigner has rights just as much as an American. To be a foreigner is not to be a criminal. Yet our government treats as criminals those foreigners not lucky enough to win the green-card lottery.
Seeking employment in this country is not a criminal act. It coerces no one and violates no one's rights. There is no "right" to be exempt from competition in the labor market, or in any other market.
It is not a criminal act to buy or rent a home here in which to reside. Paying for housing is not a coercive act--whether the buyer is an American or a foreigner. No one's rights are violated when a Mexican, or Canadian, or Senegalese rents an apartment from an American owner and moves into the housing he is paying for. And what about the rights of those American citizens who want to sell or rent their property to the highest bidders? Or the American businesses that want to hire the lowest-cost workers? It is morally indefensible for our government to violate their right to do so.
Immigration quotas forcibly exclude foreigners who want not to seize but to purchase housing here, who want not to rob Americans but to engage in productive work, raising our standard of living. To forcibly exclude those who seek peacefully to trade value for value with us is a violation of the rights of both parties to such a trade: the rights of the American seller or employer and the rights of the foreign buyer or employee.
Thus, immigration quotas treat both Americans and foreigners as if they were criminals, as if the peaceful exchange of values to mutual benefit were an act of destruction.
To take an actual example, if I want to invite my Norwegian friend Klaus to live in my home, either as a guest or as a paying tenant, what right does our government have to stop Klaus and me? To be a Norwegian is not to be a criminal. And if some American business wants to hire Klaus, what right does our government have to interfere?
The implicit premise of barring foreigners is: "This is our country, we let in who we want." But who is "we"? The government does not own the country. Jurisdiction is not ownership. Only the owner of land or any item of property can decide the terms of its use or sale. Nor does the majority own the country. This is a country of private property, and housing is private property. So is a job.
American land is not the collective property of some entity called "the U.S. government." Nor is there such a thing as collective, social ownership of the land. The claim, "We have the right to decide who is allowed in" means some individuals--those with the most votes--claim the right to prevent other citizens from exercising their rights. But there can be no right to violate the rights of others.
Our constitutional republic respects minority rights. 60% of the population cannot vote to enslave the other 40%. Nor can a majority dictate to the owners of private property. Nor can a majority dictate on whom private employers spend their money. Not morally, not in a free society. In a free society, the rights of the individual are held sacrosanct, above any claim of even an overwhelming majority.
The rights of one man end where the rights of his neighbor begin. Only within the limits of his rights is a man free to act on his own judgment. The criminal is the man who deliberately steps outside his rights-protected domain and invades the domain of another, depriving his victim of his exclusive control over his property, or liberty, or life. The criminal, by his own choice, has rejected rights in favor of brute violence. Thus, an immigration policy that excludes criminals is proper.
Likewise, a person with an infectious disease, such as smallpox, threatens with serious physical harm those with whom he comes into proximity. Unlike the criminal, he may not intend to do damage, but the threat of physical harm is clear, present, and objectively demonstrable. To protect the lives of Americans, he may be kept out or quarantined until he is no longer a threat.
But what about the millions of Mexicans, South Americans, Chinese, Canadians, etc. seeking entry who are not criminal and not bearing infectious diseases? By what moral principle can they be excluded? Not on the grounds of majority vote, not on the grounds of protecting any American's rights, not on the grounds of any legitimate authority of the state.
THE MORAL AND THE PRACTICAL
That's the moral case for phasing out limits on immigration. But some ask: "Is it practical? Wouldn't unlimited immigration--even if phased in over a decade--be disastrous to our economic well-being and create overcrowding? Are we being told to just grit our teeth and surrender our interests in the name of morality?"
This question is invalid on its face. It shows a failure to understand the nature of rights, and of moral principles generally. Rational moral principles reflect a recognition of the basic nature of man, his nature as a specific kind of living organism, having a specific means of survival. Questions of what is practical, what is to one's self-interest, can be answered only in that context. It is neither practical nor to one's interest to attempt to live and act in defiance of one's nature as a human being.
Yet that is the meaning of the moral-practical dichotomy. When one claims, "It is immoral but practical," one is maintaining, "It cripples my nature as a human being, but it is beneficial to me"--which is a contradiction.
Rights, in particular, are not something pulled from the sky or decreed by societal whim. Rights are moral principles, established by reference to the needs inherent in man's nature qua man. "Rights are conditions of existence required by man's nature for his proper survival." (Ayn Rand)
Every organism has a basic means of survival; for man, that means is: reason. Man is the rational animal, homo sapiens. Rights are moral principles that spell out the terms of social interaction required for a rational being to survive and flourish. Since the reasoning mind cannot function under physical coercion, the basic social requirement of man's survival is: freedom. Rights prescribe freedom by proscribing coercion.
"If man is to live on earth, it is right for him to use his mind, it is right to act on his own free judgment, it is right to work for his values and to keep the product of his work." (Ayn Rand)
Rights reflect the fundamental alternative of voluntary consent or brute force. The reign of force is in no one's interest; the system of voluntary cooperation by mutual consent is the precondition of anyone achieving his actual interests.
To ignore the principle of rights means jettisoning the principled, moral resolution of conflicts, and substituting mere numbers (majority vote). That is not to anyone's interest. Tyranny is not to anyone's self-interest.
Rights establish the necessary framework within which one defines his legitimate self-interest. One cannot hold that one's self-interest requires that he be "free" to deprive others of their freedom, treating their interests as morally irrelevant. One cannot hold that recognizing the rights of others is moral but "impractical."
Since rights are based on the requirements of man's life as a rational being, there can be no conflict between the moral and the practical here: if respecting individual rights requires it, your interest requires it.
Freedom or force, reason or compulsion--that is the basic social alternative. Immigrants recognize the value of freedom--that's why they seek to come here.
The American Founders defined and implemented a system of rights because they recognized that man, as a rational being, must be free to act on his own judgment and to keep the products of his own effort. They did not intend to establish a system in which those who happen to be born here could use force to "protect" themselves from the peaceful competition of others.
ECONOMICS
One major fear of open immigration is economic: the fear of losing one's job to immigrants. It is asked: "Won't the immigrants take our jobs?" The answer is: "Yes, so we can go on to better, higher-paying jobs."
The fallacy in this protectionist objection lies in the idea that there is only a finite amount of work to be done. The unstated assumption is: "If Americans don't get to do that work, if foreigners do it instead, we Americans will have nothing to do."
But work is the creation of wealth. A job is a role in the production of goods and services--the production of food, of cars, computers, the providing of internet content--all the items that go to make up our standard of living. A country cannot have too much wealth. The need for wealth is limitless, and the work that is to be done is limitless.
From a grand, historical perspective, we are only at the beginning of the wealth-creating age. The wealth Americans produce today is as nothing compared to what we'll have two hundred years from now--just as the standard of living 200 years in the past, in 1806, was as nothing compared to ours today.
Unemployment is not caused by an absence of avenues for the creation of wealth. Unemployment is caused by government interference in the labor market. Even with that interference, the number of jobs goes relentlessly upward, decade after decade. This bears witness to the fact that there's no end to the creation of wealth and thus no end to the useful employment of human intelligence and the physical effort directed by that intelligence. There is always more productive work to be done. If you can give your job to an immigrant, you can get a more valuable job.
What is the effect of a bigger labor pool on wage rates? If the money supply is constant, nominal wage rates fall. But real wage rates rise, because total output has gone up. Economists have demonstrated that real wages have to rise as long as the immigrants are self-supporting. If immigrants earn their keep, if they don't consume more than they produce, then they add to total output, which means that prices fall (if the money supply is constant).
And, in fact, rising real wages was the history of our country in the nineteenth century. Before the 1920s, there were no limits on immigration, yet these were the years of America's fasted economic progress. The standard of living rocketed upward. Self-supporting immigrants were an economic benefit not an injury.
The protectionist objection that immigrants take away jobs and harm our standard of living is a solid economic fallacy.
WELFARE
A popular misconception is that immigrants come here to get welfare. To the extent that is true, immigrants do constitute a burden. But this issue is mooted by the passage, under the Clinton Administration, of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity and Reconciliation Act (PRWORA), which makes legal permanent residents ineligible for most forms of welfare for 5 years. I support this kind of legislation.
Further, if the fear is of non-working immigrants, why is the pending aimed at employers of immigrants?
OVERCROWDING
America is a vastly underpopulated country. Our population density is less than one-third of France's.
Take an extreme example. Suppose a tidal wave of immigrants came here. Suppose that half of the people on the planet moved here. That would mean an unthinkable eleven-fold increase in our population--from 300 million to 3.3 billion people. The result? America would be a bit less "densely" populated than England (360 people/sq. km. vs. 384 people/sq. km.). In fact, it would make us less densely populated than the state of New Jersey (453 per sq. km.). And these calculations exclude Alaska and Hawaii, and count only land area.
Contrary to widespread beliefs, high population density is a value not a disvalue. High population density intensifies the division of labor, which makes possible a wider variety of jobs and specialized consumer products. For instance, in Manhattan, there is a "doll hospital"--a store specializing in the repair of children's dolls. Such a specialized, niche business requires a high population density in order to have a market. Try finding a doll hospital in Poughkeepsie. In Manhattan, one can find a job as a Pilates Method teacher or as a "Secret Shopper" (two jobs actually listed on Craig's List). Not in Paducah.
People want to live near other people, in cities. One-seventh of England's population lives in London. If population density is a bad thing, why are Manhattan real-estate prices so high?
THE VALUE OF IMMIGRANTS
Immigrants are the kind of people who refresh the American spirit. They are ambitious, courageous, and value freedom. They come here, often with no money and not even speaking the language, to seek a better life for themselves and their children.
The vision of American freedom, with its opportunity to prosper by hard work, serves as a magnet drawing the best of the world's people. Immigrants are self-selected for their virtues: their ambitiousness, daring, independence, and pride. They are willing to cast aside the tradition-bound roles assigned to them in their native lands and to re-define themselves as Americans. These are the people our country needs in order to keep alive the individualist, hard-working attitude that made America.
Here is a short list of some great immigrants: Alexander Hamilton, Alexander Graham Bell, Andrew Carnegie, most of the top scientists of the Manhattan Project, Igor Sikorsky (the inventor of the helicopter), Ayn Rand.
Open immigration: the benefits are great. The right is unquestionable. So let them come.
Copyright © 2006. TOF Publications, Inc. www.hblist.com/immigr.htm Permission hereby granted to republish, in whole or in part, provided no changes are made in the wording of material used, Harry Binswanger's authorship is stated, and this notice is carried.
An end to immigration quotas is demanded by the principle of individual rights. Every individual has rights as an individual, not as a member of this or that nation. One has rights not by virtue of being an American, but by virtue of being human.
One doesn't have to be a resident of any particular country to have a moral entitlement to be secure from governmental coercion against one's life, liberty, and property. In the words of the Declaration of Independence, government is instituted "to secure these rights"--to protect them against their violation by force or fraud.
A foreigner has rights just as much as an American. To be a foreigner is not to be a criminal. Yet our government treats as criminals those foreigners not lucky enough to win the green-card lottery.
Seeking employment in this country is not a criminal act. It coerces no one and violates no one's rights. There is no "right" to be exempt from competition in the labor market, or in any other market.
It is not a criminal act to buy or rent a home here in which to reside. Paying for housing is not a coercive act--whether the buyer is an American or a foreigner. No one's rights are violated when a Mexican, or Canadian, or Senegalese rents an apartment from an American owner and moves into the housing he is paying for. And what about the rights of those American citizens who want to sell or rent their property to the highest bidders? Or the American businesses that want to hire the lowest-cost workers? It is morally indefensible for our government to violate their right to do so.
Immigration quotas forcibly exclude foreigners who want not to seize but to purchase housing here, who want not to rob Americans but to engage in productive work, raising our standard of living. To forcibly exclude those who seek peacefully to trade value for value with us is a violation of the rights of both parties to such a trade: the rights of the American seller or employer and the rights of the foreign buyer or employee.
Thus, immigration quotas treat both Americans and foreigners as if they were criminals, as if the peaceful exchange of values to mutual benefit were an act of destruction.
To take an actual example, if I want to invite my Norwegian friend Klaus to live in my home, either as a guest or as a paying tenant, what right does our government have to stop Klaus and me? To be a Norwegian is not to be a criminal. And if some American business wants to hire Klaus, what right does our government have to interfere?
The implicit premise of barring foreigners is: "This is our country, we let in who we want." But who is "we"? The government does not own the country. Jurisdiction is not ownership. Only the owner of land or any item of property can decide the terms of its use or sale. Nor does the majority own the country. This is a country of private property, and housing is private property. So is a job.
American land is not the collective property of some entity called "the U.S. government." Nor is there such a thing as collective, social ownership of the land. The claim, "We have the right to decide who is allowed in" means some individuals--those with the most votes--claim the right to prevent other citizens from exercising their rights. But there can be no right to violate the rights of others.
Our constitutional republic respects minority rights. 60% of the population cannot vote to enslave the other 40%. Nor can a majority dictate to the owners of private property. Nor can a majority dictate on whom private employers spend their money. Not morally, not in a free society. In a free society, the rights of the individual are held sacrosanct, above any claim of even an overwhelming majority.
The rights of one man end where the rights of his neighbor begin. Only within the limits of his rights is a man free to act on his own judgment. The criminal is the man who deliberately steps outside his rights-protected domain and invades the domain of another, depriving his victim of his exclusive control over his property, or liberty, or life. The criminal, by his own choice, has rejected rights in favor of brute violence. Thus, an immigration policy that excludes criminals is proper.
Likewise, a person with an infectious disease, such as smallpox, threatens with serious physical harm those with whom he comes into proximity. Unlike the criminal, he may not intend to do damage, but the threat of physical harm is clear, present, and objectively demonstrable. To protect the lives of Americans, he may be kept out or quarantined until he is no longer a threat.
But what about the millions of Mexicans, South Americans, Chinese, Canadians, etc. seeking entry who are not criminal and not bearing infectious diseases? By what moral principle can they be excluded? Not on the grounds of majority vote, not on the grounds of protecting any American's rights, not on the grounds of any legitimate authority of the state.
THE MORAL AND THE PRACTICAL
That's the moral case for phasing out limits on immigration. But some ask: "Is it practical? Wouldn't unlimited immigration--even if phased in over a decade--be disastrous to our economic well-being and create overcrowding? Are we being told to just grit our teeth and surrender our interests in the name of morality?"
This question is invalid on its face. It shows a failure to understand the nature of rights, and of moral principles generally. Rational moral principles reflect a recognition of the basic nature of man, his nature as a specific kind of living organism, having a specific means of survival. Questions of what is practical, what is to one's self-interest, can be answered only in that context. It is neither practical nor to one's interest to attempt to live and act in defiance of one's nature as a human being.
Yet that is the meaning of the moral-practical dichotomy. When one claims, "It is immoral but practical," one is maintaining, "It cripples my nature as a human being, but it is beneficial to me"--which is a contradiction.
Rights, in particular, are not something pulled from the sky or decreed by societal whim. Rights are moral principles, established by reference to the needs inherent in man's nature qua man. "Rights are conditions of existence required by man's nature for his proper survival." (Ayn Rand)
Every organism has a basic means of survival; for man, that means is: reason. Man is the rational animal, homo sapiens. Rights are moral principles that spell out the terms of social interaction required for a rational being to survive and flourish. Since the reasoning mind cannot function under physical coercion, the basic social requirement of man's survival is: freedom. Rights prescribe freedom by proscribing coercion.
"If man is to live on earth, it is right for him to use his mind, it is right to act on his own free judgment, it is right to work for his values and to keep the product of his work." (Ayn Rand)
Rights reflect the fundamental alternative of voluntary consent or brute force. The reign of force is in no one's interest; the system of voluntary cooperation by mutual consent is the precondition of anyone achieving his actual interests.
To ignore the principle of rights means jettisoning the principled, moral resolution of conflicts, and substituting mere numbers (majority vote). That is not to anyone's interest. Tyranny is not to anyone's self-interest.
Rights establish the necessary framework within which one defines his legitimate self-interest. One cannot hold that one's self-interest requires that he be "free" to deprive others of their freedom, treating their interests as morally irrelevant. One cannot hold that recognizing the rights of others is moral but "impractical."
Since rights are based on the requirements of man's life as a rational being, there can be no conflict between the moral and the practical here: if respecting individual rights requires it, your interest requires it.
Freedom or force, reason or compulsion--that is the basic social alternative. Immigrants recognize the value of freedom--that's why they seek to come here.
The American Founders defined and implemented a system of rights because they recognized that man, as a rational being, must be free to act on his own judgment and to keep the products of his own effort. They did not intend to establish a system in which those who happen to be born here could use force to "protect" themselves from the peaceful competition of others.
ECONOMICS
One major fear of open immigration is economic: the fear of losing one's job to immigrants. It is asked: "Won't the immigrants take our jobs?" The answer is: "Yes, so we can go on to better, higher-paying jobs."
The fallacy in this protectionist objection lies in the idea that there is only a finite amount of work to be done. The unstated assumption is: "If Americans don't get to do that work, if foreigners do it instead, we Americans will have nothing to do."
But work is the creation of wealth. A job is a role in the production of goods and services--the production of food, of cars, computers, the providing of internet content--all the items that go to make up our standard of living. A country cannot have too much wealth. The need for wealth is limitless, and the work that is to be done is limitless.
From a grand, historical perspective, we are only at the beginning of the wealth-creating age. The wealth Americans produce today is as nothing compared to what we'll have two hundred years from now--just as the standard of living 200 years in the past, in 1806, was as nothing compared to ours today.
Unemployment is not caused by an absence of avenues for the creation of wealth. Unemployment is caused by government interference in the labor market. Even with that interference, the number of jobs goes relentlessly upward, decade after decade. This bears witness to the fact that there's no end to the creation of wealth and thus no end to the useful employment of human intelligence and the physical effort directed by that intelligence. There is always more productive work to be done. If you can give your job to an immigrant, you can get a more valuable job.
What is the effect of a bigger labor pool on wage rates? If the money supply is constant, nominal wage rates fall. But real wage rates rise, because total output has gone up. Economists have demonstrated that real wages have to rise as long as the immigrants are self-supporting. If immigrants earn their keep, if they don't consume more than they produce, then they add to total output, which means that prices fall (if the money supply is constant).
And, in fact, rising real wages was the history of our country in the nineteenth century. Before the 1920s, there were no limits on immigration, yet these were the years of America's fasted economic progress. The standard of living rocketed upward. Self-supporting immigrants were an economic benefit not an injury.
The protectionist objection that immigrants take away jobs and harm our standard of living is a solid economic fallacy.
WELFARE
A popular misconception is that immigrants come here to get welfare. To the extent that is true, immigrants do constitute a burden. But this issue is mooted by the passage, under the Clinton Administration, of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity and Reconciliation Act (PRWORA), which makes legal permanent residents ineligible for most forms of welfare for 5 years. I support this kind of legislation.
Further, if the fear is of non-working immigrants, why is the pending aimed at employers of immigrants?
OVERCROWDING
America is a vastly underpopulated country. Our population density is less than one-third of France's.
Take an extreme example. Suppose a tidal wave of immigrants came here. Suppose that half of the people on the planet moved here. That would mean an unthinkable eleven-fold increase in our population--from 300 million to 3.3 billion people. The result? America would be a bit less "densely" populated than England (360 people/sq. km. vs. 384 people/sq. km.). In fact, it would make us less densely populated than the state of New Jersey (453 per sq. km.). And these calculations exclude Alaska and Hawaii, and count only land area.
Contrary to widespread beliefs, high population density is a value not a disvalue. High population density intensifies the division of labor, which makes possible a wider variety of jobs and specialized consumer products. For instance, in Manhattan, there is a "doll hospital"--a store specializing in the repair of children's dolls. Such a specialized, niche business requires a high population density in order to have a market. Try finding a doll hospital in Poughkeepsie. In Manhattan, one can find a job as a Pilates Method teacher or as a "Secret Shopper" (two jobs actually listed on Craig's List). Not in Paducah.
People want to live near other people, in cities. One-seventh of England's population lives in London. If population density is a bad thing, why are Manhattan real-estate prices so high?
THE VALUE OF IMMIGRANTS
Immigrants are the kind of people who refresh the American spirit. They are ambitious, courageous, and value freedom. They come here, often with no money and not even speaking the language, to seek a better life for themselves and their children.
The vision of American freedom, with its opportunity to prosper by hard work, serves as a magnet drawing the best of the world's people. Immigrants are self-selected for their virtues: their ambitiousness, daring, independence, and pride. They are willing to cast aside the tradition-bound roles assigned to them in their native lands and to re-define themselves as Americans. These are the people our country needs in order to keep alive the individualist, hard-working attitude that made America.
Here is a short list of some great immigrants: Alexander Hamilton, Alexander Graham Bell, Andrew Carnegie, most of the top scientists of the Manhattan Project, Igor Sikorsky (the inventor of the helicopter), Ayn Rand.
Open immigration: the benefits are great. The right is unquestionable. So let them come.
Copyright © 2006. TOF Publications, Inc. www.hblist.com/immigr.htm Permission hereby granted to republish, in whole or in part, provided no changes are made in the wording of material used, Harry Binswanger's authorship is stated, and this notice is carried.
Saturday, April 15, 2006
We Must Act Now to Defeat the Central Enemy in the War on Terrorism - by Robert Tracinski
You can find this article at website.
Four and a half years after September 11—which was supposed to awaken us to the threat of devastating attacks by state-sponsored terrorists—America is finally beginning to confront the world's largest and most dangerous state sponsor of terrorism: the Islamic Republic of Iran.
For the past week, newspapers and magazines have been filled with discussion of possible military action against Iran. The debate, so far, is between those who merely want to "threaten" the use of force, and those who argue that the Iranian threat is illusory. No one is yet willing to face the fact that Iran is already at war with the United States—and that Iran is the central enemy we have to defeat if we are going to win the War on Terrorism.
In all of the obfuscation generated by the backward-looking debate over what happened to Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction, it has been easy for some to claim that the Iranian threat is being blown out of proportion by the Bush administration. But grasping the case against Iran doesn't depend on secret dossiers and obscure intelligence reports. All it requires is that you open up your newspaper and read the pronouncements of Iran's own leaders.
In early April, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad hosted a pep rally at which dancers in traditional Persian garb held aloft vials of refined uranium, while Ahmadinejad announced that Iran had succeeding in enriching uranium, the first step toward producing a nuclear bomb. Iran "has joined the club of nuclear countries," he boasted. An Iranian official followed up by announcing that Iran would immediately take the next step, expanding uranium enrichment to an industrial scale, allowing Iran to start building its nuclear arsenal as early as the end of this year.
Why does Iran want to enrich uranium? Ahmadinejad isn't interested so much in joining a nuclear club as he is in wielding a nuclear club. He has openly boasted that Iran wants to "wipe Israel off the map." Is Ahmadinejad just a wild-eyed "radical," out of touch with the rest of the Iranian regime? A few years ago, Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani—a man considered "moderate" by the standards of the Iranian regime—boasted that "a single atomic bomb has the power to completely destroy Israel." In case you don't think they're serious, Iran's religious establishment recently released a fatwa sanctioning the use of nuclear weapons.
But the biggest threat posed by an Iranian nuclear weapon is not in Israel, but in Iraq—where Iran is already fighting a proxy war against America and its allies.
In the Iraqi conflict, Iran has been playing both ends against the middle—that is, against the United States. In Western Iraq, the Sunni insurgency is supported by a flow of terrorists, weapons, and money from Syria—a key Iranian ally. In Southern Iraq, Shiite insurgents have been using sophisticated Iranian-built shaped charges in their bomb attacks on American convoys. But this is the least of the Iranian threat. Violent Shiite militias that seek to impose an Islamist dictatorship are funded, organized, and take their ideological inspiration from Iran. The leader of the most pro-Iranian faction, Muqtada al-Sadr, has publicly pledged to fight on Iran's behalf if it is attacked by America.
There is no need to invoke the doctrine of pre-emption against Iran. Iran is already fighting a war against the United States. We just haven't been fighting back. We have held our fire as if Iran were protected by a shield of nuclear weapons. How much more aggressive will the Iranians become when they are actually protected by such a nuclear shield?
Iran's reach is not limited to Iraq. Late last year, when Bashar Assad's Syrian dictatorship was reeling from the loss of Lebanon, Ahmadinejad made a trip to Damascus in which he urged Assad to stand fast and pledged Iranian support. The Assad regime, which had been sending up trial balloons about political liberalization, instead threw hundreds of dissidents into prison. At the same time, Ahmadinejad met with leaders of Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed terrorist militia in Southern Lebanon, and representatives of two Palestinian terrorist groups: Islamic Jihad and Hamas. Now that Hamas has won the Palestinian elections, it is looking for diplomatic and financial support from—where else?—Iran.
Iran's tentacles even extend beyond the Middle East. Iran has been cultivating an alliance with Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez, including discussions about providing the anti-American firebrand and protégé of Fidel Castro with nuclear technology.
This expansionist pattern is no accident. The mullahs who rule Iran's system from behind the scenes maneuvered Ahmadinejad into power last year because they knew he had the fiery fanaticism to go on the offensive, pressing Iran's advantage in the face of American wavering on Iraq. Ahmadinejad has not disappointed them. Like the super-villain of a corny James Bond film—but one who commands actual armies and actual missiles—Ahmadinejad has a master plan for the domination of the world. In a document presented to Iran's parliament last year, he declared that the US is a fading "sunset power," while Iran is poised to become the "core power" of the Islamic world, the center of a totalitarian Islamic empire.
Everywhere you look in the Middle East, if you ask who is the biggest threat to America's interests, you will find the same answer—Hamas in the Palestinian territories, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Assad regime in Syria, the Sunni terrorists and Shiite militias in Iraq—directly or indirectly, Iran is supporting them all.
Iran's global ambitions are as grandiose as anything put forward by Osama bin Laden—but they are backed by control of a country of 70 million people with an army, navy, and air force, a vast network of terrorist organizations across the Middle East, and, very soon, nuclear weapons.
If America's failure to act against the comparatively minor threat from Bin Laden in the 1990s resulted in the horrors of September 11, we can expect far worse if we fail to act against Iran.
A war with Iran must begin with the destruction of its nuclear facilities, but it must not end there. Iran is likely to respond to any American attack by escalating, inciting an uprising in Southern Iraq, unleashing a wave of terrorist attacks, launching missiles against US targets in the Middle East, attacking oil tankers in the Persian Gulf. And even if we neutralize all of these threats, Iran's theocrats will not drop their global ambitions. They will merely wait for our attention to wander and attempt to strike us again. The goal of a war against Iran must be to topple the Iranian regime—and to support the rise of a new government formed by the secularist dissidents who now languish in Iran's prisons.
The wars we have fought so far, against the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Baathist regime in Iraq—were necessary, but they left the largest, most dangerous Islamist regime untouched. The Iranians know it. Sensing American weakness, they are moving against us on all fronts—and any further delay in pushing them back will only make the task more difficult. We have to act—and we have to act now.
There can be no victory in the War on Terrorism until we confront—and defeat—the Islamic Republic of Iran. This is the real war, and it's time we started fighting it.
Four and a half years after September 11—which was supposed to awaken us to the threat of devastating attacks by state-sponsored terrorists—America is finally beginning to confront the world's largest and most dangerous state sponsor of terrorism: the Islamic Republic of Iran.
For the past week, newspapers and magazines have been filled with discussion of possible military action against Iran. The debate, so far, is between those who merely want to "threaten" the use of force, and those who argue that the Iranian threat is illusory. No one is yet willing to face the fact that Iran is already at war with the United States—and that Iran is the central enemy we have to defeat if we are going to win the War on Terrorism.
In all of the obfuscation generated by the backward-looking debate over what happened to Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction, it has been easy for some to claim that the Iranian threat is being blown out of proportion by the Bush administration. But grasping the case against Iran doesn't depend on secret dossiers and obscure intelligence reports. All it requires is that you open up your newspaper and read the pronouncements of Iran's own leaders.
In early April, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad hosted a pep rally at which dancers in traditional Persian garb held aloft vials of refined uranium, while Ahmadinejad announced that Iran had succeeding in enriching uranium, the first step toward producing a nuclear bomb. Iran "has joined the club of nuclear countries," he boasted. An Iranian official followed up by announcing that Iran would immediately take the next step, expanding uranium enrichment to an industrial scale, allowing Iran to start building its nuclear arsenal as early as the end of this year.
Why does Iran want to enrich uranium? Ahmadinejad isn't interested so much in joining a nuclear club as he is in wielding a nuclear club. He has openly boasted that Iran wants to "wipe Israel off the map." Is Ahmadinejad just a wild-eyed "radical," out of touch with the rest of the Iranian regime? A few years ago, Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani—a man considered "moderate" by the standards of the Iranian regime—boasted that "a single atomic bomb has the power to completely destroy Israel." In case you don't think they're serious, Iran's religious establishment recently released a fatwa sanctioning the use of nuclear weapons.
But the biggest threat posed by an Iranian nuclear weapon is not in Israel, but in Iraq—where Iran is already fighting a proxy war against America and its allies.
In the Iraqi conflict, Iran has been playing both ends against the middle—that is, against the United States. In Western Iraq, the Sunni insurgency is supported by a flow of terrorists, weapons, and money from Syria—a key Iranian ally. In Southern Iraq, Shiite insurgents have been using sophisticated Iranian-built shaped charges in their bomb attacks on American convoys. But this is the least of the Iranian threat. Violent Shiite militias that seek to impose an Islamist dictatorship are funded, organized, and take their ideological inspiration from Iran. The leader of the most pro-Iranian faction, Muqtada al-Sadr, has publicly pledged to fight on Iran's behalf if it is attacked by America.
There is no need to invoke the doctrine of pre-emption against Iran. Iran is already fighting a war against the United States. We just haven't been fighting back. We have held our fire as if Iran were protected by a shield of nuclear weapons. How much more aggressive will the Iranians become when they are actually protected by such a nuclear shield?
Iran's reach is not limited to Iraq. Late last year, when Bashar Assad's Syrian dictatorship was reeling from the loss of Lebanon, Ahmadinejad made a trip to Damascus in which he urged Assad to stand fast and pledged Iranian support. The Assad regime, which had been sending up trial balloons about political liberalization, instead threw hundreds of dissidents into prison. At the same time, Ahmadinejad met with leaders of Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed terrorist militia in Southern Lebanon, and representatives of two Palestinian terrorist groups: Islamic Jihad and Hamas. Now that Hamas has won the Palestinian elections, it is looking for diplomatic and financial support from—where else?—Iran.
Iran's tentacles even extend beyond the Middle East. Iran has been cultivating an alliance with Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez, including discussions about providing the anti-American firebrand and protégé of Fidel Castro with nuclear technology.
This expansionist pattern is no accident. The mullahs who rule Iran's system from behind the scenes maneuvered Ahmadinejad into power last year because they knew he had the fiery fanaticism to go on the offensive, pressing Iran's advantage in the face of American wavering on Iraq. Ahmadinejad has not disappointed them. Like the super-villain of a corny James Bond film—but one who commands actual armies and actual missiles—Ahmadinejad has a master plan for the domination of the world. In a document presented to Iran's parliament last year, he declared that the US is a fading "sunset power," while Iran is poised to become the "core power" of the Islamic world, the center of a totalitarian Islamic empire.
Everywhere you look in the Middle East, if you ask who is the biggest threat to America's interests, you will find the same answer—Hamas in the Palestinian territories, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Assad regime in Syria, the Sunni terrorists and Shiite militias in Iraq—directly or indirectly, Iran is supporting them all.
Iran's global ambitions are as grandiose as anything put forward by Osama bin Laden—but they are backed by control of a country of 70 million people with an army, navy, and air force, a vast network of terrorist organizations across the Middle East, and, very soon, nuclear weapons.
If America's failure to act against the comparatively minor threat from Bin Laden in the 1990s resulted in the horrors of September 11, we can expect far worse if we fail to act against Iran.
A war with Iran must begin with the destruction of its nuclear facilities, but it must not end there. Iran is likely to respond to any American attack by escalating, inciting an uprising in Southern Iraq, unleashing a wave of terrorist attacks, launching missiles against US targets in the Middle East, attacking oil tankers in the Persian Gulf. And even if we neutralize all of these threats, Iran's theocrats will not drop their global ambitions. They will merely wait for our attention to wander and attempt to strike us again. The goal of a war against Iran must be to topple the Iranian regime—and to support the rise of a new government formed by the secularist dissidents who now languish in Iran's prisons.
The wars we have fought so far, against the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Baathist regime in Iraq—were necessary, but they left the largest, most dangerous Islamist regime untouched. The Iranians know it. Sensing American weakness, they are moving against us on all fronts—and any further delay in pushing them back will only make the task more difficult. We have to act—and we have to act now.
There can be no victory in the War on Terrorism until we confront—and defeat—the Islamic Republic of Iran. This is the real war, and it's time we started fighting it.
The Road to Victory Goes Through Tehran - by Robert Tracinski
Below is the text of an op-ed Rob Tracinski wrote for the Ayn Rand Institute on May 14, 2003 (which was derived from "The Turning of the Tide," the cover article of the June 2003 print issue of TIA), making the case for a war against Iran.
President Bush has declared the end of "major combat operations" in Iraq, but he has not declared victory in the War on Terrorism—and that's a good thing, because the largest and most important battle in that war still remains to be fought.
The road to victory goes through Tehran.
An end to the threat of Islamic terrorism requires, not just the toppling of one state sponsor of terrorism in Iraq, but the toppling of the regime that is the Middle East's most active promoter of terrorism—and the most virulent center of the ideology behind Islamic terrorism: the theocracy that rules Iran.
The most recent evidence for the urgent need to confront Iran is the simmering conflict in southern Iraq. Post-war Iraq has been touted by the administration as an attempt to create a free, peaceful, and prosperous society as a model to be followed by dissidents in neighboring countries like Iran. But Iran also wants to turn Iraq into a model—a model for American humiliation and the triumph of Islamic fanaticism.
The evidence of meticulous Iranian planning is everywhere. Note that Shiite demonstrators showed up just days after the fall of Baghdad carrying elaborate, professionally made banners proclaiming their theocratic agenda—with slogans printed in both Arabic and English, for the benefit of the Western media. This is not the work of poor, uneducated Iraqi peasants. It is the work of well-funded political operatives. Indeed, US forces have already begun to capture Iranian agents in Iraq and believe that thousands more Iranian-backed fighters have flooded over the border in the past month.
A peaceful Iraq that respects the rights of its citizens—and allows the presence of US troops or military bases—is a grave danger to Iran and to its co-conspirator in terrorism, Syria. So these two nations are trying to turn Iraq into "another Lebanon"—a quagmire of terrorist attacks and guerilla warfare. Their hope is that the United States will be so afraid of looking like a "bully" imposing an "occupation" that we will withdraw and abandon Iraq, letting Iran set up its own Khomeini-style regime there—in the same way that we abandoned Lebanon, allowing it to be colonized by Syria.
If we let this Iranian strategy work, we will have achieved "regime change" all right—we will have exchanged a fascist anti-American regime for a theocratic anti-American regime.
The nascent guerilla campaign in southern Iraq is a clear hostile act against the United States. Yet Iran is hoping that America will refuse to recognize this as an act of war. The mullahs hope we will once again put ourselves in the impossible situation of having to fight bands of guerillas among Iraq's civilian population, while refusing to confront the terror masters they serve.
What makes them think they can get away with it? Ultimately, Iran is counting on the administration's loudly proclaimed refusal to "impose our values" or our form of government on Iraq. But fighting for liberty is never an "imposition." No one has a right to violate the rights of others—and so it is no limitation on the "freedom" of Iraqi Shiites or Iranian agents if we deny their ambition to impose religious strictures by force.
The vow that we will not try to influence the new Iraq is a declaration of America's unilateral moral disarmament—our failure to fight for and protect the crucial values at stake in this war.
America needs to recognize that this war is inherently a conflict between two opposing value systems. Our enemies are driven by the theocratic philosophy shared, despite minor sectarian differences, by Osama bin Laden and by the mullahs who rule Iran. The destruction of the Iranian theocracy would do more than just eliminate the world's largest supporter of terrorism; it would do more than end a nuclear-weapons program that is far closer to completion than Iraq's ever was; it would do more than stop the Iranian-staged Shiite agitation in Iraq. The end of the Iranian regime would destroy the Middle East's laboratory of theocracy—the leading example and exporter of a system of religious dogma enforced by terror.
President Bush called the military victory in Iraq "the turning of the tide" in the War on Terrorism. That may be true, but the tide won't stay with us—or carry us to victory—until we are willing to take the war to Tehran and topple the most important material and ideological supporter of Islamic terrorism.
President Bush has declared the end of "major combat operations" in Iraq, but he has not declared victory in the War on Terrorism—and that's a good thing, because the largest and most important battle in that war still remains to be fought.
The road to victory goes through Tehran.
An end to the threat of Islamic terrorism requires, not just the toppling of one state sponsor of terrorism in Iraq, but the toppling of the regime that is the Middle East's most active promoter of terrorism—and the most virulent center of the ideology behind Islamic terrorism: the theocracy that rules Iran.
The most recent evidence for the urgent need to confront Iran is the simmering conflict in southern Iraq. Post-war Iraq has been touted by the administration as an attempt to create a free, peaceful, and prosperous society as a model to be followed by dissidents in neighboring countries like Iran. But Iran also wants to turn Iraq into a model—a model for American humiliation and the triumph of Islamic fanaticism.
The evidence of meticulous Iranian planning is everywhere. Note that Shiite demonstrators showed up just days after the fall of Baghdad carrying elaborate, professionally made banners proclaiming their theocratic agenda—with slogans printed in both Arabic and English, for the benefit of the Western media. This is not the work of poor, uneducated Iraqi peasants. It is the work of well-funded political operatives. Indeed, US forces have already begun to capture Iranian agents in Iraq and believe that thousands more Iranian-backed fighters have flooded over the border in the past month.
A peaceful Iraq that respects the rights of its citizens—and allows the presence of US troops or military bases—is a grave danger to Iran and to its co-conspirator in terrorism, Syria. So these two nations are trying to turn Iraq into "another Lebanon"—a quagmire of terrorist attacks and guerilla warfare. Their hope is that the United States will be so afraid of looking like a "bully" imposing an "occupation" that we will withdraw and abandon Iraq, letting Iran set up its own Khomeini-style regime there—in the same way that we abandoned Lebanon, allowing it to be colonized by Syria.
If we let this Iranian strategy work, we will have achieved "regime change" all right—we will have exchanged a fascist anti-American regime for a theocratic anti-American regime.
The nascent guerilla campaign in southern Iraq is a clear hostile act against the United States. Yet Iran is hoping that America will refuse to recognize this as an act of war. The mullahs hope we will once again put ourselves in the impossible situation of having to fight bands of guerillas among Iraq's civilian population, while refusing to confront the terror masters they serve.
What makes them think they can get away with it? Ultimately, Iran is counting on the administration's loudly proclaimed refusal to "impose our values" or our form of government on Iraq. But fighting for liberty is never an "imposition." No one has a right to violate the rights of others—and so it is no limitation on the "freedom" of Iraqi Shiites or Iranian agents if we deny their ambition to impose religious strictures by force.
The vow that we will not try to influence the new Iraq is a declaration of America's unilateral moral disarmament—our failure to fight for and protect the crucial values at stake in this war.
America needs to recognize that this war is inherently a conflict between two opposing value systems. Our enemies are driven by the theocratic philosophy shared, despite minor sectarian differences, by Osama bin Laden and by the mullahs who rule Iran. The destruction of the Iranian theocracy would do more than just eliminate the world's largest supporter of terrorism; it would do more than end a nuclear-weapons program that is far closer to completion than Iraq's ever was; it would do more than stop the Iranian-staged Shiite agitation in Iraq. The end of the Iranian regime would destroy the Middle East's laboratory of theocracy—the leading example and exporter of a system of religious dogma enforced by terror.
President Bush called the military victory in Iraq "the turning of the tide" in the War on Terrorism. That may be true, but the tide won't stay with us—or carry us to victory—until we are willing to take the war to Tehran and topple the most important material and ideological supporter of Islamic terrorism.
Friday, March 17, 2006
Rot in the Belly of the Beast
"The gimcrack pedagogical notion that education should be 'relevant' to children's lives gained currency in England in the sixties. The thought that this would confine children to the world that they already know - and a pretty dismal world it was, too, as anyone with the slightest acquaintance with English working-class life will testify - apparently never occurred to those educationists who claimed such exceptional sympathy with the relatively disadvantaged. The result was that a route - perhaps the one most frequently traveled-to social advancement was substantially closed to them.
"Unfortunately, it is extremely difficult to overturn these educational (or anti-educational) developments even now, when the central government has belatedly realized their disastrous consequences. Why? First, the teachers and the teachers of the teachers in the training colleges are deeply imbued with the kinds of education ideas that have brought us to this pass. Second, a huge education bureaucracy has grown up in England (one bureaucrat per teacher, pullulating like admirals in a South American navy) which uses every subterfuge to prevent change, from falsification of figures to willful misinterpretation of government policy......Thus it happens that Britain spends a higher percentage of its GDP on education than any of its competitors and ends up with a catastrophically ill-educated population, whose lack of intelligence is evident from their ruminant gaze to be seen on every street in the country, and which is remarked upon by all my foreign friends." (Life at the Bottom - The Worldview That Makes The Underclass by Theodore Dalrymple).
This could have been written about the USA. While we have to import engineers and scientists our children rot in the belly of the beast of American public education whose master, the NEA (National Education Association) refuses to allow the firing of unqualified teachers, or to allow any change in the curriculum that may require the teachers to actually teach something, or to allow charter schools where they can stop them. Meanwhile our own children graduate with very little knowledge of American history (I've read that some teenagers do not know who George Washington was!), poor math skills and reasoning skills - but our teenagers do know how to have fun. Spring break speaks volumes about our youth today - mindlessness passing for fun.
Everyone should read "Life At the Bottom" - it will open your eyes to our own underclass right here at home as well as our atrocious public schools.
"Unfortunately, it is extremely difficult to overturn these educational (or anti-educational) developments even now, when the central government has belatedly realized their disastrous consequences. Why? First, the teachers and the teachers of the teachers in the training colleges are deeply imbued with the kinds of education ideas that have brought us to this pass. Second, a huge education bureaucracy has grown up in England (one bureaucrat per teacher, pullulating like admirals in a South American navy) which uses every subterfuge to prevent change, from falsification of figures to willful misinterpretation of government policy......Thus it happens that Britain spends a higher percentage of its GDP on education than any of its competitors and ends up with a catastrophically ill-educated population, whose lack of intelligence is evident from their ruminant gaze to be seen on every street in the country, and which is remarked upon by all my foreign friends." (Life at the Bottom - The Worldview That Makes The Underclass by Theodore Dalrymple).
This could have been written about the USA. While we have to import engineers and scientists our children rot in the belly of the beast of American public education whose master, the NEA (National Education Association) refuses to allow the firing of unqualified teachers, or to allow any change in the curriculum that may require the teachers to actually teach something, or to allow charter schools where they can stop them. Meanwhile our own children graduate with very little knowledge of American history (I've read that some teenagers do not know who George Washington was!), poor math skills and reasoning skills - but our teenagers do know how to have fun. Spring break speaks volumes about our youth today - mindlessness passing for fun.
Everyone should read "Life At the Bottom" - it will open your eyes to our own underclass right here at home as well as our atrocious public schools.
Monday, February 13, 2006
Islamic Opinion Be Damned! by Richard Winkler
This opinion piece was first published in www.capitalismnow.com on February 12, 2006 and is being reprinted here.
When a person is physically threatened for expressing an opinion the police should be called in to arrest those issuing the threat. When a nation or group threatens another nation or group with physical violence for having expressed an opinion, then the very principle of freedom of speech is threatened. The first amendment was designed to protect that very thing – the right of any individual to express an opinion without fear of physical retaliation. That freedom of speech forms the cornerstone of any civilized society should hardly be a matter of debate anymore.
If the issue holds any confusion for anyone, it is due to multiculturalism (or simple cowardice), the idea that all cultures are equal and all ideas, including the murderous ideas behind the Islamist’s death threats, should be respected equally. The Islamists certainly have no confusion on the subject; these threats show their ideas for what they are (as if that was in any doubt after the Salmon Rushdie death edict and the regular beheadings, and worse, of “non-believers” by the Islamists).
Multiculturalism is completely at odds with the U.S. constitution, which is a political statement of principles or ideas that apply to all men anywhere and at any time. “All men are created equal” does not include the caveat, “except if they run afoul of Islamist dogma”.
For the U.S. government to uphold freedom of speech against Islamists who are threatening to kill anyone who prints the Muhammad cartoons, and in the same breath to reproach those who print the cartoons, pleading with them to respect religion, is such an abject and transparent surrender of principle that it is difficult to call it anything less then cowardice. It places the right of free speech on par with the “right” to murder, and abandons those brave souls that print the cartoons.
There is a clear clash of principles here that cannot be evaded. Islamist’s believe that reproducing the likeness of their prophet is a blasphemy, punishable by death. Freedom of speech is the principle that ideas are protected against physical retaliation. There is no reconciling these principles; a stand has to be taken. After all, the principle of freedom of speech was not created to protect speech that does not offend anyone. Its purpose is precisely to defend the type of speech represented in those cartoons.
When a person is physically threatened for expressing an opinion the police should be called in to arrest those issuing the threat. When a nation or group threatens another nation or group with physical violence for having expressed an opinion, then the very principle of freedom of speech is threatened. The first amendment was designed to protect that very thing – the right of any individual to express an opinion without fear of physical retaliation. That freedom of speech forms the cornerstone of any civilized society should hardly be a matter of debate anymore.
If the issue holds any confusion for anyone, it is due to multiculturalism (or simple cowardice), the idea that all cultures are equal and all ideas, including the murderous ideas behind the Islamist’s death threats, should be respected equally. The Islamists certainly have no confusion on the subject; these threats show their ideas for what they are (as if that was in any doubt after the Salmon Rushdie death edict and the regular beheadings, and worse, of “non-believers” by the Islamists).
Multiculturalism is completely at odds with the U.S. constitution, which is a political statement of principles or ideas that apply to all men anywhere and at any time. “All men are created equal” does not include the caveat, “except if they run afoul of Islamist dogma”.
For the U.S. government to uphold freedom of speech against Islamists who are threatening to kill anyone who prints the Muhammad cartoons, and in the same breath to reproach those who print the cartoons, pleading with them to respect religion, is such an abject and transparent surrender of principle that it is difficult to call it anything less then cowardice. It places the right of free speech on par with the “right” to murder, and abandons those brave souls that print the cartoons.
There is a clear clash of principles here that cannot be evaded. Islamist’s believe that reproducing the likeness of their prophet is a blasphemy, punishable by death. Freedom of speech is the principle that ideas are protected against physical retaliation. There is no reconciling these principles; a stand has to be taken. After all, the principle of freedom of speech was not created to protect speech that does not offend anyone. Its purpose is precisely to defend the type of speech represented in those cartoons.
Moral Self Confidence – Have We Lost It?
The following was written on August 13, 2005 and is being reprinted here from www.capitalismnow.com.
The man who refuses to judge, who neither agrees nor disagrees, who declares that there are no absolutes and believes that he escapes responsibility, is the man responsible for all the blood that is now spilled in the world. Reality is an absolute, existence is an absolute, a speck of dust is an absolute and so is a human life….(Ayn Rand in Atlas Shrugged).
Hand wringing and mea culpas abound on this the 60th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Buy why do we cry? We are cozy in our beds at night, with tummy full and a roof that does not leak. We did not cry or hand wring in 1945 as this 21 year old second Lieutenant related: “We learned to our astonishment that we would not be obliged in a few months to rush up the beaches near Tokyo assault-firing while being machine-gunned, mortared, and shelled, and for all the practiced phlegm of our tough facades we broke down and cried with relief and joy. We were going to live.”
“We were going to live”. Powerful words coming from a boy who knew that the Japanese were expected to fight to the death. Lives did not mean much by the Japanese moral code of the day as it hadn’t for centuries. Pride and victory were everything for these aggressors.
So Fat Man and Little Boy ended the Japanese dreams of conquest by terrorism and death. They surrendered unconditionally – Hirohito was allowed to remain a figurehead emperor. General Douglas MacArthur proceeded to institute democratic reforms and wrote their constitution. He was the boss in Japan and made sure that the people were westernized. What were the results of MacArthur’s tough guy stance and demands? Prosperity and peace for the Japanese for the past 60 years!
We have this very important lesson reminding us every anniversary, if nothing else that the good (the West for all you peaceniks) can only triumph over evil (Japan and Germany in 1945) if the good is willing to go all the way – no compromises and mealy mouth begging.
Some people decry the bomb as an evil thing. False! It is a good thing if it keeps America safe. Oh – some will say – the atom bomb kills hundreds of thousands in an instant and more die later of radiation. Yes true. But is that worse than a million of our 18-25 year olds dying and maimed over 5 years with bullets and explosives? I don’t see the difference. There is no contest. The 2 bombs were a good that allowed boys to return home, Japan to prosper and become a member of the community of free nations and eventually for the evil empire, the Soviet Union, to die.
Evil nations exist because they are populated by enough evil people or at least many people who hold the wrong ideas. The Japanese are a prime example of a people that wholeheartedly took up the nihilistic cause of expansionism and subjugation at whatever cost.
Wrong ideas lead me to the present. With the Islamo-terrorists, if we do not revisit WWII and relearn those lessons – the main one being that the west possessed moral self-confidence that we somehow lost over the past 60 years, we will be doomed to failure and an atomic bomb will one day and soon - devastate us. Do we deserve to be bombed? I don’t think so.
We must as a nation and individually decide whether we are the good. And if we are then we will maybe regain our moral self-confidence. With confidence in our being on the right side we will do the right thing concerning the Islamo-terrorists – annihilate them by doing whatever it takes. If that means dropping a bomb on Iran then so be it.
The following is a quote from Ayn Rand in Galt’s Speech in Atlas Shrugged and reprinted in “For the New Intellectual”.
There are two sides to every issue: one side is right and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil. The man who is wrong still retains some respect for truth, if only by accepting the responsibility of choice. But the man in the middle is the knave who blanks out the truth in order to pretend that no choice or values exist.
Right now President Bush and Prime Minister Blair are the men in the middle. They are blanking out the truth that we are fighting rabid religious terrorists and they mean what they say and aim to get what they want: A paradise of Islamic fundamentalism on earth.
Clouds gather while the West fiddles with evasions and half truths. Just as the Japanese understood moral courage and certainty and not bargains and appeasement, so we should deal with these nihilists for whom death is everything. We are a culture of life and goodness on earth. Our continued existence depends upon our regaining our moral self-confidence and recognizing evil for what it is and wherever it is.
The man who refuses to judge, who neither agrees nor disagrees, who declares that there are no absolutes and believes that he escapes responsibility, is the man responsible for all the blood that is now spilled in the world. Reality is an absolute, existence is an absolute, a speck of dust is an absolute and so is a human life….(Ayn Rand in Atlas Shrugged).
Hand wringing and mea culpas abound on this the 60th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Buy why do we cry? We are cozy in our beds at night, with tummy full and a roof that does not leak. We did not cry or hand wring in 1945 as this 21 year old second Lieutenant related: “We learned to our astonishment that we would not be obliged in a few months to rush up the beaches near Tokyo assault-firing while being machine-gunned, mortared, and shelled, and for all the practiced phlegm of our tough facades we broke down and cried with relief and joy. We were going to live.”
“We were going to live”. Powerful words coming from a boy who knew that the Japanese were expected to fight to the death. Lives did not mean much by the Japanese moral code of the day as it hadn’t for centuries. Pride and victory were everything for these aggressors.
So Fat Man and Little Boy ended the Japanese dreams of conquest by terrorism and death. They surrendered unconditionally – Hirohito was allowed to remain a figurehead emperor. General Douglas MacArthur proceeded to institute democratic reforms and wrote their constitution. He was the boss in Japan and made sure that the people were westernized. What were the results of MacArthur’s tough guy stance and demands? Prosperity and peace for the Japanese for the past 60 years!
We have this very important lesson reminding us every anniversary, if nothing else that the good (the West for all you peaceniks) can only triumph over evil (Japan and Germany in 1945) if the good is willing to go all the way – no compromises and mealy mouth begging.
Some people decry the bomb as an evil thing. False! It is a good thing if it keeps America safe. Oh – some will say – the atom bomb kills hundreds of thousands in an instant and more die later of radiation. Yes true. But is that worse than a million of our 18-25 year olds dying and maimed over 5 years with bullets and explosives? I don’t see the difference. There is no contest. The 2 bombs were a good that allowed boys to return home, Japan to prosper and become a member of the community of free nations and eventually for the evil empire, the Soviet Union, to die.
Evil nations exist because they are populated by enough evil people or at least many people who hold the wrong ideas. The Japanese are a prime example of a people that wholeheartedly took up the nihilistic cause of expansionism and subjugation at whatever cost.
Wrong ideas lead me to the present. With the Islamo-terrorists, if we do not revisit WWII and relearn those lessons – the main one being that the west possessed moral self-confidence that we somehow lost over the past 60 years, we will be doomed to failure and an atomic bomb will one day and soon - devastate us. Do we deserve to be bombed? I don’t think so.
We must as a nation and individually decide whether we are the good. And if we are then we will maybe regain our moral self-confidence. With confidence in our being on the right side we will do the right thing concerning the Islamo-terrorists – annihilate them by doing whatever it takes. If that means dropping a bomb on Iran then so be it.
The following is a quote from Ayn Rand in Galt’s Speech in Atlas Shrugged and reprinted in “For the New Intellectual”.
There are two sides to every issue: one side is right and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil. The man who is wrong still retains some respect for truth, if only by accepting the responsibility of choice. But the man in the middle is the knave who blanks out the truth in order to pretend that no choice or values exist.
Right now President Bush and Prime Minister Blair are the men in the middle. They are blanking out the truth that we are fighting rabid religious terrorists and they mean what they say and aim to get what they want: A paradise of Islamic fundamentalism on earth.
Clouds gather while the West fiddles with evasions and half truths. Just as the Japanese understood moral courage and certainty and not bargains and appeasement, so we should deal with these nihilists for whom death is everything. We are a culture of life and goodness on earth. Our continued existence depends upon our regaining our moral self-confidence and recognizing evil for what it is and wherever it is.
Saturday, December 24, 2005
Kofi's Nine Year Milk Cow
“The most effective ambassadors I have known in this building are the ones who’ve been able to sit across the table, reach out to their colleagues and persuade them to take a course of action. And I would suggest to all ambassadors who want to make progress to go that route.”
This is what Kofi Annan said as he criticized U.S. Ambassador John R. Bolton’s tough negotiating style read.
Of course what Mr. Bolton wants is to see progress made on the long promised UN reforms and he is urging the United States to withhold the 22% it contributes to this organization.
But of course no one would expect Annan to ‘want’ to institute reforms in an institution that has been a milk cow for many members for the past nine years. Another not too widely noted incident among the many “incidents” (read scandals) that have plagued Annan’s tenure at the UN occurred a few days ago. It seems that Annan was very touchy about a certain question that UN correspondent for The Times, James Bone asked. Again it had to do with Annan’s son Kojo who bought a Mercedes Benz and shipped it to Ghana with the benefit of UN tax exemptions. Well Annan got furious with the reporter and instead of answering the question lashed out in a purple rage attacking Mr. Bone thus: “"You are an embarrassment to your colleagues and to your profession...Please stop misbehaving, and please let's move on to a more serious subject."
What could be more serious than being accused of using UN connections inappropriately? Remember the UN administered Iraqi “food for oil” scandal? So many countries were involved in that and there has yet to be any punishments meted out.
The UN is a conglomeration of nations led by evil and corrupt governments. It is time to either clean it up or let it rot in the ash heap of other good for nothing bureaucratic organizations.
This is what Kofi Annan said as he criticized U.S. Ambassador John R. Bolton’s tough negotiating style read.
Of course what Mr. Bolton wants is to see progress made on the long promised UN reforms and he is urging the United States to withhold the 22% it contributes to this organization.
But of course no one would expect Annan to ‘want’ to institute reforms in an institution that has been a milk cow for many members for the past nine years. Another not too widely noted incident among the many “incidents” (read scandals) that have plagued Annan’s tenure at the UN occurred a few days ago. It seems that Annan was very touchy about a certain question that UN correspondent for The Times, James Bone asked. Again it had to do with Annan’s son Kojo who bought a Mercedes Benz and shipped it to Ghana with the benefit of UN tax exemptions. Well Annan got furious with the reporter and instead of answering the question lashed out in a purple rage attacking Mr. Bone thus: “"You are an embarrassment to your colleagues and to your profession...Please stop misbehaving, and please let's move on to a more serious subject."
What could be more serious than being accused of using UN connections inappropriately? Remember the UN administered Iraqi “food for oil” scandal? So many countries were involved in that and there has yet to be any punishments meted out.
The UN is a conglomeration of nations led by evil and corrupt governments. It is time to either clean it up or let it rot in the ash heap of other good for nothing bureaucratic organizations.
Tuesday, December 20, 2005
Reviewing What Clinton Said Eight Years Ago About Iraq
Remember when Clinton initiated military attacks on Sadam Hussein? Of course he didn't finish the job (neither did the first President Bush) and so it goes that the piper must be paid. I thought it would be interesting to refresh our memories regarding what then President Clinton said to the American people in his justification for attacking Sadam almost eight years ago. I'm sure it will all sound familiar. Just goes to show if you don't treat the tumor properly it will grow and be more difficult to eradicate.
Portions of President Clinton's address to Joint Chiefs of Staff and Pentagon staff on Feb 17, 1998
Now, let me say to all of you here as all of you know the weightiest decision any president ever has to make is to send our troops into harm's way. And force can never be the first answer. But sometimes, it's the only answer.
Saddam Hussein's Iraq reminds us of what we learned in the 20th century and warns us of what we must know about the 21st. In this century, we learned through harsh experience that the only answer to aggression and illegal behavior is firmness, determination, and when necessary action.
In the next century, the community of nations may see more and more the very kind of threat Iraq poses now a rogue state with weapons of mass destruction ready to use them or provide them to terrorists, drug traffickers or organized criminals who travel the world among us unnoticed.
If we fail to respond today, Saddam and all those who would follow in his footsteps will be emboldened tomorrow by the knowledge that they can act with impunity, even in the face of a clear message from the United Nations Security Council and clear evidence of a weapons of mass destruction program.
Portions of President Clinton’s address to the nation from the Oval Office on December 16, 1998
Saddam (Hussein) must not be allowed to threaten his neighbors or the world with nuclear arms, poison gas or biological weapons.
Earlier today I ordered America's armed forces to strike military and security targets in Iraq. They are joined by British forces."
Their mission is to attack Iraq's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and its military capacity to threaten its neighbors.
Along with Prime Minister (Tony) Blair of Great Britain, I made it equally clear that if Saddam failed to cooperate fully we would be prepared to act without delay, diplomacy or warning.
Instead of inspectors disarming Saddam, Saddam has disarmed the inspectors. If Saddam can cripple the weapons inspections system and get away with it, he would conclude the international community, led by the United States, has simply lost its will. He would surmise that he has free rein to rebuild his arsenal of destruction.
The best way to end that threat once and for all is with a new Iraqi government -- a government ready to live in peace with its neighbors, a government that respects the rights of its people.
Saddam Hussein and the other enemies of peace may have thought that the serious debate currently before the House of Representatives would distract Americans or weaken our resolve to face him down, but once more, the United States has proven that although we are never eager to use force, when we must act in America's vital interests, we will do so.
Portions of President Clinton's address to Joint Chiefs of Staff and Pentagon staff on Feb 17, 1998
Now, let me say to all of you here as all of you know the weightiest decision any president ever has to make is to send our troops into harm's way. And force can never be the first answer. But sometimes, it's the only answer.
Saddam Hussein's Iraq reminds us of what we learned in the 20th century and warns us of what we must know about the 21st. In this century, we learned through harsh experience that the only answer to aggression and illegal behavior is firmness, determination, and when necessary action.
In the next century, the community of nations may see more and more the very kind of threat Iraq poses now a rogue state with weapons of mass destruction ready to use them or provide them to terrorists, drug traffickers or organized criminals who travel the world among us unnoticed.
If we fail to respond today, Saddam and all those who would follow in his footsteps will be emboldened tomorrow by the knowledge that they can act with impunity, even in the face of a clear message from the United Nations Security Council and clear evidence of a weapons of mass destruction program.
Portions of President Clinton’s address to the nation from the Oval Office on December 16, 1998
Saddam (Hussein) must not be allowed to threaten his neighbors or the world with nuclear arms, poison gas or biological weapons.
Earlier today I ordered America's armed forces to strike military and security targets in Iraq. They are joined by British forces."
Their mission is to attack Iraq's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and its military capacity to threaten its neighbors.
Along with Prime Minister (Tony) Blair of Great Britain, I made it equally clear that if Saddam failed to cooperate fully we would be prepared to act without delay, diplomacy or warning.
Instead of inspectors disarming Saddam, Saddam has disarmed the inspectors. If Saddam can cripple the weapons inspections system and get away with it, he would conclude the international community, led by the United States, has simply lost its will. He would surmise that he has free rein to rebuild his arsenal of destruction.
The best way to end that threat once and for all is with a new Iraqi government -- a government ready to live in peace with its neighbors, a government that respects the rights of its people.
Saddam Hussein and the other enemies of peace may have thought that the serious debate currently before the House of Representatives would distract Americans or weaken our resolve to face him down, but once more, the United States has proven that although we are never eager to use force, when we must act in America's vital interests, we will do so.
Saturday, December 17, 2005
Che Chic and the Ladies in White
It is fashionable to wear T-shirts with Che’s mug plastered across it. From teens in small villages in northern Italy to those Hollywood intellectuals on the Left coast, Che is chic.
But who champions the Ladies in White of Cuba – wives, mothers and sisters and daughters of prisoners rotting in Fidel Castro’s prisons for a variety of crimes from expressing “forbidden opinions” to attempting to flee the hell hole of Cuban dictatorship.
A piece by Mary Anatasia O’Grady (read) describes how in 2003 Castro “ordered the lockup of 75 journalists, librarians and democracy advocates” calculating that after an initial outcry by the outside world all would be forgotten. After all, isn’t that how Castro has maintained his grip on power for fifty years? Well these women had had enough of repression and so for two years there have been weekly gatherings and processions in white in a kind of defiant, silent protest.
This has caused Castro’s heavenly worker’s paradise to be catapulted into the news – again - because these brave and persistent women were awarded the European Parliament’s Sakhorov Prize which honors freedom of thought.
And what about the Left coast Idol? Castro excels in taking political prisoners (estimated at 500,000 since 1959) and executing thousands of these. What are crimes according to the gospel of Fidelito? Meeting to discuss the economy, writing letters to the government, “to report on political developments, to speak to international reporters, to advocate human rights or to visit friends or relatives outside your local area of residence without government permission” (read).
As for Che, well he was just an evil and incompetent fool. “Che excelled in one thing: mass murder of defenseless men. In anything like a fair fight Che was consistently routed, stomped and humiliated” (read).
Will the world turn a blind eye again to Castro’s virtual imprisonment of 11 million Cubans after mumbling a few words of indignation? But daaahling, it’s so much more chic to wear Che and fawn all over the strongman of Cuba - Fidel Castro.
But who champions the Ladies in White of Cuba – wives, mothers and sisters and daughters of prisoners rotting in Fidel Castro’s prisons for a variety of crimes from expressing “forbidden opinions” to attempting to flee the hell hole of Cuban dictatorship.
A piece by Mary Anatasia O’Grady (read) describes how in 2003 Castro “ordered the lockup of 75 journalists, librarians and democracy advocates” calculating that after an initial outcry by the outside world all would be forgotten. After all, isn’t that how Castro has maintained his grip on power for fifty years? Well these women had had enough of repression and so for two years there have been weekly gatherings and processions in white in a kind of defiant, silent protest.
This has caused Castro’s heavenly worker’s paradise to be catapulted into the news – again - because these brave and persistent women were awarded the European Parliament’s Sakhorov Prize which honors freedom of thought.
And what about the Left coast Idol? Castro excels in taking political prisoners (estimated at 500,000 since 1959) and executing thousands of these. What are crimes according to the gospel of Fidelito? Meeting to discuss the economy, writing letters to the government, “to report on political developments, to speak to international reporters, to advocate human rights or to visit friends or relatives outside your local area of residence without government permission” (read).
As for Che, well he was just an evil and incompetent fool. “Che excelled in one thing: mass murder of defenseless men. In anything like a fair fight Che was consistently routed, stomped and humiliated” (read).
Will the world turn a blind eye again to Castro’s virtual imprisonment of 11 million Cubans after mumbling a few words of indignation? But daaahling, it’s so much more chic to wear Che and fawn all over the strongman of Cuba - Fidel Castro.
Wednesday, December 14, 2005
Budding Barbarians Among Us
George Melloan writes in the December 13 issue of the Wall Street Journal (There are Always Barbarians at the Gates read) that predators have walked among us since the dawn of man. In the twentieth century alone there was an endless gang of them including Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Castro, Arafat, Sadam Hussein, the numerous African varieties and now the thug from Iran - what's his name.
Man has free will so there will always be those who would lust after wealth and power and use force to do it. But it is very difficult to understand this thuggery in the world we live in versus the world of the Inquisition for example. Prior to the Modern era the majority of the people spent their lives barely above that of the animals they lived with and death was always around the corner. But today we have the unimaginable wealth created by the freer countries of the world such as Hong Kong and the United States.
The shining examples of what man can accomplish when he is free to use his mind in production instead of destruction is there for everyone to see and study. It is not a secret. And still we allow and often times condone these mindless thugs their ascent to power. Why don't we nip these neer do wells in the bud before they blossom into their murderous reign? Isn't that why we have governments to protect us from those that would initiate force?
Mellon writes: "There is so much work left to do. The U.S. effort to convert Afghanistan and Iraq from failed tyrannies into thriving democracies needs an ingredient not always understood by bureaucrats and politicians, including some Americans. Energizing a society requires economic as well as political freedom. That means property rights, minimum bureaucratic obstacles to business formation and a legal system that can enforce laws and contracts. Iraq's leaders say they understand this, but one wonders if that understanding will overcome the usual temptations of power.
"There is also the question of whether the U.S. left and its organs of opinion -- not to mention some who would normally be regarded as holding right-wing views -- understand America's post-World War II history. The cries for disengagement from Iraq, and even from world politics, are dispiriting in light of what American engagement has accomplished in the last 65 years. They reflect not only a failure to understand U.S. history but a broader failure to understand the entirety of world history.
"That history tells us that rich nations will always be envied by the political leaders of have-not states. Rather than try to learn how America became rich and free up their own societies to follow the same road to riches, too many will do the opposite and plot to get those riches through theft. There's always a barbarian out there somewhere."
Every nation can become productive and enjoy the rewards of that productivity but first they have to recognize the barbarian when he is a small fry and then treat the cancer before it grows too powerful.
Man has free will so there will always be those who would lust after wealth and power and use force to do it. But it is very difficult to understand this thuggery in the world we live in versus the world of the Inquisition for example. Prior to the Modern era the majority of the people spent their lives barely above that of the animals they lived with and death was always around the corner. But today we have the unimaginable wealth created by the freer countries of the world such as Hong Kong and the United States.
The shining examples of what man can accomplish when he is free to use his mind in production instead of destruction is there for everyone to see and study. It is not a secret. And still we allow and often times condone these mindless thugs their ascent to power. Why don't we nip these neer do wells in the bud before they blossom into their murderous reign? Isn't that why we have governments to protect us from those that would initiate force?
Mellon writes: "There is so much work left to do. The U.S. effort to convert Afghanistan and Iraq from failed tyrannies into thriving democracies needs an ingredient not always understood by bureaucrats and politicians, including some Americans. Energizing a society requires economic as well as political freedom. That means property rights, minimum bureaucratic obstacles to business formation and a legal system that can enforce laws and contracts. Iraq's leaders say they understand this, but one wonders if that understanding will overcome the usual temptations of power.
"There is also the question of whether the U.S. left and its organs of opinion -- not to mention some who would normally be regarded as holding right-wing views -- understand America's post-World War II history. The cries for disengagement from Iraq, and even from world politics, are dispiriting in light of what American engagement has accomplished in the last 65 years. They reflect not only a failure to understand U.S. history but a broader failure to understand the entirety of world history.
"That history tells us that rich nations will always be envied by the political leaders of have-not states. Rather than try to learn how America became rich and free up their own societies to follow the same road to riches, too many will do the opposite and plot to get those riches through theft. There's always a barbarian out there somewhere."
Every nation can become productive and enjoy the rewards of that productivity but first they have to recognize the barbarian when he is a small fry and then treat the cancer before it grows too powerful.
Monday, December 12, 2005
The Wealthiest Nation In History
I'm reading a remarkable book called "The Capitalist Manifesto" by Andrew Bernstein. In it he tackles the task of explaining what it takes for countries to be wealthy and why political and economic freedom are requirements. He delves into the philosophical basis for the wealth of the capitalist nations and the utter poverty and destruction in lives and property of the socialist nations. Here is an example of what Mr. Berstein writes:
"Imagine the horror of the anti-capitalist, socialist mentalities if it was said to them: what if there were a country in which the government stays out of the economy? One with no tariffs or other legal restrictions on international trade - with no regulatory agencies, no minimum wage laws, no price or wage controls. Imagine, it is said to them, that the government limits neither investment coming in nor profit going out. There's no capital gains tax, no interest tax, no sales tax and a pittance in corporate bailout for companies that fail to compete on a free market. This imaginary country has a 15 percent flat tax, enabling its citizens to retain the preponderance of their earnings. Further, it extends no unemployment benefits, enacts no labor legislation and provides no Social Security, no national health insurance and scarcely any welfare. The welfare statist would recoil in horror from such a proposal; he would drown his interlocutor with dire warnings regarding the misery of the numberless poor and exploited who would be the inevitable victims of such a heartless, callous system. But in fact, that country exists, it is real; it's Hong Kong, one of the wealthiest nations of history." ( Read)
If you want to understand, finally, the dismal economic failure of the Soviet Union, China, North Korea and Cuba, to name just the biggies, read this book. The writing is clear, organized and exciting, if you are interested in history and ideas. With an extensive notes section with references at the end of book it's a treasure trove of information. Berstein organizes a vast array of facts from different sources and makes them accessible to the layman. While many of these facts are known kind of hodge podge by most educated people, Bernstein gives us the philosophical analysis for the differences among nations in the past and today - in other words the "why".
If we as a nation want to avoid going down the path of self destruction this is a must read book.
"Imagine the horror of the anti-capitalist, socialist mentalities if it was said to them: what if there were a country in which the government stays out of the economy? One with no tariffs or other legal restrictions on international trade - with no regulatory agencies, no minimum wage laws, no price or wage controls. Imagine, it is said to them, that the government limits neither investment coming in nor profit going out. There's no capital gains tax, no interest tax, no sales tax and a pittance in corporate bailout for companies that fail to compete on a free market. This imaginary country has a 15 percent flat tax, enabling its citizens to retain the preponderance of their earnings. Further, it extends no unemployment benefits, enacts no labor legislation and provides no Social Security, no national health insurance and scarcely any welfare. The welfare statist would recoil in horror from such a proposal; he would drown his interlocutor with dire warnings regarding the misery of the numberless poor and exploited who would be the inevitable victims of such a heartless, callous system. But in fact, that country exists, it is real; it's Hong Kong, one of the wealthiest nations of history." ( Read)
If you want to understand, finally, the dismal economic failure of the Soviet Union, China, North Korea and Cuba, to name just the biggies, read this book. The writing is clear, organized and exciting, if you are interested in history and ideas. With an extensive notes section with references at the end of book it's a treasure trove of information. Berstein organizes a vast array of facts from different sources and makes them accessible to the layman. While many of these facts are known kind of hodge podge by most educated people, Bernstein gives us the philosophical analysis for the differences among nations in the past and today - in other words the "why".
If we as a nation want to avoid going down the path of self destruction this is a must read book.
Thursday, December 08, 2005
The Ethics of Honor Killing
There is a quaint tribal tradition in the world of Islam called “Honor Killing” that was brought to our attention yesterday by a report on National Public Radio. This is how it works. If a male family member of tribe X is abducted and he is returned alive to his family – “a sheep is killed to celebrate”. If a female member is abducted and even possibly raped and returned alive to her family – “it’s a disgrace”. There is no celebration. Instead she is killed by a brother, a father or a cousin because she has brought dishonor to the tribe, to the family.
How do these men explain this perfidy? In the words of one who had murdered his 16 year old female cousin after being returned from an abduction “It’s in the blood – it’s tradition. How can it change?” The cousin did it because the father and brother couldn’t bring themselves to do it. They didn’t see anything wrong in it just that they couldn’t do it. The women don’t intervene because they are afraid for their own lives and many of them receive regular beatings with rubber hoses by their husbands.
Thousands of girls and women are murdered by male family members world wide but mostly in the Middle East. These honor killings are an ancient patriarchal custom used to control the family structure and hierarchy. So how can we understand this ancient, evil custom today? Why are honor killings based on the primitive concept of tribe being condoned by governments in the 21st century. Tribalism is a subset of a wider phenomenon called collectivism which is the idea that the individual is nothing – the tribe, the race, society is all.
The politics of collectivism are buoyed by the ethics of altruism be it via religion (Islamists) or mother earth (environmentalism) or the race (Nazi Germany). It is the idea that individuals must sacrifice for the greater good of “fill in the blank”. In the Middle East, besides being infected with the commandments of the Muslim religion, there are the mandates of the tribe. All must bow down to the dictates of tribal customs thousands of years old. So a girl is molested by her father – well she has dishonored the family so the child must be murdered.
Observe that there is no concept here of the individual only the tribe. The individual is nothing – the tribe is all. What drives these people to continue such a barbaric custom – the sacrifice of their daughters, sisters and wives? Irrationality or the anti-mind - the “act of unfocusing his mind, the suspension of his consciousness…the refusal to know” (The Objectivist Ethics by Ayn Rand).
When reason is not your guide to action or your means to knowledge then you are left with using emotion, tribal dictate, and whim as your guide. The results of irrationality are strewn throughout the centuries. From Honor Killings to suicide bombers to the killing fields of Cambodia to millions slaughtered by the Nazis and the Chinese Communist Party leaders, irrationality results in only death and destruction.
Is there an antidote to all this misery? Yes. Reason and individualism. The mind as a means to life and the individual as the benefactor of his use of reason.
How do these men explain this perfidy? In the words of one who had murdered his 16 year old female cousin after being returned from an abduction “It’s in the blood – it’s tradition. How can it change?” The cousin did it because the father and brother couldn’t bring themselves to do it. They didn’t see anything wrong in it just that they couldn’t do it. The women don’t intervene because they are afraid for their own lives and many of them receive regular beatings with rubber hoses by their husbands.
Thousands of girls and women are murdered by male family members world wide but mostly in the Middle East. These honor killings are an ancient patriarchal custom used to control the family structure and hierarchy. So how can we understand this ancient, evil custom today? Why are honor killings based on the primitive concept of tribe being condoned by governments in the 21st century. Tribalism is a subset of a wider phenomenon called collectivism which is the idea that the individual is nothing – the tribe, the race, society is all.
The politics of collectivism are buoyed by the ethics of altruism be it via religion (Islamists) or mother earth (environmentalism) or the race (Nazi Germany). It is the idea that individuals must sacrifice for the greater good of “fill in the blank”. In the Middle East, besides being infected with the commandments of the Muslim religion, there are the mandates of the tribe. All must bow down to the dictates of tribal customs thousands of years old. So a girl is molested by her father – well she has dishonored the family so the child must be murdered.
Observe that there is no concept here of the individual only the tribe. The individual is nothing – the tribe is all. What drives these people to continue such a barbaric custom – the sacrifice of their daughters, sisters and wives? Irrationality or the anti-mind - the “act of unfocusing his mind, the suspension of his consciousness…the refusal to know” (The Objectivist Ethics by Ayn Rand).
When reason is not your guide to action or your means to knowledge then you are left with using emotion, tribal dictate, and whim as your guide. The results of irrationality are strewn throughout the centuries. From Honor Killings to suicide bombers to the killing fields of Cambodia to millions slaughtered by the Nazis and the Chinese Communist Party leaders, irrationality results in only death and destruction.
Is there an antidote to all this misery? Yes. Reason and individualism. The mind as a means to life and the individual as the benefactor of his use of reason.
Saturday, December 03, 2005
The Mallau Bridge - Poetry In The Skies
I was getting ready to write something about our failing public education system when I caught a program called Extreme Engineering on the Discovery Channel. My mood went from disgust and anxiety over the state of our education system to admiration and excitement over man's accomplishments over nature.
A case in point is the amazing Mallau Viaduct a bridge over the river Tarn in the Massif Central Mountain range which opened on December 17, 2004. This marvel of the 21st century forms the final link in the A75 highway from Paris to Barcelona. It is 2.4 km long and stands 270 meters above the river at its highest point.
French and Spanish technicians and engineers were involved in the building of the bridge. The architect in charge of design was Norman Foster from England. His goal was to create an image of delicate transparency the "delicacy of a butterfly". If these pictures do it any justice he accomplished what he set out to do.An amazing fact (go to www.roadtraffic-technology.com) is that construction began in October 2001! Think about it. Three years to construct a bridge of this magnitude? Unbelievable.
No cranes were used to hoist sections of the deck because of the 900 m height above the valley floor (at its tallest point). Instead new engineering techniques were used. The seven graceful towers were built first with steel reinforced concrete and then the road way (pre-constructed of high-grade steel instead of concrete in 2,000 pieces at the factory) was put together starting at both ends of the valley until "it met at the center with precision" thanks to GPS alignement, 60 cm at a time.
There is an 18-lane toll station that accommodates technical and administrative services as well and the trip across the bridge costs 5.60 dollars. What a bargain for a shorter and easier drive from Paris to the Mediterranean while experiencing the results of man's daring, technological ingenuity and can-d0 attitude.
The bridge cost was $524 million dollars (all private funds) and 500 men worked permanently at the site."A work of man must fuse with nature. The pillars had to look almost organic, like they had grown from the earth" (Norman Foster).
This is what happens when nations (France and Britain in this case) cooperate to achieve a common goal that advances the interests of the individual and of the nation. I can't help and compare this feat to its antithesis. The utter destructiveness and nihilistic results of the Jihadist-terrorists from the Middle East.
Maybe the West should send the people of the Middle East DVDs from the Discovery Channel to show them what the mind of man can create when he seeks to live his life by reason and achievement rather than live his life by death and destruction.
Saturday, November 26, 2005
A Proper Address for Our Achievements
In a commentary in the Wall Street Journal, James Q. Wilson (A Fitting Address – November 26, 2005 Read ) sketches out a speech he would like to hear President Bush give. In this speech Mr. Wilson describes the good that Americans have done as a result of our Middle East involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq. It is his view that “…What most Americans care about is not who is lying but whether we are winning”. The following are excerpts from this imaginary speech – a proper speech for our President to give in light of what we have really achieved in our war against evil in spite of the anxiety ridden screeching from the left.
* * *
"My fellow Americans: We are winning, and winning decisively, in Iraq and the Middle East. We defeated Saddam Hussein's army in just a few weeks. None of the disasters that many feared would follow our invasion occurred. Our troops did not have to fight door to door to take Baghdad. The Iraqi oil fields were not set on fire. There was no civil war between the Sunnis and the Shiites. There was no grave humanitarian crisis.
“Saddam Hussein was captured and is awaiting trial. His two murderous sons are dead. Most of the leading members of Saddam's regime have been captured or killed. After our easy military victory, we found ourselves inadequately prepared to defeat the terrorist insurgents, but now we are prevailing.
“Iraq has held free elections in which millions of people voted. A new, democratic constitution has been adopted that contains an extensive bill of rights. Discrimination on the basis of gender, religion, or politics is banned. Soon the Iraqis will be electing their first parliament.
“An independent judiciary exists, almost all public schools are open, every hospital is functioning, and oil sales have increased sharply. In most parts of the country, people move about freely and safely.
“According to surveys, Iraqis are overwhelmingly opposed to the use of violence to achieve political ends, and the great majority believe that their lives will improve in the future. The Iraqi economy is growing very rapidly, much more rapidly than the inflation rate.
“In some places, the terrorists who lost the war are now fighting back by killing Iraqi civilians. Some brave American soldiers have also been killed, but most of the attacks are directed at decent, honest Iraqis. This is not a civil war; it is terrorism gone mad.
“And the terrorists have failed. They could not stop free elections. They could not prevent Iraqi leaders from taking office. They could not close the schools or hospitals. They could not prevent the emergence of a vigorous free press that now involves over 170 newspapers that represent every shade of opinion.
“Terrorist leaders such as Zarqawi have lost. Most Sunni leaders, whom Zarqawi was hoping to mobilize, have rejected his call to defeat any constitution. The Muslims in his hometown in Jordan have denounced him. Despite his murderous efforts, candidates representing every legitimate point of view and every ethnic background are competing for office in the new Iraqi government.
"The progress of democracy and reconstruction has occurred faster in Iraq than it did in Germany 60 years ago, even though we have far fewer troops in the Middle East than we had in Germany after Hitler was defeated.
“…To take their places, Iraq has trained, with American and NATO assistance, tens of thousands of new troops and police officers. In the last election, there were more Iraqi soldiers than American ones guarding the polling places.
“…Our success is not confined to Iraq. Libya has renounced its search for nuclear weapons. Syria has pulled out of Lebanon. Afghanistan has produced a democratic government and economic progress for its people. Egypt has had the beginnings of a democratic vote. In an area once dominated by dictatorships, the few remaining ones are either changing or worrying deeply about those that have changed.
“We have created a balance of power in the Middle East in which no regime can easily threaten any other. ...And we are winning. Soon Iraqi forces will be able to maintain order in the few hot spots that still exist in Iraq. We will stay the course until they are ready. We made no mistake ending Saddam's rule. We have brought not only freedom to Iraq, but progress to most of the Middle East. America should be proud of what it has accomplished. America will not cut and run until the Iraqis can manage their own security, and that will happen soon.
"Thank you, and God bless you."
* * *
"My fellow Americans: We are winning, and winning decisively, in Iraq and the Middle East. We defeated Saddam Hussein's army in just a few weeks. None of the disasters that many feared would follow our invasion occurred. Our troops did not have to fight door to door to take Baghdad. The Iraqi oil fields were not set on fire. There was no civil war between the Sunnis and the Shiites. There was no grave humanitarian crisis.
“Saddam Hussein was captured and is awaiting trial. His two murderous sons are dead. Most of the leading members of Saddam's regime have been captured or killed. After our easy military victory, we found ourselves inadequately prepared to defeat the terrorist insurgents, but now we are prevailing.
“Iraq has held free elections in which millions of people voted. A new, democratic constitution has been adopted that contains an extensive bill of rights. Discrimination on the basis of gender, religion, or politics is banned. Soon the Iraqis will be electing their first parliament.
“An independent judiciary exists, almost all public schools are open, every hospital is functioning, and oil sales have increased sharply. In most parts of the country, people move about freely and safely.
“According to surveys, Iraqis are overwhelmingly opposed to the use of violence to achieve political ends, and the great majority believe that their lives will improve in the future. The Iraqi economy is growing very rapidly, much more rapidly than the inflation rate.
“In some places, the terrorists who lost the war are now fighting back by killing Iraqi civilians. Some brave American soldiers have also been killed, but most of the attacks are directed at decent, honest Iraqis. This is not a civil war; it is terrorism gone mad.
“And the terrorists have failed. They could not stop free elections. They could not prevent Iraqi leaders from taking office. They could not close the schools or hospitals. They could not prevent the emergence of a vigorous free press that now involves over 170 newspapers that represent every shade of opinion.
“Terrorist leaders such as Zarqawi have lost. Most Sunni leaders, whom Zarqawi was hoping to mobilize, have rejected his call to defeat any constitution. The Muslims in his hometown in Jordan have denounced him. Despite his murderous efforts, candidates representing every legitimate point of view and every ethnic background are competing for office in the new Iraqi government.
"The progress of democracy and reconstruction has occurred faster in Iraq than it did in Germany 60 years ago, even though we have far fewer troops in the Middle East than we had in Germany after Hitler was defeated.
“…To take their places, Iraq has trained, with American and NATO assistance, tens of thousands of new troops and police officers. In the last election, there were more Iraqi soldiers than American ones guarding the polling places.
“…Our success is not confined to Iraq. Libya has renounced its search for nuclear weapons. Syria has pulled out of Lebanon. Afghanistan has produced a democratic government and economic progress for its people. Egypt has had the beginnings of a democratic vote. In an area once dominated by dictatorships, the few remaining ones are either changing or worrying deeply about those that have changed.
“We have created a balance of power in the Middle East in which no regime can easily threaten any other. ...And we are winning. Soon Iraqi forces will be able to maintain order in the few hot spots that still exist in Iraq. We will stay the course until they are ready. We made no mistake ending Saddam's rule. We have brought not only freedom to Iraq, but progress to most of the Middle East. America should be proud of what it has accomplished. America will not cut and run until the Iraqis can manage their own security, and that will happen soon.
"Thank you, and God bless you."
Monday, November 07, 2005
Anarchy and Pirates
I read an incredible article about a Cruise Liner called the Seabourn Spirit which was sailing 100 miles off the coast of Somali with 151 passengers and 161 crew members when two boats filled with pirates sped toward them firing weapons. The captain of the ship sped the boat up and changed course thereby preventing the thugs from boarding the ship. But at some point the captain apparently also tried to run down one of the boats attacking them. Hurray for the captain and for the crew.
Can you believe it? In the 21st century and we have pirates trolling the ocean for victims to pillage!
Why along Somalia’s coast? Well, come to find out that between March and August of this year there have been 15 violent pirate attacks off of the 2000 mile coastline of Somalia. It is in a state of anarchy since the dictator thug Mohamed Siad Barre was ousted in 1991. Anarchy is defined in “The New Shorter Oxford Dictionary” as – absence of government in a society. So what do people do without a government to maintain order? The leaders in Somalia “turned on each other, transforming this nation of 7 million into a patchwork of battling fiefdoms ruled by heavily armed militias” (“Cruise Ship Crew Fends off Pirate Hijack Attempt” by Rodrique Ngowi, AP)
So it’s a free for all in Somalia. “If a society provided no organized protection against force, it would compel every citizen to go about armed, to turn his home into a fortress, to shoot any strangers approaching his door – or to join a protective gang of citizens who would fight other gangs, formed for the same purpose, and thus bring about the degeneration of that society into the chaos of gang-rule, i.e., rule by brute force, into perpetual tribal warfare of prehistorically savages” (The Nature of Government, Ayn Rand).
This is what some Libertarians espouse, the anarchy of competing “governments”. They should move to Somalia and experience their ideal first hand. But I digress. So what is the purpose of government?
Ayn Rand defined government as an “institution that holds the exclusive power to enforce certain rules of social conduct in a given geographical area…If physical force is to be barred from social relationships, men need an institution charged with the task of protecting their rights under an objective code of rules….A government is the means of placing the retaliatory use of physical force under objective control – i.e., under objectively defined laws…The source of the government’s authority is ‘the consent of the governed’. This means that the government is not the ruler, but the servant or agent of the citizens; it means that the government as such has no rights except the rights delegated to it by the citizens for a specific purpose” (The Nature of Government, Ayn Rand).
This is the rule of law and what maintains order thereby allowing a nation to prosper. Somalia’s descent into a kind of hell is warning to all of what will happen when people lose their ability to use reason to solve problems. There is nothing left but the use of physical force otherwise called the law of the jungle. No prosperity ever resulted under those conditions. Africa is a continent self-destructing into the abyss of dictatorship and anarchy.
The problems of Africa, be they poverty, hunger or disease will never be solved by charity from the West (as our genius Hollywood Actors continually suggest). It's simpler than that: all one has to do is think, study history and rediscover the use of reason and the rule of law.
Can you believe it? In the 21st century and we have pirates trolling the ocean for victims to pillage!
Why along Somalia’s coast? Well, come to find out that between March and August of this year there have been 15 violent pirate attacks off of the 2000 mile coastline of Somalia. It is in a state of anarchy since the dictator thug Mohamed Siad Barre was ousted in 1991. Anarchy is defined in “The New Shorter Oxford Dictionary” as – absence of government in a society. So what do people do without a government to maintain order? The leaders in Somalia “turned on each other, transforming this nation of 7 million into a patchwork of battling fiefdoms ruled by heavily armed militias” (“Cruise Ship Crew Fends off Pirate Hijack Attempt” by Rodrique Ngowi, AP)
So it’s a free for all in Somalia. “If a society provided no organized protection against force, it would compel every citizen to go about armed, to turn his home into a fortress, to shoot any strangers approaching his door – or to join a protective gang of citizens who would fight other gangs, formed for the same purpose, and thus bring about the degeneration of that society into the chaos of gang-rule, i.e., rule by brute force, into perpetual tribal warfare of prehistorically savages” (The Nature of Government, Ayn Rand).
This is what some Libertarians espouse, the anarchy of competing “governments”. They should move to Somalia and experience their ideal first hand. But I digress. So what is the purpose of government?
Ayn Rand defined government as an “institution that holds the exclusive power to enforce certain rules of social conduct in a given geographical area…If physical force is to be barred from social relationships, men need an institution charged with the task of protecting their rights under an objective code of rules….A government is the means of placing the retaliatory use of physical force under objective control – i.e., under objectively defined laws…The source of the government’s authority is ‘the consent of the governed’. This means that the government is not the ruler, but the servant or agent of the citizens; it means that the government as such has no rights except the rights delegated to it by the citizens for a specific purpose” (The Nature of Government, Ayn Rand).
This is the rule of law and what maintains order thereby allowing a nation to prosper. Somalia’s descent into a kind of hell is warning to all of what will happen when people lose their ability to use reason to solve problems. There is nothing left but the use of physical force otherwise called the law of the jungle. No prosperity ever resulted under those conditions. Africa is a continent self-destructing into the abyss of dictatorship and anarchy.
The problems of Africa, be they poverty, hunger or disease will never be solved by charity from the West (as our genius Hollywood Actors continually suggest). It's simpler than that: all one has to do is think, study history and rediscover the use of reason and the rule of law.
Saturday, November 05, 2005
The Walls of Evil Came a Tumbling Down
“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing is worth a war is much worse.” (John Stuart Mills)
Yes, “the ugliest of things” is observing our fellow “Americans” denounce our President Bush and accuse him of the vilest of conspiracies – that of fabricating the reason for our war with Iraq. Well we know that the CIA had evidence that Iraq WAS trying to produce WMD’s. So what was America to do? Wait and see what happens? Guess what? We did that and it cost us 9/11.
Then you have the spectacle of a Senator Leahy, marking the 2000th American death in Iraq by saying during his acrimonious floor speech recently that we’ve ignored the lessons of Vietnam. I beg to differ, Senator. We lost Vietnam precisely because we did not stay the course in a war we were winning. The communist North Vietnamese knew that they could only win the war in the end if they could just wait it out while the American leftist media won it for them.
Apparently, Mr. Leahy, President Bush HAS learned the lesson: America was attacked – we went to war – and now we will stay the course and get the job done. The formula is this: Attack us or our interests and we will retaliate. Americans don’t cower and plead for mercy from evil.
Perhaps Mr. Leahy could stop counting the dead soldiers in Iraq for a moment to remember the millions liberated by America from oppression and tyranny: Afghanistan, Kuwait, Lebanon, most of Europe during WWII, most of the countries in the Soviet Union orbit such as Poland and the millions who will be liberated (again by America) if Syria’s government crashes as it is expected to and if Iran’s threats are taken seriously by our government.
Look, there are billions of people – today – still living under tyranny. What the left does not understand is that living under tyranny is NOT FUN. Those Hollywood marvels and leftist politicians are so out of touch with the reality of these people locked away in their prisons of oppression that their la-la land version of truth is that Bush is the epitome of tyranny!
Remember how President Reagan was ridiculed and maligned for daring to speak the truth about the “Evil Empire”. Reagan announced in March of 1983 his Strategic Defense Initiative and in 1987 called for Gorbachev to “tear down this wall”. But despite the left Reagan stayed the course and the walls of evil and oppression came a tumbling down, revealing the truth of the purveyors of evil.
Reagan gave such an important and brave speech on June 12, 1987 before the Brandenburg Gate in West Berlin, Germany that I will reprint a large portion of it here as follows to remind my fellow Americans what can be accomplished when a leader is strong, honest and courageous in the face of evil.
“In this season of spring in 1945, the people of Berlin emerged from their air-raid shelters to find devastation. Thousands of miles away, the people of the United States reached out to help. And in 1947 Secretary of State--as you've been told--George Marshall announced the creation of what would become known as the Marshall Plan. Speaking precisely 40 years ago this month, he said: "Our policy is directed not against any country or doctrine, but against hunger, poverty, desperation, and chaos."
In the Reichstag a few moments ago, I saw a display commemorating this 40th anniversary of the Marshall Plan. I was struck by the sign on a burnt-out, gutted structure that was being rebuilt. I understand that Berliners of my own generation can remember seeing signs like it dotted throughout the western sectors of the city. The sign read simply: "The Marshall Plan is helping here to strengthen the free world." A strong, free world in the West, that dream became real. Japan rose from ruin to become an economic giant. Italy, France, Belgium--virtually every nation in Western Europe saw political and economic rebirth; the European Community was founded.
In West Germany and here in Berlin, there took place an economic miracle, the Wirtschaftswunder. Adenauer, Erhard, Reuter, and other leaders understood the practical importance of liberty--that just as truth can flourish only when the journalist is given freedom of speech, so prosperity can come about only when the farmer and businessman enjoy economic freedom. The German leaders reduced tariffs, expanded free trade, lowered taxes. From 1950 to 1960 alone, the standard of living in West Germany and Berlin doubled.
Where four decades ago there was rubble, today in West Berlin there is the greatest industrial output of any city in Germany--busy office blocks, fine homes and apartments, proud avenues, and the spreading lawns of parkland. Where a city's culture seemed to have been destroyed, today there are two great universities, orchestras and an opera, countless theaters, and museums. Where there was want, today there's abundance--food, clothing, automobiles--the wonderful goods of the Ku'damm. From devastation, from utter ruin, you Berliners have, in freedom, rebuilt a city that once again ranks as one of the greatest on earth. The Soviets may have had other plans. But my friends, there were a few things the Soviets didn't count on--Berliner Herz, Berliner Humor, ja, und Berliner Schnauze. [Berliner heart, Berliner humor, yes, and a Berliner Schnauze.]
In the 1950s, Khrushchev predicted: "We will bury you." But in the West today, we see a free world that has achieved a level of prosperity and well-being unprecedented in all human history. In the Communist world, we see failure, technological backwardness, declining standards of health, even want of the most basic kind--too little food. Even today, the Soviet Union still cannot feed itself. After these four decades, then, there stands before the entire world one great and inescapable conclusion: Freedom leads to prosperity. Freedom replaces the ancient hatreds among the nations with comity and peace. Freedom is the victor.
And now the Soviets themselves may, in a limited way, be coming to understand the importance of freedom. We hear much from Moscow about a new policy of reform and openness. Some political prisoners have been released. Certain foreign news broadcasts are no longer being jammed. Some economic enterprises have been permitted to operate with greater freedom from state control.
Are these the beginnings of profound changes in the Soviet state? Or are they token gestures, intended to raise false hopes in the West, or to strengthen the Soviet system without changing it? We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace. There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace.
General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
I understand the fear of war and the pain of division that afflict this continent-- and I pledge to you my country's efforts to help overcome these burdens. To be sure, we in the West must resist Soviet expansion. So we must maintain defenses of unassailable strength. Yet we seek peace; so we must strive to reduce arms on both sides.
…While we pursue these arms reductions, I pledge to you that we will maintain the capacity to deter Soviet aggression at any level at which it might occur. And in cooperation with many of our allies, the United States is pursuing the Strategic Defense Initiative--research to base deterrence not on the threat of offensive retaliation, but on defenses that truly defend; on systems, in short, that will not target populations, but shield them. By these means we seek to increase the safety of Europe and all the world. But we must remember a crucial fact: East and West do not mistrust each other because we are armed; we are armed because we mistrust each other. And our differences are not about weapons but about liberty. When President Kennedy spoke at the City Hall those 24 years ago, freedom was encircled, Berlin was under siege. And today, despite all the pressures upon this city, Berlin stands secure in its liberty. And freedom itself is transforming the globe.
In the Philippines, in South and Central America, democracy has been given a rebirth. Throughout the Pacific, free markets are working miracle after miracle of economic growth. In the industrialized nations, a technological revolution is taking place--a revolution marked by rapid, dramatic advances in computers and telecommunications.
In Europe, only one nation and those it controls refuse to join the community of freedom. Yet in this age of redoubled economic growth, of information and innovation, the Soviet Union faces a choice: It must make fundamental changes, or it will become obsolete.
Today thus represents a moment of hope. We in the West stand ready to cooperate with the East to promote true openness, to break down barriers that separate people, to create a safe, freer world. And surely there is no better place than Berlin, the meeting place of East and West, to make a start. Free people of Berlin: Today, as in the past, the United States stands for the strict observance and full implementation of all parts of the Four Power Agreement of 1971. Let us use this occasion, the 750th anniversary of this city, to usher in a new era, to seek a still fuller, richer life for the Berlin of the future. Together, let us maintain and develop the ties between the Federal Republic and the Western sectors of Berlin, which is permitted by the 1971 agreement.
And I invite Mr. Gorbachev: Let us work to bring the Eastern and Western parts of the city closer together, so that all the inhabitants of all Berlin can enjoy the benefits that come with life in one of the great cities of the world.
To open Berlin still further to all Europe, East and West, let us expand the vital air access to this city, finding ways of making commercial air service to Berlin more convenient, more comfortable, and more economical. We look to the day when West Berlin can become one of the chief aviation hubs in all central Europe.
With our French and British partners, the United States is prepared to help bring international meetings to Berlin. It would be only fitting for Berlin to serve as the site of United Nations meetings, or world conferences on human rights and arms control or other issues that call for international cooperation.
There is no better way to establish hope for the future than to enlighten young minds, and we would be honored to sponsor summer youth exchanges, cultural events, and other programs for young Berliners from the East. Our French and British friends, I'm certain, will do the same. And it's my hope that an authority can be found in East Berlin to sponsor visits from young people of the Western sectors.
…In these four decades, as I have said, you Berliners have built a great city. You've done so in spite of threats--the Soviet attempts to impose the East-mark, the blockade. Today the city thrives in spite of the challenges implicit in the very presence of this wall. What keeps you here? Certainly there's a great deal to be said for your fortitude, for your defiant courage. But I believe there's something deeper, something that involves Berlin's whole look and feel and way of life--not mere sentiment. No one could live long in Berlin without being completely disabused of illusions. Something instead, that has seen the difficulties of life in Berlin but chose to accept them, that continues to build this good and proud city in contrast to a surrounding totalitarian presence that refuses to release human energies or aspirations. Something that speaks with a powerful voice of affirmation, that says yes to this city, yes to the future, yes to freedom. In a word, I would submit that what keeps you in Berlin is love--love both profound and abiding.
Perhaps this gets to the root of the matter, to the most fundamental distinction of all between East and West. The totalitarian world produces backwardness because it does such violence to the spirit, thwarting the human impulse to create, to enjoy, to worship. The totalitarian world finds even symbols of love and of worship an affront…
As I looked out a moment ago from the Reichstag, that embodiment of German unity, I noticed words crudely spray-painted upon the wall, perhaps by a young Berliner: "This wall will fall. Beliefs become reality." Yes, across Europe, this wall will fall. For it cannot withstand faith; it cannot withstand truth. The wall cannot withstand freedom.
And I would like, before I close, to say one word. I have read, and I have been questioned since I've been here about certain demonstrations against my coming. And I would like to say just one thing, and to those who demonstrate so. I wonder if they have ever asked themselves that if they should have the kind of government they apparently seek, no one would ever be able to do what they're doing again.
Yes, “the ugliest of things” is observing our fellow “Americans” denounce our President Bush and accuse him of the vilest of conspiracies – that of fabricating the reason for our war with Iraq. Well we know that the CIA had evidence that Iraq WAS trying to produce WMD’s. So what was America to do? Wait and see what happens? Guess what? We did that and it cost us 9/11.
Then you have the spectacle of a Senator Leahy, marking the 2000th American death in Iraq by saying during his acrimonious floor speech recently that we’ve ignored the lessons of Vietnam. I beg to differ, Senator. We lost Vietnam precisely because we did not stay the course in a war we were winning. The communist North Vietnamese knew that they could only win the war in the end if they could just wait it out while the American leftist media won it for them.
Apparently, Mr. Leahy, President Bush HAS learned the lesson: America was attacked – we went to war – and now we will stay the course and get the job done. The formula is this: Attack us or our interests and we will retaliate. Americans don’t cower and plead for mercy from evil.
Perhaps Mr. Leahy could stop counting the dead soldiers in Iraq for a moment to remember the millions liberated by America from oppression and tyranny: Afghanistan, Kuwait, Lebanon, most of Europe during WWII, most of the countries in the Soviet Union orbit such as Poland and the millions who will be liberated (again by America) if Syria’s government crashes as it is expected to and if Iran’s threats are taken seriously by our government.
Look, there are billions of people – today – still living under tyranny. What the left does not understand is that living under tyranny is NOT FUN. Those Hollywood marvels and leftist politicians are so out of touch with the reality of these people locked away in their prisons of oppression that their la-la land version of truth is that Bush is the epitome of tyranny!
Remember how President Reagan was ridiculed and maligned for daring to speak the truth about the “Evil Empire”. Reagan announced in March of 1983 his Strategic Defense Initiative and in 1987 called for Gorbachev to “tear down this wall”. But despite the left Reagan stayed the course and the walls of evil and oppression came a tumbling down, revealing the truth of the purveyors of evil.
Reagan gave such an important and brave speech on June 12, 1987 before the Brandenburg Gate in West Berlin, Germany that I will reprint a large portion of it here as follows to remind my fellow Americans what can be accomplished when a leader is strong, honest and courageous in the face of evil.
“In this season of spring in 1945, the people of Berlin emerged from their air-raid shelters to find devastation. Thousands of miles away, the people of the United States reached out to help. And in 1947 Secretary of State--as you've been told--George Marshall announced the creation of what would become known as the Marshall Plan. Speaking precisely 40 years ago this month, he said: "Our policy is directed not against any country or doctrine, but against hunger, poverty, desperation, and chaos."
In the Reichstag a few moments ago, I saw a display commemorating this 40th anniversary of the Marshall Plan. I was struck by the sign on a burnt-out, gutted structure that was being rebuilt. I understand that Berliners of my own generation can remember seeing signs like it dotted throughout the western sectors of the city. The sign read simply: "The Marshall Plan is helping here to strengthen the free world." A strong, free world in the West, that dream became real. Japan rose from ruin to become an economic giant. Italy, France, Belgium--virtually every nation in Western Europe saw political and economic rebirth; the European Community was founded.
In West Germany and here in Berlin, there took place an economic miracle, the Wirtschaftswunder. Adenauer, Erhard, Reuter, and other leaders understood the practical importance of liberty--that just as truth can flourish only when the journalist is given freedom of speech, so prosperity can come about only when the farmer and businessman enjoy economic freedom. The German leaders reduced tariffs, expanded free trade, lowered taxes. From 1950 to 1960 alone, the standard of living in West Germany and Berlin doubled.
Where four decades ago there was rubble, today in West Berlin there is the greatest industrial output of any city in Germany--busy office blocks, fine homes and apartments, proud avenues, and the spreading lawns of parkland. Where a city's culture seemed to have been destroyed, today there are two great universities, orchestras and an opera, countless theaters, and museums. Where there was want, today there's abundance--food, clothing, automobiles--the wonderful goods of the Ku'damm. From devastation, from utter ruin, you Berliners have, in freedom, rebuilt a city that once again ranks as one of the greatest on earth. The Soviets may have had other plans. But my friends, there were a few things the Soviets didn't count on--Berliner Herz, Berliner Humor, ja, und Berliner Schnauze. [Berliner heart, Berliner humor, yes, and a Berliner Schnauze.]
In the 1950s, Khrushchev predicted: "We will bury you." But in the West today, we see a free world that has achieved a level of prosperity and well-being unprecedented in all human history. In the Communist world, we see failure, technological backwardness, declining standards of health, even want of the most basic kind--too little food. Even today, the Soviet Union still cannot feed itself. After these four decades, then, there stands before the entire world one great and inescapable conclusion: Freedom leads to prosperity. Freedom replaces the ancient hatreds among the nations with comity and peace. Freedom is the victor.
And now the Soviets themselves may, in a limited way, be coming to understand the importance of freedom. We hear much from Moscow about a new policy of reform and openness. Some political prisoners have been released. Certain foreign news broadcasts are no longer being jammed. Some economic enterprises have been permitted to operate with greater freedom from state control.
Are these the beginnings of profound changes in the Soviet state? Or are they token gestures, intended to raise false hopes in the West, or to strengthen the Soviet system without changing it? We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace. There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace.
General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
I understand the fear of war and the pain of division that afflict this continent-- and I pledge to you my country's efforts to help overcome these burdens. To be sure, we in the West must resist Soviet expansion. So we must maintain defenses of unassailable strength. Yet we seek peace; so we must strive to reduce arms on both sides.
…While we pursue these arms reductions, I pledge to you that we will maintain the capacity to deter Soviet aggression at any level at which it might occur. And in cooperation with many of our allies, the United States is pursuing the Strategic Defense Initiative--research to base deterrence not on the threat of offensive retaliation, but on defenses that truly defend; on systems, in short, that will not target populations, but shield them. By these means we seek to increase the safety of Europe and all the world. But we must remember a crucial fact: East and West do not mistrust each other because we are armed; we are armed because we mistrust each other. And our differences are not about weapons but about liberty. When President Kennedy spoke at the City Hall those 24 years ago, freedom was encircled, Berlin was under siege. And today, despite all the pressures upon this city, Berlin stands secure in its liberty. And freedom itself is transforming the globe.
In the Philippines, in South and Central America, democracy has been given a rebirth. Throughout the Pacific, free markets are working miracle after miracle of economic growth. In the industrialized nations, a technological revolution is taking place--a revolution marked by rapid, dramatic advances in computers and telecommunications.
In Europe, only one nation and those it controls refuse to join the community of freedom. Yet in this age of redoubled economic growth, of information and innovation, the Soviet Union faces a choice: It must make fundamental changes, or it will become obsolete.
Today thus represents a moment of hope. We in the West stand ready to cooperate with the East to promote true openness, to break down barriers that separate people, to create a safe, freer world. And surely there is no better place than Berlin, the meeting place of East and West, to make a start. Free people of Berlin: Today, as in the past, the United States stands for the strict observance and full implementation of all parts of the Four Power Agreement of 1971. Let us use this occasion, the 750th anniversary of this city, to usher in a new era, to seek a still fuller, richer life for the Berlin of the future. Together, let us maintain and develop the ties between the Federal Republic and the Western sectors of Berlin, which is permitted by the 1971 agreement.
And I invite Mr. Gorbachev: Let us work to bring the Eastern and Western parts of the city closer together, so that all the inhabitants of all Berlin can enjoy the benefits that come with life in one of the great cities of the world.
To open Berlin still further to all Europe, East and West, let us expand the vital air access to this city, finding ways of making commercial air service to Berlin more convenient, more comfortable, and more economical. We look to the day when West Berlin can become one of the chief aviation hubs in all central Europe.
With our French and British partners, the United States is prepared to help bring international meetings to Berlin. It would be only fitting for Berlin to serve as the site of United Nations meetings, or world conferences on human rights and arms control or other issues that call for international cooperation.
There is no better way to establish hope for the future than to enlighten young minds, and we would be honored to sponsor summer youth exchanges, cultural events, and other programs for young Berliners from the East. Our French and British friends, I'm certain, will do the same. And it's my hope that an authority can be found in East Berlin to sponsor visits from young people of the Western sectors.
…In these four decades, as I have said, you Berliners have built a great city. You've done so in spite of threats--the Soviet attempts to impose the East-mark, the blockade. Today the city thrives in spite of the challenges implicit in the very presence of this wall. What keeps you here? Certainly there's a great deal to be said for your fortitude, for your defiant courage. But I believe there's something deeper, something that involves Berlin's whole look and feel and way of life--not mere sentiment. No one could live long in Berlin without being completely disabused of illusions. Something instead, that has seen the difficulties of life in Berlin but chose to accept them, that continues to build this good and proud city in contrast to a surrounding totalitarian presence that refuses to release human energies or aspirations. Something that speaks with a powerful voice of affirmation, that says yes to this city, yes to the future, yes to freedom. In a word, I would submit that what keeps you in Berlin is love--love both profound and abiding.
Perhaps this gets to the root of the matter, to the most fundamental distinction of all between East and West. The totalitarian world produces backwardness because it does such violence to the spirit, thwarting the human impulse to create, to enjoy, to worship. The totalitarian world finds even symbols of love and of worship an affront…
As I looked out a moment ago from the Reichstag, that embodiment of German unity, I noticed words crudely spray-painted upon the wall, perhaps by a young Berliner: "This wall will fall. Beliefs become reality." Yes, across Europe, this wall will fall. For it cannot withstand faith; it cannot withstand truth. The wall cannot withstand freedom.
And I would like, before I close, to say one word. I have read, and I have been questioned since I've been here about certain demonstrations against my coming. And I would like to say just one thing, and to those who demonstrate so. I wonder if they have ever asked themselves that if they should have the kind of government they apparently seek, no one would ever be able to do what they're doing again.
Saturday, October 29, 2005
The Big Bad Oilmen
Every time Oil Corporations make profits they are scorned, denigrated and accused of price gouging. Headlines scream and politicians pout, stamping their feet at the thought of one of our greatest industries daring to make record profits. But then politicians and news people are not known for their love of business let alone the businessman. My concern is why the oil executives never philosophically defend themselves and the profits (when they make them) that they earn.
We all know that high taxes and price controls don’t work. Remember the 70’s under former President Carter?
As the Investor’s Business Daily writes: “Strange how these proposals keep coming back up, like a bad meal. Given the history of energy price controls and taxes, they scarcely merit mention. But the danger is so great, they must be shot down immediately.” (read).
Well you can read what our bright politicos in Washington have tried to get away with historically and how detrimental their shenanigans were to the economy every time these politicos come up with control and tax schemes (http://www.investors.com/). What I want to talk about is the Oil Producer Executives who are in dire need of a “raison d’etre”. What I mean is, they need to let the world know what they do and how they do it: the long lead time the oil business is governed by when there are changes in prices and demand. It’s not exactly like oilmen go and pluck oil from trees or find it floating in lakes.
First they have to find it, which usually takes years, then they have to figure out a way to dig for it in a cost effective manner, then there’s the shipping to refineries, etc. etc. We are not making bread here folks.
The next step is to proclaim loud and clear that they are EXPLORERS and PRODUCERS and without them there would be no 21st century as we know it, that the long range thinking and planning to get the product from the ground to the consumer’s car, house and the thousands of other products that are derived from oil doesn’t just happen. It takes brains and brawn. Thinking and long range planning are not skills that a lot of people have let’s face it. Certainly the antithesis of these skills are what politicians possess.
Oilmen, stand up and courageously defend yourselves from politicos who will never be your equal at any level.
Ayn Rand in “For the New Intellectual” defines the businessman thus: “The businessman carries scientific discoveries from the laboratory of the inventor to industrial plants, and transforms them into material products that fill men’s physical needs and expand the comfort of men’s existence…He is the great liberator who, in the short span of a century and a half, has released men from bondage to their physical needs, has released them from …pestilences, from the stagnant hopelessness and terror in which most of mankind had lived in all the pre-capitalist centuries – and in which most of it still lives, in non-capitalist countries.”
Ms Rand writes: “Businessmen are the symbol of a free society-the symbol of America. If and when they perish, civilization will perish. But if you wish to fight for freedom, you must begin by fighting for its unrewarded, unrecognized, unacknowledged, yet best representatives-the American businessmen.” (America’s Persecuted Minority: Big Business).
I salute American Big Bad Oilmen and I hope someday soon they can stand up to the politicos and news media and declare proudly what their profits are and that they EARNED the profits.
We all know that high taxes and price controls don’t work. Remember the 70’s under former President Carter?
As the Investor’s Business Daily writes: “Strange how these proposals keep coming back up, like a bad meal. Given the history of energy price controls and taxes, they scarcely merit mention. But the danger is so great, they must be shot down immediately.” (read).
Well you can read what our bright politicos in Washington have tried to get away with historically and how detrimental their shenanigans were to the economy every time these politicos come up with control and tax schemes (http://www.investors.com/). What I want to talk about is the Oil Producer Executives who are in dire need of a “raison d’etre”. What I mean is, they need to let the world know what they do and how they do it: the long lead time the oil business is governed by when there are changes in prices and demand. It’s not exactly like oilmen go and pluck oil from trees or find it floating in lakes.
First they have to find it, which usually takes years, then they have to figure out a way to dig for it in a cost effective manner, then there’s the shipping to refineries, etc. etc. We are not making bread here folks.
The next step is to proclaim loud and clear that they are EXPLORERS and PRODUCERS and without them there would be no 21st century as we know it, that the long range thinking and planning to get the product from the ground to the consumer’s car, house and the thousands of other products that are derived from oil doesn’t just happen. It takes brains and brawn. Thinking and long range planning are not skills that a lot of people have let’s face it. Certainly the antithesis of these skills are what politicians possess.
Oilmen, stand up and courageously defend yourselves from politicos who will never be your equal at any level.
Ayn Rand in “For the New Intellectual” defines the businessman thus: “The businessman carries scientific discoveries from the laboratory of the inventor to industrial plants, and transforms them into material products that fill men’s physical needs and expand the comfort of men’s existence…He is the great liberator who, in the short span of a century and a half, has released men from bondage to their physical needs, has released them from …pestilences, from the stagnant hopelessness and terror in which most of mankind had lived in all the pre-capitalist centuries – and in which most of it still lives, in non-capitalist countries.”
Ms Rand writes: “Businessmen are the symbol of a free society-the symbol of America. If and when they perish, civilization will perish. But if you wish to fight for freedom, you must begin by fighting for its unrewarded, unrecognized, unacknowledged, yet best representatives-the American businessmen.” (America’s Persecuted Minority: Big Business).
I salute American Big Bad Oilmen and I hope someday soon they can stand up to the politicos and news media and declare proudly what their profits are and that they EARNED the profits.
Animal Rights Terrorists – In Their Own Words - Again
“I don’t think you’d have to kill – assassinate – too many vivisectors before you would see a marked decrease in the amount of vivisection going on. And I think for five lives, ten lives, 15 lives, we could save a million, two million, ten million non-human lives.” (Jerry Vlasak, spokesman for ALF – a terrorist organization).
The Foundation for Biomedical Research devoted to promoting the understanding of animal research reported on http://www.fbresearch.org/ on the hearing to investigate the animal rights group SHAC whose mission is to force the closure of one of America’s largest independent contract research organizations and has targeted employees and their families relentlessly and ruthlessly over the past several years. The company, HLS, has lost millions of dollars in business and legal costs.
In my opinion it’s just a matter of time before one of these wackos commits murder in the name of their irrational cause. Now contemplate the above quote from ALF and the episode where Peta was found asphyxiating cats and dogs in plastic bags in their van and dumping them in the waste bin. I have said it a hundred times and I’ll say it again. These creatures do not love animals – they hate man and technology. They hate the fact that animal research furthers scientific progress in the area of medicine and medical devices not just for man but for animals as well. What they hate is the mind and all that it can create when left alone to think and act. But then what these troglodytes do not like to do is to think.
Sound familiar? If you said yes – why that sounds like the Islamofascists! You get an A plus.
The Foundation for Biomedical Research devoted to promoting the understanding of animal research reported on http://www.fbresearch.org/ on the hearing to investigate the animal rights group SHAC whose mission is to force the closure of one of America’s largest independent contract research organizations and has targeted employees and their families relentlessly and ruthlessly over the past several years. The company, HLS, has lost millions of dollars in business and legal costs.
In my opinion it’s just a matter of time before one of these wackos commits murder in the name of their irrational cause. Now contemplate the above quote from ALF and the episode where Peta was found asphyxiating cats and dogs in plastic bags in their van and dumping them in the waste bin. I have said it a hundred times and I’ll say it again. These creatures do not love animals – they hate man and technology. They hate the fact that animal research furthers scientific progress in the area of medicine and medical devices not just for man but for animals as well. What they hate is the mind and all that it can create when left alone to think and act. But then what these troglodytes do not like to do is to think.
Sound familiar? If you said yes – why that sounds like the Islamofascists! You get an A plus.
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
Tax Cuts Were For The Rich AND Poor
'President Bush has enough on his plate right now - including an expensive rebuilding job after an epic natural disaster, and a global war against an enemy unlike any we have ever faced before...He shouldn't have to contend with another enemy at home, who in their relentless search for bad news, refuse to tell the truth about our healthy economy - and what it is that brought it back to good health." Investors Business Daily - Wednesday October 26, 2005(WWW.Investors.com).
The truth that the news is not telling the truth about is that this administration's extensive tax cuts are what resulted in the largely sound economy we are enjoying today. These tax cuts were across-the-board: for the rich and poor. According to Investor's Business Daily, "32% of all taxpayers, a record- pay no taxes at all." Let's make a list of what the Bush tax legislation of 2003 were about so the leftist media can get it straight.
1. Taxes for over 135 million taxpayers were lowered. (I'm sure there are poor somewhere in that vast number of taxpayers).
2. The per-child tax credit was increased from $600 to $1000.
3. A family of four with $40,000 income had their taxes reduced to about 5% of what they were. 4. The average Bush tax cut was $1,500 a year.
5. The top capital gains tax rate was cut by 25%.
6. The tax rate on dividend income was reduced.
7. Over 20 million small business owners got a tax cut of $2,200 on average.
The results, according to IBD, speak for themselves: investment has been rising since 2003 and reached historical highs this year.
But you wouldn't know it from the mainstream media reporting. I finally subscribed to a business journal which I figured had to tell the truth at least most of the time in order to stay in business. And low and behold the second newspaper I received had this very positive article. Amazing isn't it? I question how truthful the mainstream leftist media is regarding our war against terrorists - really WWIII. It takes patience and persistent hunting to find a good news outlet today. I suggest that everyone do their darn best to take the time to do this.
"What cannot be forgiven, however, is the continual misrepresentation to the American People of the condition of what is, by and large, a sound economy..."
"Just as an individual on the receiving end of enough insults will lose all self-confidence, an economy constantly bashed by the press will needlessly suffer as consumers take it for granted that the bad news is really true."
No matter what political leanings we have whether socialists or capitalists, truth must be recognized and dealt with honestly. Bush's tax cuts have worked, as they always have worked in past. People who are taxed fairly and businesses who are not overtaxed or overburdened by regulations will respond by increasing their productivity and growth. This is not news anymore. If only the mainstream media would stop hating Bush so much and deal with giving us the news truthfully.
The truth that the news is not telling the truth about is that this administration's extensive tax cuts are what resulted in the largely sound economy we are enjoying today. These tax cuts were across-the-board: for the rich and poor. According to Investor's Business Daily, "32% of all taxpayers, a record- pay no taxes at all." Let's make a list of what the Bush tax legislation of 2003 were about so the leftist media can get it straight.
1. Taxes for over 135 million taxpayers were lowered. (I'm sure there are poor somewhere in that vast number of taxpayers).
2. The per-child tax credit was increased from $600 to $1000.
3. A family of four with $40,000 income had their taxes reduced to about 5% of what they were. 4. The average Bush tax cut was $1,500 a year.
5. The top capital gains tax rate was cut by 25%.
6. The tax rate on dividend income was reduced.
7. Over 20 million small business owners got a tax cut of $2,200 on average.
The results, according to IBD, speak for themselves: investment has been rising since 2003 and reached historical highs this year.
But you wouldn't know it from the mainstream media reporting. I finally subscribed to a business journal which I figured had to tell the truth at least most of the time in order to stay in business. And low and behold the second newspaper I received had this very positive article. Amazing isn't it? I question how truthful the mainstream leftist media is regarding our war against terrorists - really WWIII. It takes patience and persistent hunting to find a good news outlet today. I suggest that everyone do their darn best to take the time to do this.
"What cannot be forgiven, however, is the continual misrepresentation to the American People of the condition of what is, by and large, a sound economy..."
"Just as an individual on the receiving end of enough insults will lose all self-confidence, an economy constantly bashed by the press will needlessly suffer as consumers take it for granted that the bad news is really true."
No matter what political leanings we have whether socialists or capitalists, truth must be recognized and dealt with honestly. Bush's tax cuts have worked, as they always have worked in past. People who are taxed fairly and businesses who are not overtaxed or overburdened by regulations will respond by increasing their productivity and growth. This is not news anymore. If only the mainstream media would stop hating Bush so much and deal with giving us the news truthfully.
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