Evil Still Exists

Over at Ricochet, Mollie Hemingway offers up an important point that tends to be purposely glided over today:  evil still does exist.  The media seems to have a propensity to call anyone who does anything that used to be regarded as an evil act as insane; this is especially true in the case of the Norway mass murdered Anders Breivick.  In Breivick's case, however, the worst charge the media could level against him was that he was a "Christian" (Ann Coulter promptly destroyed this argument here).  Here is more on the important distinction between evil and insanity:

I've noticed how quickly reporters try to claim that any terrorist is mentally imbalanced or alienated. In a world where everyone is diagnosed as mentally ill and we pathologize what used to be called sin or evil, this is what you do. It's so much easier to call someone crazy or a victim of a child abuse or something than to deal with their evil.

But a society that is incapable of properly responding to evil, to sin, is one that worries me. [Anders] Breivik didn't start the movement that he hoped to, thankfully, but evil people will use terror even more if we don't refute it and respond to it. Norway is choosing an easy route out of this, but at what cost?

The slow elimination of the idea of evil tacitly takes away any grounding of condemnation of any act, and instead, we are lead to sympathize with the perpetrators because of the environment they grew up in or their bad upbringing.    

The Devil Went Down to Georgia

The latest allegations against Herman Cain come from Ginger White, who claims that she and Cain just recently ended a 13 year affair.  Cain came out yesterday on CNN, two hours before the news broke, to defend himself against the charges.  Cain's lawyer, Lin Wood, later issued a ridiculous statement that basically all but admits that something had taken place between Cain and Ms. White.  Here is an excerpt:

Mr. Cain has been informed today that your television station plans to broadcast a story this evening in which a female will make an accusation that she engaged in a 13-year long physical relationship with Mr. Cain. This is not an accusation of harassment in the workplace – this is not an accusation of an assault – which are subject matters of legitimate inquiry to a political candidate.

Rather, this appears to be an accusation of private, alleged consensual conduct between adults – a subject matter which is not a proper subject of inquiry by the media or the public. No individual, whether a private citizen, a candidate for public office or a public official, should be questioned about his or her private sexual life. The public’s right to know and the media’s right to report has boundaries and most certainly those boundaries end outside of one’s bedroom door.

Mr. Cain has alerted his wife to this new accusation and discussed it with her. He has no obligation to discuss these types of accusations publicly with the media and he will not do so even if his principled position is viewed unfavorably by members of the media.

Cain's attorney must have graduated from the Gloria Allred School of Law.  As Leon Wolf at RedState points out, "Either Mr. Cain and his attorney are basing their views on what is an appropriate subject of media scrutiny for political candidates on the way politics work on another planet (perhaps another galaxy, even), or they are basically trying to telegraph to us that he completely did it."  But all kidding aside, Cain had to approve every word of Lin's statement so that should say something. 

Good News First

The good news:  Rep. Barney Frank today announced that he will not be running for re-election in 2012.  He is one of 17 Democrats--compared to 6 Republicans--who won't be running for re-election. 

The bad news:  Rep. Maxine Waters will be replacing Frank as the ranking Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee. 

Here one of Waters' more memorable moments:

OWS, Diversity, and Equality

This is a very interesting observation about the Occupy Wall Street movement that, curiously, hasn't come to light yet:  only 1.6 percent of the protestors are black.  Furthermore, only 2.6% are Asian, only 6.8% are Hispanic, and (surprise, surprise) only 2.4% say they are Republicans.  Of course the major stories involving the Tea Party was the supposed racism of its members because of the lack of diversity.  Where are the same stories about the lack of diversity regarding the OWS mob?

The Left seems only concerned with diversity when it applies to others, not to themselves.  But as far as it goes, this critique of liberal hypocrisy--which is the typical conservative critique--doesn't really get at the heart of the matter.  How about this critique:  It is wrong by nature to categorize people based on something like skin color, which does not have any bearing whatsoever on their moral character, or capacity for reason.  Skin color, an accident of nature, does not determine anything about a person.  We can't reasonably infer anything about a person based on attributes that have no bearing on them as a moral person.  So, for example, we cannot infer anything about the intentions of a group of people simply on the basis of their racial composition.  The Left's obsession with race in order to achieve equality, ironically, furthers and engenders racial animosity and leaves us farther away from the principle of all men are created equal.

The True Party of No

In his latest op-ed, Charles Krauthammer touches on a point that should be endlessly repeated by Republicans until the 2012 election:  the Democrats are the true do-nothing party.  Here is Krauthammer:

As regarding the supercommittee, Obama was AWOL — then immediately pounced on its failure by going on TV to repeat his incessantly repeated campaign theme of the do-nothing (Republican) Congress.

A swell slogan that fits nicely with the Norquist myth. Except for another inconvenient fact: It is the Republicans who passed — through the House, the only branch of government they control — a real budget that cut $5.8 trillion of spending over the next ten years. Obama’s February budget, which would have increased spending, was laughed out of the Senate, voted down 97– 0. As for the Democratic Senate, it has submitted no budget at all for two and a half years.

Who, then, is do-nothing? Republicans should happily take on this absurd, and central, Democratic campaign plank. Bring Simpson-Bowles to the House floor and pass the most radical of its three deficit-reduction alternatives.

It's amazing that the Democrats have been able to get away with slandering Republicans as the Party of No (I happen to think this says more about the Republicans' inability to counter these claims than the strength of the claims themselves).  But it will be tough to change this narrative of things when the mainstream media bases their reporting on the Democrat perspective as well. 

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!

I would recommend reading Washington's Thanksgiving proclamation or Lincoln's Thanksgiving proclamation and reflect on the great blessings bestowed on this nation and the reasons for those blessings.  We all need to give thanks to God on this day--and not just today--for His mercy and justice without which, we would truly be lost.

Debate Thoughts

At Powerline, Steve Hayward has some thoughts on the Republican debate last night:

So when Ron Paul, the crazy uncle of the field, said in the opening exchange that criminal law had “worked well” with Timothy McVeigh, your could see Newt across the stage coil up like Alex Rodriguez seeing a slow hanging curveball coming toward the plate.  You could see this coming a mile away: “Timothy McVeigh succeeded.  He killed a lot of Americans.”  Newt went on to make the obvious point (paraphrasing here): I don’t want a law that says we get you after you’ve destroyed an American city.  We need a body of law that enables a president to stop it from happening.  Newt established his dominant position right out of the gate.

I could detect Ron Paul audibly snort when Rick Santorum, weighing in on this same thread, rather foolishly but approvingly said that Lincoln “ran over civil rights” during the Civil War.  Never mind instructing Santorum here: had I the chance, I would love to ask Ron Paul, “Why do you belong to the Party of Lincoln if you share the view that Lincoln was a Constitution-shredding president who is the primary author of big government in the US?”  (It’s a commonly held view among the most extreme and simplistic libertarians.)

And:

Another minor flub that got a flinch was Rick Perry saying that “Afghanistan and India are working together” on Pakistan.  Um, I doubt many Indians would conceive the matter that way.  And the idea of free trade zone as a remedy for the region’s instability seems a tad goofy, too.

On Syria, Herman Cain said one thing we ought to do is “stop buying oil from Syria.”  I guess he thinks all Arab nations must have oil because they’re Arab.  And then he managed to change the subject to economic growth at home.  I was sure we were about to get “nine-nine-nine,” but Cain restrained himself.

I want to add a little more to Hayward's very prescient thoughts.

Herman Cain's answers were all about "listening to his commanders on the ground" but after that, there was nothing of substance whatsoever.  The real question is this:  how does Cain know that his commanders on the ground are correct?  Does Cain just want the commanders then running the show in place of the executive?  During the Civil War, Lincoln surely listened more than to just his commanders on the ground  and in some cases, he removed those commanders.  There has got to be a standard of judgment outside of what the commanders say.  Cain doesn't seem to fully realize this.

Santorum is sometimes doing well and other times not.  He really needs to cut it out with the I-am-not-getting-enough-air-time-routine; that really marginalizes him as a candidate.  And he also stated that under his watch, he would have the TSA profile all Muslims...but how does one do that?  Religion is not like race or gender.  A person doesn't have their religion stamped on their forehead.

Rick Perry said he would end sending "blank checks" to Pakistan.  Memo to Rick Perry:  that's not how it works.  Surely foreign aid should be on the table when cuts to the federal budget are being debated, but he should give a realistic assessment of how it's actually done, not a simplistic reproduction.

The Meaning of Constitutional Conservatism

Today National Review Online has made available a very good essay by Yuval Levin from the upcoming Nov. 28th edition of National Review.  Levin argues that even though liberals have seemed to argue from two very distinct vantage points--one based on populism and the other based on denunciations of democracy--they nevertheless are in agreement on the central principle:  the rejection of the constitutionalism of the Founders.  Here is more:

The original progressives of the early 20th century, just like today’s seemingly incoherent liberals, were populist and technocratic — they argued both for direct democracy and for expert rule. Even as they called for enlarging the scope of the federal government and putting a class of educated specialists in charge of it, they also called for radical democratic reforms of our constitutional system. In the 1912 election, the Progressive-party platform proposed not only the direct election of senators but also the enactment of federal laws by public initiative, and even advocated allowing the public to overturn some court decisions by referendum.

But this is in direct contrast to the principles of the Constitution:

The Constitution is built upon a profound skepticism about the ability of any political arrangement to overcome the limitations of human reason and human nature, and so establishes a system of checks to prevent sudden large mistakes while enabling gradual changes supported by a broad and longstanding consensus. Experts should not govern, nor should the people do so directly, but rather the people’s representatives should govern in a system filled with mediating institutions and opposing interests — a system designed to force us to see problems and proposed solutions from a variety of angles simultaneously and, as Alexander Hamilton puts it in Federalist 73, “to increase the chances in favor of the community against the passing of bad laws through haste, inadvertence, or design.” 

For the Founders, more democracy did not necessarily mean more liberty.  And the rule of experts certainly would be in contravention to the consent of the governed.  But it is important to note that the Founders always qualified consent with a phrase like "enlightened" or "rightful" consent.  They were no simple majoritarians, and they knew that whatever the majority wants is not always in their best interest.  The Founders put in place what Madison called "auxiliary precautions" that would have the effect of tempering the passions of the people so that their will would become reasonable and rightful.  The standard to judge whether the majority is rightful are the principles underlying the Constitution:  the principles of the Declaration of Independence.

For the Founders, men, that being in between God and beast, had access to the faculty of reason and therefore were capable of judging things right or wrong, just or unjust.  Because of the dual nature of the soul--because men are capable of both good and bad--the Founders set in place a government that recognizes both the capacity for good and bad but above all, reason by which all men are endowed with by nature.  The reason for the existence of government was the protection of the people's naturally insecure natural rights.  It is in this way that the term "limited government" can be fully understood.

The Founder's did not always agree on the means--which is evidenced by the political fights between Jefferson and Hamilton in the 1790s--but they did agree on the ends of government and thereby the principles of government.  Today, however, liberals and conservatives are in disagreement regarding ends and means; this is why there is much fighting between the parties and why a civic education the in the principles of American statesmanship is all the more important.  Levin's essay is another step towards recovering that kind of education.   

A Fool on the Hill

Yesterday on Meet the Depressed, Senator John Kerry criticized Mitt Romney for flip-flopping (no, really he did).  Here is the story from Politico:

Democratic Sen. John Kerry launched a broadside against fellow Massachusetts politician Mitt Romney on Sunday, calling him a flip-flopper.

"There are few people I've met in public life who have changed on as many issues as he has," Kerry said on NBC's "Meet the Press"

"Every major touchstone of American politics — from abortion to guns to war to God to gays, you name it," Kerry told host David Gregory. "People will make their own judgments about that."

There is no doubt that if Rommey is the nominee--and that is far from settled--the Right will have to figure out how to deal with these claims.  The Democrats obviously are trying to mirror the conservative arguments against Romney and use that as a wedge to divide certain coalitions within the Republican party.

But what I want to know is this:  how has Romney changed his position on God and war (thanks to Ramesh Ponnuru)?  Is Romney now a theist when before he was an atheist?  Was Romney strictly a believer in peace and love and getting rid of the Department of Defense (e.i., or what Barack Obama says are the true teachings of Jesus's Sermon on the Mount)?

And today on MSNBC, Kerry, who was trying to save the so-called supercommittee, unwittingly agreed with Republicans that letting the Bush tax cuts expire will result in "a major tax increase."  Democrats of course argued against the Bush tax cuts--that is until President Obama begrudgingly acknowledged that raising taxes in the middle of a recession was not a good idea.  Kerry parroted these arguments just a little over a year ago on Meet the Depressed and claimed that extending these tax cuts would be giving those in the highest tax bracket "huge extra tax cuts" and a "special bonus."

It's truly amazing that this man was once the Democrat nominee for President.

Give Our Straw Back!

In his Friday column, Charles Krauthammer focuses his pen on the Obama Administration's decision to halt action on the Keystone XL Pipeline, a 1,700 mile transnational pipeline that would carry Alberta oil to refineries in Teaxs.  Here is Krauthammer on the reason for the stoppage:

So what happened? “The administration,” reported the New York Times, “had in recent days been exploring ways to put off the decision until after the presidential election.” Exploring ways to improve the project? Hardly. Exploring ways to get past the election.

Obama’s decision was meant to appease his environmentalists. It’s already working. The president of the National Wildlife Federation told the Washington Post (online edition, November 10) that thousands of environmentalists who were galvanized to protest the pipeline would now support Obama in 2012. Moreover, a source told the Post, Obama campaign officials had concluded that “they do not pick up one vote from approving this project.”

Krauthammer also notes that the "State Department had subjected Keystone to three years of review — the most exhaustive study of any oil pipeline in U.S. history — and twice concluded in voluminous studies that there would be no significant environmental harm."

Also, in conjunction with this story, the US Department of Agriculture delayed a mineral lease auction for the Wayne National Forest in Ohio.  Supposedly, this was done under the auspices of studying the effects of hydraulic fracturing or fracking as it more commonly known--never mind the fact that fracking has had a 60 year record of safety.  The Washington Examiner notes that "one environmentalist group spokesman suggested that moving forward with drilling 'could turn the Ohio Valley into Ozone Alley,'  even though Wayne National Forest already has nearly 1300 oil and gas wells in operation which this study does not affect."

And so Obama is the one getting away with charging Republicans with being obstructionists and putting "ideology" above country.  Seems to me it is the other way around.

Why We Shouldn't Bail Out Student Loan Borrowers

Here is a great argument on why we should not bail out those who have had to take out loans to make it through college:

The 148th Anniversary of the Gettysburg Address

Today is the 148 anniversary of the Gettysburg Address, which Abraham Lincoln delivered in the afternoon of November 19, 1863 at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery in Gettysburg.  Clocking in just over two minutes, and following Edward Everett's two hour plus oration, this speech is perhaps one of the greatest speeches ever delivered. Here is the text in full:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate--we can not consecrate--we can not hallow--this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us--that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion--that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain--that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom--and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

An Open and Shut Case

At No Left Turns, Richard Adams brings our attention back to the words and wisdom of Laurence Tribe, Professor of Law at Harvard, and the supposed "clear case" for the constitutionality of Obamacare.  Tribe wrote an op-ed for the New York Times last February and argued that "There is every reason to believe that a strong, nonpartisan majority of justices will do their constitutional duty, set aside how they might have voted had they been members of Congress and treat this constitutional challenge for what it is — a political objection in legal garb." Here is more from Tribe:

Since the New Deal, the court has consistently held that Congress has broad constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce. This includes authority over not just goods moving across state lines, but also the economic choices of individuals within states that have significant effects on interstate markets. By that standard, this law’s constitutionality is open and shut. Does anyone doubt that the multitrillion-dollar health insurance industry is an interstate market that Congress has the power to regulate?

But is not Tribe wedded the to theory of a living constitution?  Why then should he still care about precedent based on what the New Deal Court said 70 years ago?  The Constitution has surely evolved since that time, and it would be absurd to chain ourselves to past understandings of the law.

Also, as Richard points out in his post, we should take care to note Tribe's definition of "clear" which he gives in his book, Constitutional Choices.  The definition:

Whenever I suggest in these essays, for want of space or of humility, that one or another decision seems to me "plainly right" or "plainly wrong," or that some proposal or position is "clearly" consistent (or inconsistent) with the constitution, I hope my words will be understood as shorthand not for a conclusion I offer as indisputably "correct" but solely for a conviction I put forward as powerfully held.

But to substitute truth for convictions "powerfully held" is to say nothing about the convictions themselves.  Joseph Stalin surely held convictions "powerfully held" on the importance of the Gulags and secret police to keep the USSR under lock and key.  Tribe also does not seem to notice that his definition of "clear" is based on a prior acceptance of the idea of some of kind of permanence, because without that, he could not offer any definitions in the first place.   

The Eviction of Occupy Wall Street

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, finally having enough of the Occupy Wall Street protestors creating health hazards in his city and unlawfully occupying public land, ordered Zuccotti Park to be taken back by the NYC Police.  The New York Post has more to the story here:

An administration source insisted that Bloomberg gave the go-ahead to roust the protesters because of “an accumulation of things” — including concerns that the park became a firetrap and that protesters were planning to build wooden structures to prepare for winter.

But sources familiar with Bloomberg’s decision said he also was concerned with public health.

Scabies and lice recently cropped up among those sleeping in Zuccotti Park — and there were concerns that the infestations would grow even worse, said a law-enforcement source.

There also was an increasing numbers of lung ailments caused by constant smoking and the chilly nighttime temperatures, medics who worked on the scene confirmed.

This is good that Mayor Bloomberg finally thought it wise to take back his city.  The lawlessness and crime taking place at OWS camps throughout the United States has been well documented (see the OWS rap sheet here).  The public has started seeing the vices of OWS on display with more regularity and have started to change their opinions on the occupiers.  I am just so glad that our strong-willed political officers are now starting to catch on. 

This kind of mob rule is not what the Founders envisioned when they created the Constitution and set it on the foundation of "the Law of Nature and of Nature's God."

Kagan Should Recuse Herself in Obamacare Case

Emails have been unearthed between then-U.S. Solicitor General Elena Kagan and Laurence Tribe, Professor of Law at Harvard, that show Kagan's seeming approval of the passage of the Patient Care and Affordable Care Act (otherwise known as Obamacare).  Kagan tells Tribe “I hear they have the votes, Larry!! Simply amazing.”  During Kagan's time as Solicitor General, she was heavily involved in promoting the passage of Obamacare.  Carrie Severino of the Judicial Crisis Network makes a strong case why Justice Kagan should recuse herself in the upcoming case on the constitutionality of Obamacare.

Schmucks

Frank Miller, a famous comic book artist and writer, has a great rant on his website today on Occupy Wall Street.  Here is a sample:

The “Occupy” movement, whether displaying itself on Wall Street or in the streets of Oakland (which has, with unspeakable cowardice, embraced it) is anything but an exercise of our blessed First Amendment. “Occupy” is nothing but a pack of louts, thieves, and rapists, an unruly mob, fed by Woodstock-era nostalgia and putrid false righteousness. These clowns can do nothing but harm America. 

Miller joins the growing chorus of former leftists and closet conservatives who, more and more, have begun to openly deride many shibboleths of the Left.  Earlier this year, playwright and former leftist David Mamet published a book on his turn towards conservatism.  There is no doubt that this is very good for conservatism. 

On the Right to Riot

Although I have not yet said anything about the scandal that rocked Penn State this past week, I want to highlight something related to it:  the student reaction to the firing of Joe Paterno, who was in his 46th year as head coach.  In his Friday column, Jonah Goldberg notes that students blamed their rioting on the decision of the school trustees who, hours before, had fired the head coach because of his inaction on learning about the heinous crimes of former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky.  Here is Goldberg:

Imbued with a sense of victimhood, entitlement, and cultivated grievance that can only be taught, their preferred response to inconvenience is a temper tantrum. Sometimes, as with the Penn State riots, they are physical. Other times, they are intellectual or theatrical. But the tantrums are always self-justifying. Arguments are correct not if they conform to facts and reason, but if they are passionately held. Unfairness is measured by the intensity of one’s feelings.

Perhaps that’s why a “right to riot” has become a staple of campus culture across the country, particularly at big schools. Students riot when administrators take away their beer. They riot when they lose games. They riot when they win games. They riot when the cops try to break up parties. Inconvenience itself has become outrageous.

This is a very lucid and thoughtful critique of modern society.  This supposed right to riot is just as absurd as saying that one has a right to a temper tantrum or a right to slavery, an act contrary to the very principles which underlie this republic.  James Wilson taught in his Lecture on Law that "selfishness and injury are as little countenanced by the law of nature as by the law of man. Positive penalties, indeed, may, by human laws, be annexed to both. But these penalties are a restraint only upon injustice and overweening self-love, not upon the exercise of natural liberty."

Goldberg also points out that today, passion rules reason completely.  Things once held to be self-evident truths can now only be judged as good based on how passionately one holds to that belief, notwithstanding the belief itself.  The exclusive focus on rights totally eliminates any sense of duty to anyone else. 

At bottom, this is relativism and nihilism which, on most college campuses, is only reinforced by the professors who teach these same students.

The Real Cause of the Financial Crisis

Unbeknownst to the Occupy Wall Street crowd, those evil corporatists who work on Wall Street were not the main cause of the housing collapse that precipitated the economic downturn in 2008:  it was the federal government.  Conn Carroll at the Washington Examiner explains:

This we do know: Thanks to the widespread belief that the federal government would bail them out, Fannie and Freddie were able to borrow money at below-market interest rates.

This gave them a significant competitive advantage over private-sector firms which, by 1992, the two government-backed corporate entities had turned into an almost 70 percent share in the mortgage securitization market.

That same year, at the direction of the Congress, the Department of Housing and Urban Development began setting "affordable" mortgage goals for the agencies.

Countrywide was a growing force in the mortgage industry when it partnered with Fannie in 1992. But after [Countrywide Financial President Angelo] Mozilo's firm secured a steady government buyer for their loans, business exploded. Revenues went from $92 million in 1992, to $860 million in 1996, to $2 billion in 2000. By 2004, they were the nation's largest mortgage lender.

The secret to Countrywide's success was no mystery: They shredded standard industry lending practices, giving home loans to virtually anybody who asked. Fannie Mae not only knew this, Fannie rewarded it.

In 2000, the Fannie Mae Foundation honored Countrywide for "Outstanding Achievement" in the industry. The foundation's 2000 annual report noted: "When necessary -- in cases where applicants have no established credit history, for example -- Countrywide uses nontraditional credit, a practice now accepted by [Fannie]."

Countrywide continued to be the biggest supplier of loans to Fannie Mae all the way through the height of the housing boom. In 2004, 26 percent of the loans Fannie bought were from Countrywide. In 2007, that number had risen to 28 percent.

In his 1993 Nobel Prize lecture, economist Douglass North said, "If the institutional framework rewards piracy, then piratical organizations will come into existence; and if the institutional framework rewards productive activities then organizations -- firms -- will come into existence to engage in productive activities."

From 1992 through the height of the housing bubble, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac used their monopoly position in the mortgage securitization industry to reward firms like Countrywide for making bad bets in the housing market. Countrywide's success was a signal to other market participants to lower their standards as well.

Wall Street banks are not blameless for the financial crisis. But they were only responding to the incentives set up by the federal government. Ignoring this history will help no one.

Due to the efforts of Rep. Barney Frank, then-Senator Chris Dodd, and other Democrats, Fannie and Freddie were able to keep their scheme going without any awareness of the consequences that would be just around the corner.

Occupy Wall Street: Fact and Fiction

Justin Paulette, a blogger at No Left Turns and an alumnus of Ashland University, has a great column on the facts and fictions of the Occupy Wall Street movement.  Here are some excerpts:

Global Span. Claims that OWS has spread to countries around the world — that is, Europe — fail to recall that circuses of this sort have been common in Europe for years. The OWS brand of demonstrator belongs to a quasi-professional cadre of anti-everything crusaders who follow protests like a Grateful Dead tour. Euro-protesters launch copy-cat OWS rallies because that’s what they do — they follow protests, not issues. Euro-protests have now reached America, not vice versa.

And:

Direct Democracy. Commentators report that OWS presents an alternative to established republican government and reacquaints Americans with a strain of direct democracy. This is true, but confuses virtue and vice. OWS looks like direct democracy because it is disorganized, leaderless, inefficient, susceptible to demagoguery, overly influenced by passions and incapable of articulating a coherent philosophy or forming a consistent governing policy. These are precisely the reasons the Founding Fathers prudently rejected direct democracy in favor of representative government.

You should definitely take some time and read the whole thing.

A Salute to Veterans

Today on Veterans' Day, I cannot really do adequate justice on saying how much the veterans who have served in the armed force mean to this county.  So in lieu of taking time myself, I will post some quotes that begin to attempt to explain and frame their scarifices for this country, the greatest county now or ever.

Lincoln in the Gettysburg Address:

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate--we can not consecrate--we can not hallow--this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us--that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion--that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain--that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom--and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.  

G.K. Chesterton on courage (thanks to Peter Schramm):

Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die. 'He that will lose his life, the same shall save it,' is not a piece of mysticism for saints and heroes. It is a piece of everyday advice for sailors or mountaineers. It might be printed in an Alpine guide or a drill book. This paradox is the whole principle of courage; even of quite earthly or quite brutal courage. A man cut off by the sea may save his life if he will risk it on the precipice.

He can only get away from death by continually stepping within an inch of it. A soldier surrounded by enemies, if he is to cut his way out, needs to combine a strong desire for living with a strange carelessness about dying. He must not merely cling to life, for then he will be a coward, and will not escape. He must not merely wait for death, for then he will be a suicide, and will not escape. He must seek his life in a spirit of furious indifference to it; he must desire life like water and yet drink death like wine. No philosopher, I fancy, has ever expressed this romantic riddle with adequate lucidity, and I certainly have not done so. But Christianity has done more: it has marked the limits of it in the awful graves of the suicide and the hero, showing the distance between him who dies for the sake of living and him who dies for the sake of dying.

Ronald Reagan on November 11, 1988:

We're gathered today, just as we have gathered before, to remember those who served, those who fought, and those who -- those still missing, and those who gave their last full measure of devotion for our country. We're gathered at a monument on which the names of our fallen friends and loved ones are engraved, and with crosses instead of diamonds beside them, the names of those whose fate we do not yet know. One of those who fell wrote, shortly before his death, these words: "Take what they have left and what they have taught you with their dying and keep it with your own. And take one moment to embrace those gentle heroes you left behind."

Well, today, Veterans Day, as we do every year, we take that moment to embrace the gentle heroes of Vietnam and of all our wars. We remember those who were called upon to give all a person can give, and we remember those who were prepared to make that sacrifice if it were demanded of them in the line of duty, though it never was. Most of all, we remember the devotion and gallantry with which all of them ennobled their nation as they became champions of a noble cause.

Hayward on Newt

At Power Line, Steven Hayward, while drawing up a strong argument for the candidacy of Newt Gingrich, ruminates on a very important point:  Newt's focus on bringing back on older style of politics more akin to that of the Founders.  Here is Hayward:

 But beyond handicapping the primary campaign dynamics, Newt is doing something interesting and maybe profound: he is trying to run for president according to an older model that stresses substance over sound bytes and gimmicky, targeted campaign strategy.  (Hence the emphasis on Lincoln-Douglas style debates that de-emphasize the place of the media questioners, among other things.)  It is a bid to see whether presidential politics can still be conducted along the line of the old republic that would be more familiar to the Founders, to the style of public argument more akin to what Hamilton had in mind in talking about “refining and enlarging the public view” through “reflection and choice” in Federalist #1.

Exploring this phenomena is all the more important in an age where the characteristics and traits needed to become president are getting farther and farther from the virtues and principles needed to be a good president.

Hmmm...

On Natural Law and Conservative Judges

In his latest column, Hadley Arkes recounts an ever-present theme in his writing over the years:  the abandonment of natural law by conservative judges.  Here is Arkes:

One of the oddities of our time is how many Catholic lawyers look upon the natural law as a collection of hazy sentiments, hovering in the sky, having little practical bearing on the cases that come before them. They identify the natural law with “activist” judges on the Left, soaring off into the stratosphere, offering high-minded sentiments, untethered to anything in the text of the Constitution.   

And yet, if we can recognize the misuse or abuse of the natural law, that suggests we can tell the difference between a plausible and implausible, rightful or wrongful use. Why not get clear, then, on the rightful use, rather than abandon the natural law altogether?

He then points to the Contract Clause of the Constitution to show an example of the underlying natural law principles inherent in the Constitution:

...The “Contracts Clause” of the Constitution represents one of the deep principles of lawfulness, but nothing in the Constitution distinguishes a legitimate from an illegitimate contract. We are thrown back upon the sense of the community about things that are rightful or wrongful, to the moral reasoning that should ever form the laws.

Only one kind of creature can make a contract – or a law.  For only one kind of creature understands what it means to bear an obligation that may no longer accord with his interests or inclinations. Any serious discussion of the law will have to lead us back to that one creature who must ever be the subject and object of the law. 

It is critical that conservative judges are able to interpret the Constitution in this light, the way the Founders intended.  Without this standard, there is no way to coherently separate the principles from the compromises of the Constitution.

Some Thoughts on Herman Cain

I was on vacation over the weekend, and I missed--thankfully--a lot of the news that occurred, with much of it centering on Herman Cain and the allegations against him that are growing by the day.  I am not sure if he did what the growing number of women allege that he did, but it is obviously troublesome to say the least.  It is not that troublesome that Cain did not seem to prepare for these allegations; Rush Limbaugh said on Monday that it is kind of preposterous to say that Cain should have seen this coming, and he is somewhat right:  most of the women settled with the National Restaurant Association back in the late 90s, and Cain was unaware of the settlement conditions.

The troublesome thing--and somewhat unsurprising thing--is the way the media has come after Cain.  Those politicians on the Left seem to always be given the presumption of innocence until proven guilty, and those defending certain politicians--e.g., Bill Clinton--seem to still want to blame the women accusers or redefine the meaning of sexual assault in a Hobbesian kind-of-way (or, in the case of John Edwards, be in constant need of having to wear a neck brace).  Cain and most politicians on the Right are presumed guilty right away.  Those defending Cain should be careful not to so much as defend the man--who may be guilty--but the principle underlying this whole ordeal:  the presumption of innocence until guilt is proven.

Obama's God

President Obama, commenting on a vote today in Congress today affirming the motto "In God We Trust" on all government buildings, said this in response:  "That's not putting people back to work," Obama said. "I trust in God, but God wants to see us help ourselves by putting people to work."  Wow, what humility.  I am glad that Obama jobs bill now has the approval of God.  But wait a minute, didn't Obama just give a speech on the evils of relying on things outside the control of the government? 


I am reminded here of Lincoln's God in the Second Inaugural where he talks of the relation of the North and South to the will of a Living God:

Both [the North and South] read the same Bible, and pray to the same God; and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God’s assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men’s faces; but let us judge not that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered; that of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. 

For Lincoln, God's purposes are mysterious and are out of the grasp of human reason.  The God of the Bible is not directly concerned with positive law--that is left up to us to decide.  But that doesn't mean that the positive law--the laws set down by the people--does not have a standard.  The standard to judge the justness of the positive law is the natural law, which is accessible to everyone capable of reason. 

So at the end of the day, I guess I am just really not sure how Obama knows God's will regarding his jobs bill.   

The Ohio Farmer on the Debates

In today's Letter from a Ohio Farmer, a project of the Ashbrook Center at Ashland University, the Farmer wonders aloud if the current process of picking a president--with much of it being based solely on debate performances--is worthy of a nation like ours.  Here is the Farmer:

What’s so strange about the growing importance of debates in presidential campaigns is that debating – even defined loosely as appearing poised, serious, imperturbable, and well-informed in what amounts to a competitive group press-conference – doesn't correspond to anything a president ever does once elected.  An American president does not, like a British prime minister, have to defend his policies to critics in legislative chambers.  Presidents talk a lot in public, of course, but always in highly controlled settings that allow them to confine their remarks to the subjects they want to talk about, and address them in ways of their own choosing.  Saying we elected Smith president because he’s such a good debater, then, is a little like saying that we chose Jones to be our quarterback because he's such a good ice skater.

As the Farmer chronicles, debates between presidential nominees became the standard in our politics only after the Nixon-Kennedy debates leading up to the election in 1960. 

But, as an logical extension from the above paragraph, one wonders if the characteristics to successfully become president are the same as those it takes to actually be a good president.  Would today's process make it easier or harder to pick a man like Lincoln, who would look awfully strange, and would have a voice that would be unimpressive?  If the answer is in the affirmative, then that should tell us something about the great flaws of the current process.