The Magicians and TANSTAAFL

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

--Arthur C. Clarke, 1961

It would be funny if the situation weren't so dire. Yesterday, against the advice of many economists, and with nays from the entire opposition party, the House passed the biggest spending package in history of the United States, and quite possibly, in history of the world. This, at a time when the country is in the red to the tune of almost ten trillion dollars, not counting our future unfunded obligations to Medicare and Social Security.

Insanity is too kind of a word.

And as I was trying to figure out what these guys could possibly be thinking, Clarke's Third Law of Prediction popped into my head and stubbornly took up residence.

First published in his essay Hazards of Prophecy: The Failure of Imagination, in the book Profiles of the Future, published when I was just coming out of diapers. Last night, I tossed and turned in sleepless frutration, trying to figure out who it is exactly whose imagination has failed: the Pols or the Founders.

Most certainly it is the Pols, but before I go into that, I think a little background on Clarke's Third Law is in order. In his novella Against the Fall of Night, human civilization stalls out after a billion years of evolution. The remnants of the human race live among the left overs of the now defunct advanced civilization, and use the technology that they cannot understand or replicate. To them, it is magic.

And it occured to me, in the wee hours, that money and economics, is as inexplicable to politicians the world over, as those sidewalks that flowed like rivers were to the savages living on the edge of their ancestors glory in Against the Fall of Night. Economics is a technology. Money, derided by many as some fastastical evil force, is understood by civilized people as a tool for the purpose of trade. For civilized people, economics should then simply be the study of how money and trade work in reality.

But failing to understand the origin and purpose of money, the Pols treat Economics like magic. They believe that if they mumble the right words and make the right gestures, they can change reality to fit their fantasy of what the world ought to be like. They are like the primitive peoples of the South Seas during WW II, who upon seeing that these fantastic men came on airplanes with radios and canned goods, build straw replicas of the airplanes and waited for the Cargo to rain down from heaven.

The Fed, not recognizing that they are running on empty, has anounced cuts in interest rates that have gone almost to zero, and then express surprise that the banks don't lend. Like the Cargo Culters, they print money that has no meaning (our money supply has increased over 70% in the past three months), but because they have said the right words and made the right gestures, they cannot figure out why the economy does not right itself.

Meanwhile, the Pols in Congress have succumbed to the panic of DO SOMETHING and are borrowing against the funny money that is being printed over at Treasury, which is presided over by a tax cheat. And they believe their cause is just, and it MUST WORK because, after all, they are saying the right words and making the right gestures.

None of them has any clue as to what money is or how economies function.

None of them believe that they should know these things before they begin to fiddle with the ticking time bomb of economic collapse.

It HAS to work! They have had all the best intentions in the world as they said the right words and made the right gestures.

Reality does not care one whit about human intentions.

The natural consequence of Clarke's Third Law are upon us.

The technology of money and trade are apparently sufficiently complex to the Pols in Washington, and in the state capitals around the nation, that it is indistinguishable from magic.

It is like giving a thermonuclear weapon to barbarians. We'd be well advised to get out of the way if we can.

Failing that, it might be a good idea to make some preparations.

Because as the characters invented by Robert A. Heinlein in his novel The Moon is a Harsh Mistress used to say, "TANSTAAFL*!"

Honey, should we put our money under your side of the mattress or mine? The magicians are at work.

*There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch.

The Problem with Geithner

The problem is his integrity.

He did not pay taxes that the IMF clearly informed him that he owed, and when he was audited, he still did not make good on all of the back taxes. He also continued to play fast and loose with the system.

And his name has just been sent to the full Senate for confirmation.
The committee passed him, despite all of this, because he's the genius that will fix our economy. Even though he couldn't understand Turbo Tax. (It's pretty simple, really. You hit the prompt that says "self-employed"). Not to mention the fact that the IMF not only apprised him of his tax obligation each quarter, but also wrote him a check intended to cover his tax obligation. So he kept the money from the IMF and did not pay the taxes.

Now many of us ordinary citizens have trouble with our taxes, but if we made this mistake we would pay fines, back taxes, and interest on what we owed. We might be terrorized by the IRS for years to come. Geithner has not experienced that. Apparently, there is not one law for the citizen and the politician in the United States.

What concerns me the most, though, is not Geithner's lack of integrity, although that is a big concern. What concerns me, is that our Senators and Representatives do not think it matters. After all, Geithner is the genius that came up with TARP, which was such an innovative solution that it was not used. So the congress critters have persuaded themselves that he is the only person who can save our economy from certain crash. And this bothers me quite a lot more.

First, the assumption that any one person can save an economy, any economy, by spending money we don't have defies common sense. It is what F.A. Hayek called The Fatal Conceit. Secondly, is it really possible that among a population of more than 303 million people this one, clearly flawed man is the only person who is qualified to be Secretary of the Treasury? This man who can't get his taxes right is the only person to put in charge of the IRS, the bailouts, and the printing presses at the US Treasury?

This kind of desire for a magic solution to all our problems is the same idolatry that made the Obamaniacs so nauseating. Our founders did not set up our system of government to depend on one man. As Thomas Jefferson wrote:

"It would be a dangerous delusion were a confidence in the men of our choice to silence our fears for the safety of our rights... Confidence is everywhere the parent of despotism. Free government is founded in jealousy, and not in confidence. It is jealousy and not confidence which prescribes limited constitutions, to bind down those whom we are obliged to trust with power... Our Constitution has accordingly fixed the limits to which, and no further, our confidence may go... In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution."
--Thomas Jefferson: Draft Kentucky Resolutions, 1798. ME 17:388

Ours is a government of law, not of men.
Should we then give the power over our money, which was unconstitutionally given to the Secretary of the Treasury by our venal politicians last October, over to a man who violates that law? Who, at best, is a genius who cannot understand the portions of the law that he will be charged with enforcing by virtue of his position over the IRS? Should this man have the power to deprive citizens who violate the same code he did of their rights to liberty and property?

I cannot believe that this is practically a done deal.
We have been told today that although his tax code violations would have been a problem in more ordinary times, these extraordinary times make his lack of integrity unimportant.
What? Does this mean that since these times are so extraordinary, the law does not now apply? Isn't it precisely in extraordinary times that character and integrity become extraordinaryly important? In The Crisis, Thomas Paine wrote:

"THESE are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value." (December, 1776).

Will a man who, when times were good, did not pay his taxes, and kept the money given to him by the IMF for that purpose, have the integrity to make lawful decisions about our money in these extraordinary times? I think his soul has been tried and found wanting.

We the People of the United States, deserve and should demand accountable leaders who have the courage of their convictions, and the integrity to uphold the Constitution. No one man is the solution to all of our problems. We make the solutions. And as for our leaders, we must "bind [them] down from mischief with the chains of the Constitution."

And we lack wisdom if we do not protest the placement of a man who has already done mischief with his own money in charge of the national purse.

Inauguration Tuesday

Today, the United States witnessed a transcending moment.
That this happens every eight years makes it no less unique or special.
For today, we saw the peaceful transfer of the office of President of the United States from one man to another, as we have seen in ordinary times and extraordinary times, from 1789 until now.


Today was an extraordinary time, as Barack Obama was sworn in as the first Black President of the United States, standing on the same Capital Mall as MLK did, when he said, "I have a dream . . ."

For many Americans, this is a dream fulfilled.
Tomorrow, Mr. Obama begins to govern.
Tomorrow, Americans will begin to argue about the wisdom of his government, the policies he proposes and the vision he works to make a reality.

Even that vision will be trasmuted from within and from without. From within, it will change as Mr. Obama confronts the realities that his administration must work within. From without, the change will come from the push-and-pull of politics, as through their representatives, the people of the United States demand to have their unique and diverse voices heard.
This is what our founders intended: not the efficiency of a well-oiled collective, but rather the push-and-pull of a government of, for, and by the people at work.

Tomorrow, where the rubber meets the road, Mr. Obama will begin to get the reality of the change: that his vision will not remain what it was as Candidate Obama.
Tomorrow, we will begin to pick apart the new President's policies. We will agree with some and vehemently disagree with others.

But for today, we have the satisfaction of taking pride in the Republic and in the enduring grace with which the Office of the Chief Executive is transfered. We saw it in 1789. We saw it twice in 1865. We saw it in 1974, when in the midst of division and scandal, a president resigned, and we could smile through our pain because our system worked.

Tomorrow, Mr. Obama must begin to earn our criticism and our compliments.

But for today, just for today, we can stop and rejoice in this peaceful transfer of power mandated by the Constitution.

Congratulations, President Obama.
Best Wishes to the United States.

Judenfressers: The Oldest Hatred

I have written about the current Israeli war with Hamas twice on this blog. The entries are:

They Wanted War and Unknowing Propagandists for Iran. In both of these entries I discussed the moral justification for the war, and also who is really behind the terrorists groups Hamas and Hezbollah. Yesterday, I ran into several more discussions, including a talk given by John Lewis, that clearly lay out Israel's right to defend her citizens, and an Objectivist way to think about the moral issues of making war on terrorists. An excellent analysis on the topic of responding to terrorist is Dr. Lewis' No Substitute for Victory.



This week, as the war in Gaza continues, my attention has turned to another issue, the incidents of antisemitic speech and action that have begun to surface here in the United States and in Europe, during rallies in support of Hamas.

We have seen increasingly ugly incidents, including the firebombing of synagogues in Europe, the expulsion of Jewish children from schools in Finland, and calls for Jews to "go back to the ovens!" in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

The hatred of Jews, which is perhaps the world's oldest ethnic and religious prejudice, has been the organizing principle of many of these ostensible protests of Israel's defense of her borders and her citizens. We are told over and over again, that anti-Zionism is not the same thing as antisemitism. This assertion is shown as a lie by the words on signs and banners equating Zionism with racism and with Naziism, the holocaust denial, the shouted words, and the destruction of Jewish property and lives worldwide, all excused as "protest". These protests are not in response to a particular action of the State of Israel. Rather, they are in opposition to very existence of Israel as a nation-state. Further, they are not attacks on policies, nor are they only attacks on Israel, they are attacks on all Jews.

Modern antisemitism has its origins in 19th century Europe, and Germany and Autria were the center of the spreading poison. The German version of the word antisemitism was coined by Wilhelm Marr, the man who founded the Antisemitic League. His writing later influenced Hitler and the National Socialist (Nazi) movement. Some historians suggest that modern antisemitism differs from European Christian Jew-hatred in that it is directed against Jews as a people or a race, rather than against the Jewish religion. However, the Spanish concept of Limpieza--pure-blood--that differentiated between Christians of Spanish descent and the Conversos, who were Christians of Jewish descent, indicates that this concept had been around well before the 19th century.

Christian antisemitism began in the Christian scriptures, many of which depict Jews as responsible for the murder of Jesus, and the martyrdom of his followers. It was institutionalized in Christianity after the council of Nicea, and the first anti-Jew laws in the Christian Roman Empire were codified by the Emperor Justinian. The early Christian church (east and west) was particularly concerned about Judaizing--the act of bringing Jewish practices into Christianity--and virulent Jew-hatred can be found in the writings of many of the desert fathers and early Christian theologians, such as Justin Martyr, John Chrysostom, and later, Augustine. The idea that Jews were collectively responsible, apparently across space and time, for the crucifixion of Jesus; and that they reject the deity-status of Jesus as the Christ, led to the concept of deicide, the idea that Jews killed a god.

Islamic hatred of Jews has its origins in the Koran and the Hadith (tales of Mohammed). When Mohammed lost tribal battles in Mecca and fled to Medina, the Jews were the first to give him hospitality, but later, when they refused to accept him as a prophet, they were accused of spying for his enemies, and whole tribes of Arabian Jews were murdered in the name of the prophet and Islam. Although the application of collective responsibility against Jews is clearly stated in some early Islamic texts, however, the hatred of Jews as purveyors of some cosmic evil (akin to the Christian charges of deicide) was institutionalized in the 19th century, at about the same time as modern European antisemitism. Nevertheless, the Koran itself clearly gives Islam justification for killing Jews only because they are Jews.

There are many reasons given, historical, social, and psychological, for why Jews are hated world-wide, and why antisemitism exists, even in places where there are no Jews. However, the basis for anti-semitism is always the concept of collective responsibility.
Antisemitic speech and behavior always assumes that all Jews are responsible for the ideas and actions of any other Jew, and individual differences among Jews are always discounted.

This idea of collective responsibility is profoundly anti-Western and anti-modern. This is why it is very troubling to observe it being applied in Western Europe and the United States, as antisemitic speech rears its ugly head yet again in response to this war. To fully understand why this is happening, it is important to remember that the concept of Jihad in Islam has its origins in the herem, the ancient Middle Eastern concept of Holy War. Jihad is fulfilled in the spread of Islam by force across the whole earth, until everyone either submits and accepts Islam, or becomes a dhimmi-- a second-class citizen with no rights in Islamic society. This is the goal of Islamic terrorist organizations such as Al Quaida, Hamas, Hezbollah, and Islamic Jihad. This culture of Islamization by the sword is diametrically opposed to Western concepts such as the Rule of Law and Individual Rights. Driving the Jews into the sea, which is the stated goal of Hamas, or wiping Israel off the face of the map, as Achmadinijad threatens to do, is only the beginning of the radical Islamists agenda to destroy the West.

The response to the Israeli war against Hamas is telling, as protests against it become attacks on Israel, and finally, attacks on Jews.

The bottom line here is that the State of Israel is being singled out in a way that no other modern state has, as a state that must justify its right to exist. (See for example, Mark Steyn's essay A Spreading Sickness ; the essay compares responses to Pakistan's creation with that of Israel). Why is Israel singled out this way? Because it is the Jewish state.

Prior to Marr's coining of the term 'antisemitism', Jew-haters in 19th century Germany and Austria were called Judenfressers, which literally means Jew-eaters; the sense of the term is that these are people who get their spiritual sustenance, their sense of themselves, from their hatred of Jews. As I watched footage that showed the transition of some of these protest rallies into anti-Israel rallies and then into antisemitic rallies, I realized that we are seeing the return of the Judenfressers, in a still more modern guise. And it is particularly disturbing to see this happening once again in Europe, a place that many Holocaust survivors call barbaric, although it is the seat of Western Civilization. It is even more depressing to see Westerners, and particularly Americans, join in the feeding frenzy.

I wonder if Medinat Yisrael, the State of Israel, will ever be considered a nation-state like any other?

I fear for the State of Israel. Israel is a Western democracy that espouses, however imperfectly, the value each individual life, and recognizes Individual Rights and the Rule of Law. In a very short period Israel has established a modern society, high technology, and made the desert bloom, all due to adherence to these Western principles.

I fear for the people Israel, who are again coming under attack worldwide for no other reason than that they are Jews. A small people, granted status as a world religion, more for our influence on the West than for numbers, Jews have bequeathed much to world civilization; a historical perspective, the concept of personal responsibility, the idea that time has direction, are among many other ideas.

And I fear even more for the survival of the principles and values of Western Civilization. When I see American and European young people marching in support of Hamas, using their free speech to subvert free speech, I see the fruit of two generations who have not been educated to understand and respect the achievements of the civilization that gave them their liberty.

I fear that by dishonoring our Western heritage, we have sown the wind, and will reap the whirlwind.

Edited: 1/17/09 for spelling and clarity.

Why I Am Contributing to the Great HDTV Crisis

On Saturday, when I read my local newspaper, I discovered that I am contributing to a great crisis. In an editorial entitled Courage, Couch Potatoes the editor of the Albuquerque Journal wrote:

"On Feb. 17, U.S. television goes digital and those who are not prepared will go without until they get the converter gizmo . . . a prominent part (of the government program for this conversion) are the coupons that the federal government has made available to defray much of the cost (to consumers).
"The coupons have run out before an estimated 6.8% of households with TVs took advantage of them . . . The administration-in-waiting, not blind to a disaster of such proportions, is urging Congress to delay the switchover from analog to digital signals that has been in the making since 2005. Or maybe National Guardsmen could deploy truck-mounted flat-sceens in the hardest hit areas . . ." (Albuquerque Journal, Saturday, January 10, p. A6, parenthetical statements mine)

The assumption of the editor is that if you have not got your coupon, it is because you are too lazy to get up from watching TV to get it.

In the Sunday paper, there were two separate articles about the converter gizmos, how to get them, and a big warning to get them right away, even if you don't have the coupon, so that at least one TV will be available in your house for watching broadcast TV. Apparently, the government says that New Mexico is one of those hardest hit areas, with something like 12% of us being without the HDTV Converter Gizmo Coupon Bail-out. (I wonder where the New Mexico National Guard will deploy those truck-mounted flat-screens?)

Maybe the Admin-in-Waiting is worried that New Mexicans are going to miss out on the new season of 24? That can't be it. I heard that Jack Bower talked back to Congress on last night's season opener.

I admit it. Ragamuffin House is one of those dead beats with nary a coupon or a converter box in the house. It is not because we have cable or satellite TV. And it is not because we are too lazy to turn off the TV to get one. It is because we rarely watch broadcast TV.

Now before you call Child Protective Services, we have not neglected the one child in our household. We actually own a TV. And it is in line-of-sight with all the pretty antennas up on Sandia Peak. It is a rather nice TV, in fact, although it is an older model (2003) and would need the converter box to pick up HD broadcast TV. But why bother? The last time we all watched broadcast TV was in the fall of 2007, when PBS ran the Jewish Americans series. Thus the following imaginary conversation between the administration-in-waiting (AIW) and us:

AIW: "But, but . . . how did you watch the DNC?!"
Ragamuffin House: "We didn't. We listened to selected speeches from both conventions on the local talk-radio. Our favorite was Sarah Palin. She didn't sound much like a politician. She was actually funny."
AIW: "Talk radio! We know who you are! You must be one of those bitter people, clinging to your god and guns!"
Ragamuffin House: "Nope. Not bitter. And that's G-d with a capital 'G', smart aleck! Hmm. We are card-carrying members of the NRA. We just bought more guns and ammo in case Obama Messiah raises the taxx (it's always a four-letter word) on them. But didn't you note that we watched PBS for six whole Wednesday evenings in 2007? We can't be conservatives. We're just libertarians."
AIW: "But how will we invade your home with propaganda for immoral government programs, ads for trans-fats that we want you to crave before we make eating them illegal, and political double-talk about how we can spend our way into recovery?"
Ragamuffin House: "I guess you'll have to deploy the black helicopters. We'll be waiting, our tin-foil hats firmly on our heads. We'd love to show you that beautiful Winchester 30-30 we just bought. Just look for the 'Sedillo Welcomes the Ministry of Truth' sign on the Sedillo Hill Road bridge over I-40. You can't miss it. That's the bridge that had the 'Wanted: Osama Bin Laden, Dead or Alive' sign back in the fall of '01. The American flags are still there. Wah-hoo!"

But seriously, we do not use our TV for watching television. We use it to watch DVD's that we select. I wonder how many of the other 6.8 percent of households in the US (and the slightly larger percentage in the west) who have not got the "gizmo" have the same reason that we do?

We do not need Uncle Sam to help us buy the gizmo. We can choose our own technology, thank you very much. We are not lazy. We are not couch potatoes. And you don't have to send in the Marines. We can choose to buy the previous season of 24 on DVD.
And if we really want to see Hillary's $3,000 pant-suits, there's always You Tube.

We're just not huge fans of the TV wasteland.

Unknowing Propagandists for Iran

Yesterday, I opened my local newspaper to the weekly Letters to the Editor, and was unsurprised to count two letters (one by my rabbi) supporting Israel's Operation Cast Lead, and seven or eight letters accusing Israel of violations of international law and war crimes or worse.

We know where we stand. Whenever Israel responds to a violation of her borders, the anti-Israel propaganda machine gets going, and we can expect Israel (and by proxy, Jews) to be called all of the old names and some new ones. I am not going to reiterate the tired and the new epithets here. As Jonah Goldberg says in today's column (I read it in my paper but you can click the link to find it at the NRO), you can simply go to You Tube or do a web search to find them.

We know where we stand, but I wonder if those who write letters to the editor in support of Hamas really know who they are supporting? One letter said:

" . . . Israel's response is excessive and disproportionate to the handful of homemade bombs fallen randomly upon the Israeli-Occupied territories of Palestine . . ."

Let's unpack this in view of the facts. A handful? There have been more than 8,000 missiles lobbed into Israel over the past eight years. Homemade? The terrorist organizations Hamas and Hizbollah receive weapons, funding, and ideological support from Iran. The weapons are smuggled across the border into Gaza by Hamas for the purpose of attacks upon Israeli sovereign territory. Fallen randomly? Here the writer would have us believe that these weapons simply fall from the sky. They have been targeted to schools, daycare centers and other areas where civilians gather in southern Israel. Hamas intentionally targets civilians. So far, it has been a very good thing for Israelis that Hamas has very bad aim. Upon Israeli-occupied territory? These rockets have been fired into Israeli sovereign territory. Israeli citizens in border towns like S'derot have 15 seconds from the time of launch to seek shelter.

Several of the letters stated that Israel had not ended "occupation" of the Gaza because it controls the borders. Occupation? Actually, the Gaza strip, which was partitioned to Palestine by the UN in 1947 was occupied by Egypt following Israel's War for Independence in 1948, just as the West Bank was occupied by Jordan, which was also supposed to be part of the Palestinian state. Neither of these Islamic states established the UN- mandated Palestinian state in these places. In 1967, Israel was threatened by numerous surrounding states with a war of conquest. In June of that year, Israel pre-empted that attack and in six days, took the Sinai, Golan, Jerusalem, the West Bank, and the Gaza. These lands were conquered by Israel in response to threats (aired publically from many places including Radio Damascus) to "drive the Jews into the Sea." It took some time, but Israel withdrew from the Gaza in 2005. Israel did what Egypt and Jordan did not, ceding both the Gaza and the West bank to the Palestinian state. The West Bank is controlled by the PA/Fatah, but the Gaza is ruled by Hamas, following a coup in which Hamas killed and tortured Palestinians who supported the PA. Hamas has since turned the Gaza into an armed terrorist operation, to the detriment of any state building or support of the residents there.

Israel does control the borders between Gaza and Israeli territory, just as any country controls its own borders. And Israel has shut the borders using sanctions in an attempt to stop the flow of arms into the Gaza; arms that are then used to attack Israel. Egypt does the same with its border with the Gaza. Apparently, they don't want Hamas crossing into Egypt any more than the Israelis want Hamas in Israel.

None of these letter writers appear to have a grasp on even the recent history of the area. One claimed that this war has been ongoing for 4,000 years. That is also untrue. The Palestinians of today are not the Canaanites of the Bible. The movement of peoples across the Middle East (and across the face of the earth for that matter) has been ongoing for a very long time. It is possible to make the case that Islam's war against Jews has been ongoing since Mohammed's flight to Medina, where Arabian Jews were first massacred for not submitting to the messenger of Allah, but that was also before the Palestinian's time.

In any case, who are these people really supporting? Whether they know it or not, they are supporting Achmadinejad and Iran. It is Iran that tells Hamas and Hizbollah what to do, and it is Iran that supports these Islamist terrorists groups morally and materially. In the summer of 2006, Hamas raided Israeli territory, killing Israeli soldiers and taking two hostages. As Israel responded, Hizbollah then began incursions across Israel's northern border, starting what Israelis call the second war with Lebanon. Iran was in the background, orchestrating it all.

The president of Iran, Achmadinejad, has publicly called for the destruction of Israel, and has said many times that he will "wipe Israel off the map." (In the West's current bout of Chamberlain-style appeasement, no one wants to admit that Iran might actually do it). In the past few weeks, the French President Sarkozy has received a report that Iran will pass the nuclear threshhold this year, and will be a full-fledged nuclear power by 2011. The report, based entirely on open-sourced material that Iran freely verifies, also states that this year is likely the last in which the world has the opportunity to stop Iran from getting the bomb and ICBMs to launch it. There are some commentators who believe that Iran's decision not to back Hamas with Hizbollah this time may be a diversion. Whether or not this turns out to be true, the stated purpose and only goal of Hamas is to destroy Israel, and to kill not only "the Zionist Entity", but Jews everywhere within their reach.

And Jews are just the appetizers. The stated goal of the Islamist Jihad is to make every human being on the face of the earth submit to Sharia law as Dhimmis or to become Muslim. Israel is seen by the Jihadists as "the little Satan." It is the United States that is "the Great Satan."

And the Palestinians? They are pawns in the current ambitions of Iran.
Hamas and Hizbollah are both content to use them as human shields.

FYI: A short video about Operation Cast Lead from IDFdesk at You Tube.

Have We No Pride?

The news stories coming out of Washington this week bespeak a terrible arrogance on the part of those that have been elected to represent us.

There has been a great deal of talk about the Big Three automakers and the failure of their business plans. Like they have for many of the business failures lately, those inside the beltway are eager to lay the blame for the failure soley at the feet of capitalism, as if the automobile industry had been operating in the free-market. Their response is that government must "do something" and right away, too, in order to save Detroit.
Sorry, pols, but I think Detroit is already too far gone, and I think government had something to do with it. As did the union bosses, whose main interest is maintaining power, not taking care of the "little guy."
Undoubtedly, bad business decisions also contributed.
It's damn hard to make a business plan at all, let alone a good one, when your faction has lost influence in Washington, and the regulations and pull-peddling go against you.

The thread that runs through this whole sad story is one of arrogance. Arrogance, but not pride.
It was disgusting to watch the likes of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reed lording it over the auto executives in the weeks prior to Thanksgiving, as they came hat in hand for their share of the bail-out. There was plenty of arrogance to go around. It was displayed by the union bosses and the political apparatchiki there to make political hay over the shame of the auto execs.

There was plenty of arrogance, but I had to wonder about the auto execs: Where was their pride?
I was waiting for one of them to stride into the hearings like a reincarnation of Howard Hughes to tell the Pols exactly where to shove it.
I was sorely disappointed.
No one with an ounce of pride in their company and its product would have gone begging to Washington for a handout, willing to sell out to a Car Czar for the privilege of surviving to ask for another handout a few months hence.
Better to stand up and take it like a man, while filing bankruptcy proceedings in order to get out from under the insane job-destroying union-contracts and contradictory government regulations, the better to start again under Chapter 11 reorganization.

Have they no pride?
I imagine that they sold that to the pull-peddlers long ago.

Instead they humbly kowtowed to the most ridiculous grandstanding by the Clowns from Congress . . .er, excuse me, the Honorable So-And-So's.
This might be understandable, though still disgusting, if such a bail-out had a snow-ball's- chance-in-hell of saving the companies.

But we saw this week exactly why it won't. It can't.
It's the unions, stupid! (Apologies to Bill Clinton).
Or more accurately, it's the union bosses.
We saw them doing the same thing to the Senate that they have done to the automakers.
These guys don't bargain in good faith. They don't bargain at all.
They demand.

Some of our senators do have some pride.
When the UAW refused to consider any concessions, the Senate said: No deal.
And this is the right response, because it will not matter how much money the Federal government takes out of our pockets to prop up these companies, if the companies cannot make cars that will sell at the prices people are prepared to pay. The companies will continue to sink into the red.
We will be sending good money after bad.

But now the President of the United States has said that he will subvert the decision of the Senate. In doing so, he is subverting the United States Constitution and Rule of Law.
He is perjuring himself as well, because he has taken an oath to protect and defend the Constitution.
This is the same offense that caused Bill Clinton to be hauled before the Senate for an impeachment trial.

Many Americans were calling for the impeachment of the president when he began the unconstitutional war in Iraq. And many more were doing so because of the unconstitutional provisions in the Patriot Act.

I have just one question: Where are those voices now?
Have we no pride?

Clarification Based on a Comment and a Link

I thought I had said everything I wanted to say about the election and my response.
But I do have something further to discuss.
It was provoked first by a comment to my post last Wednesday, The Morning After.
In that post, I embedded a video from You Tube that featured a parody of the old Soviet national anthem. The parody pokes fun at the Obamaniac's rather messianic view of him, among other things.

The anonymous commentor--aren't they always anonymous?--thought that my post was "disrespectful" and that it is "One thing is being unhappy with the politics of the winner. Another one entirely is bashing the candidate that won."

I think I answered the issues well in follow-up comments and in my more reasoned post Making Ready. The tendency of Anonymouses towards no sense of humor aside,I had the sense that there was something wrong with the idea that the conclusion of a presidential election is necessarily like that of a football game, and the consequences of the ideas are just as fleeting. But I have had a bad virus, and clarity has also been fleeting. Fortunately, Kathy Jo in What He Said, found someone who said it better than I can! This is very good.

And that's the last of the links for the day!

Making Ready: Cross Quarter, the Election, and Saecular Winter

Christine over at The Thinking Mother made the following suggestion in her post Election Outcome a few days ago:

"Now that we have elected a new President I have an idea. How about if we all write down our thoughts about our futures and our hopes or worries?"

In her post, she says that is is not necessary to blog it, but just to write it down for our own future reference. I am going to blog it, though I certainly understand why Christine and others might want to be more circumspect.

I have not been paying much attention to the news since Wednesday. The Engineering Geek and I have both caught rather bad colds for the first time in three years. We believe it is a function of the Boychick's return to school and my return to work. More contacts with random people means more viruses we haven't yet had.

But I have been paying attention to the light and the turning of the season. Winter is coming to Sedillo, and Thursday night was the last cross-quarter day of Common Era 2008. Friday morning, the temperature at 5:45 AM was 16 degrees F.

As the sunrise appears to move south of east, the meadow grasses are dried and waving in a cold north wind.

And just as we go through the seasons of the year, our civilization goes through cycles and seasons: summery seasons of civic and economic growth, and winters of civic and economic crisis. In their book The Fourth Turning, Strauss and Howe predicted that at about this time in our history, we'd be entering another winter in the cycle, another crisis in our history, comparable to others such as the American Revolution, the Civil War, or the Great Depression-WW II.

We have elected a new president, and his election is historic, not only because he is the first black president of the US, but because he has been elected at a crucial moment in our history. It is a time of war and economic uncertainty, and a time when our Constitution is in peril. The problems that he has inherited are grave, and they are not the result of the trends of the last eight years, as the campaign rhetoric would have us believe. the man we have elected to this office is relatively inexperienced: he has no executive experience and served in the US Senate for less than one full term. His campaign rhetoric about foreign policy was naive at best, and his progressive economic ideas are unseasonal and out of step with the reality that the Federal government is not only broke, but the valueof the dollar is in question due to the printing of billions, and the economies of developed nations across the world are in trouble. He is, however, a good orator, and he gave a good speech in Chicago on the night of his election. In it he said:

"And to those Americans whose support I have yet to earn – I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your President too." (B. Obama, Nov. 4, 2008).

I am one of those Americans whose support Obama has not yet earned. I am waiting to see whether this high-flown rhetoric is real, or whether the nastiness of his supporters towards those who disagree with them is going to be the order of the day. I hear the words, but I am waiting to see how well Obama can work within his own party to quell the "partisanship and pettiness . . . that has poisoned our politics for so long", (ibid.) as well as how readily he will reach across the aisle to work with those who have different ideas. Will they be supressed or will debate be allowed? The Democrat majority in Congress has, during the last two years, been every bit as willing to supress debate as have the previous Republican majorities. And we are going into this new administration with the same leadership, only more so, of the most disapproved of Congress in the history of the United States.

Here, I need to clearly state that my concerns and views have not been represented in this election by either major-party candidate. The disenfranchisement that I feel comes from the fact that other voices were shut out by the press and the major parties, and that many important issues were not discussed. We got sound bytes and debates in which the argument was about who did not vote or did vote for specific bills, but with no indication of which earmarks or unrelated language decided their votes. Thus the trading of accusations was meaningless. And I was further unimpressed by the treatment that Sarah Palin received from the Obama supporters. Although I disagree with Palin on many issues, I was apalled by this kind of behavior. It makes me wonder what Obama means by the word 'unity.' Does it mean forced, lockstep agreement, or does it mean bringing consensus from varied viewpoints and within the mandate of the Constitution? I hope for the latter, but given the vituperative nature of the campaigns, I am prepared for the former.

As an American who loves and respects the Constitution of the United States, I accept Obama as the Constitutionally elected President of the United States. However, my loyalty must be to the US Constitution, not to his person, or the person of any president or government official. Government is our servant, not our master; the duty of government is to protect our rights, not to save the world. I am uncertain as to whether Obama and his supporters understand this. (I am certain that his predecessor did not). I will know by what he does and not what they say. At his inauguration, he will swear to preserve and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in this duty I wish him success and resilience. The Presidency is an awesome job and a great responsibility, and so I wish him health, long life, and good courage. But I do not promise him unquestioning loyalty or unwavering support. That would be inappropriate. I am a citizen, not a subject.

I believe that the crisis that is coming could not have been averted no matter who had won the presidency. As I said in response to a comment on a previous blog entry:

"Sooner or later you have to pay the piper; he is at the door, bill in hand."

The longer we try to stave off the pain, the worse it will be when we finally face it. So, just as the birds are gathering their seeds for the coming winter, we have been preparing for the coming hard times. Not with panic, but with purpose. We have stocked up reserves of food and other necessary items, in case the current printing blitz at the US Treasury leads to inflation. We have moved investments out of the country, because Obama has promised much higher capital gains tax rates. Such high tax rates have historically supressed investment, profit-taking, capitalization, and trade. We have also purchased a hunting rifle and ammunition for the Boychick, because Obama has promised to raise taxes on them. Hunting is a good way to supplement the food supplies if the recession deepens or a depression comes. The Boychick has passed his BSA badges for the rifle and the shotgun. The Engineering Geek, being a veteran, already has a rifle and a side-arm.

Frankly, I remember the Carter years, and his economic policies (which were a deepening of Nixon's and Johnson's) led to stagflation and misery for the middle class and working people. Obama's economic plans are very similar to Carter's. So I am expecting an economy like the '70's or worse.

But even though I am expecting hard times, I am not unhopeful about the future of the country. My hope does not rest upon the president, nor upon the leadership of the government; rather it rests in the wisdom of our forefathers and in the Constitution. As Thomas Jefferson said:

""It would be a dangerous delusion were a confidence in the men of our choice to silence our fears for the safety of our rights... Confidence is everywhere the parent of despotism. Free government is founded in jealousy, and not in confidence. It is jealousy and not confidence which prescribes limited constitutions, to bind down those whom we are obliged to trust with power... Our Constitution has accordingly fixed the limits to which, and no further, our confidence may go... In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution." --Thomas Jefferson: Draft Kentucky Resolutions, 1798. ME 17:388

And so, as we pass the fourth cross-quarter, and move into this year's winter, I believe we are also passing into the Saecular Winter, a time of testing and crisis. The Spirit of America has been there before, and has come forth stronger.

As Judy Aaron says in the sidebar of her blog, Consent of the Governed:

"The answer to 1984 is 1776. Teach your children well . . ."

Our Constitution is in peril. If we are to emerge from the hard times ahead with our values in tact, our children must know what the Constitution says, and they must see us prepared to act upon threats to it. The greatest threat to it is the unqualified trust we have put in our government of late. We must let them know who is the servant and who is the master. It may be that the historic nature of this election can be useful for teaching our children more carefully about their rights and the proper way for Americans to secure them.

The Morning After

NEARLY WORDLESS WEDNESDAY

The hair of the dog that bit you . . .

It's what we expected.

Voting in Tijeras: Crests, IDs, Ballots and Other Things Totally Un-PC

So call me old-fashioned.

This morning, the Engineering Geek and I drove down to the Tijeras Village Hall to vote.

Yes, on election day itself.

What a concept.

I like voting in my precinct in my neighborhood. I see my neighbors. We chat while munching on coffee and cookies provided by the Village of Tijeras.

There are some unspoken rules about what to chat about while waiting in line.

We do talk about the weather, the progress of the I-40 rennovation in the canyon, the village crest--which sports a conquistador helmet with a Zia, a Spanish sword, the charter from Spanish King Phillip II, a yucca plant and a rosary. Rural New Mexico is refreshingly politically incorrect.


Digression: Bernalillo County's crest used to sport a cross above a green hill with sheep grazing and the legend "In hoc signe venices." Then we got an influx of refugees from Lebanon in the 1980s. Some of them were uncomfortable with the cross, which reminded them of being hassled by the Christian police. So, in the name of New Mexico hospitality, the county took the cross off. For a while, the legend remained--In this sign we conquer-- proudly emblazoned over the grazing sheep. (!) Eventually, someone down at the county building in Albuquerque must have noticed the irony, because now there's just the sheep grazing on the hill and a Zia. No cross and no legend.

But back to what is and is not talked about in the voting line:
We do not talk about candidates by name, nor do we wear any T-shirts or campaign buttons.
In small towns, we have to get along long after the election is over. So the joking is mostly on the level of saying that we think we'll write in the totally politically incorrrect Coronado himself, or a neighbor, or the Rancho Verde cat that everybody feeds but nobody owns.


When they officially opened the doors to our precinct station, we filed past the poll watchers, who helped us find our numbers, and then we gave our name and address to the poll-worker. Sometimes they ask for an ID, although the Dems that run the state have made that illegal. You can just state your name and address. When a poll-worker asked for my ID--probably because I am registered third-party--I smiled and stated my name and address again. They gave me the ballot. I wrote down my ballot number as well as my registration number and page, before proceeding to vote.


New Mexico has gone to paper ballots. This is actually more efficient because we sit at study carrels and darken in the ovals with the pens provided. There is room for about 50 people to vote at once this way. So I sat down at the carrel indicated by the poll worker, and began to darken in ovals. It was a lengthy ballot, but I had looked up the ballot on line to plan my vote.


Aside from the presidential race, I mostly voted major-party for the Republicans, because I figure that if the projected coronation takes place, we'll need opposition in Congress. And there were no third party candidates anywhere else on the ticket anyway.


There was a long list of judges up for retention. There were a few I did not know about, so I left those blank. (I believe it is immoral to vote for or against someone I know nothing about). Most of the others are worthy of retention, with one noteable exception--the judge who sentenced a marine who defended his home and family from a crystal meth-crazed car thief at 2 AM to a felony because he shot the guy. I guess this judge thought the guy should have let the gang banger live to come back for revenge--maybe when the wife was home alone with the baby.


While I was mulling over this decision, I was also listening to the busy sounds of neighbors voting. In the old days of machines, the voting rooms were remarkably quiet. Not so, now that we are at carrals. An elderly man and his wife were loudly talking about this same judge. "Vote no for ______!" the wife said authoritatively. "He lets criminals out of jail."
"Too bad we can't vote out the mayor of Albuquerque," he responded. "That one is more interested in telling city workers that they can't have a candy-bar on break (not healthy enough, EHL) than in the fact that the armed burgulary rate is five per day, and the police are busy hassling elders for leaving the dog in the car for five minutes!"
"Vote against the incumbent for District Attorney,then." Said another voice. "She's the one who decided to prosecute (the marine)."


Well, I guess this couple did not wish to keep their entire ballot secret.


I continued down the list. On to the county bond issues, the mill-levy, the constitutional amendments, and the state bond issues.
The county bonds were mostly for things the county should do, not very expensive, and in one case, overdue. A few were not so good. The mill-levy was a continuance of support for UNM hospital that had been first voted on in 1957. The state bonds took even more consideration. Some would support services I use--but not everybody does. And on the other hand, all of them were expensive and the taxpayers are already in hock to the maximum. And we don't know what is going to happen with the economy. If Obama is elected, and keeps even a third of his promises to spend money the Federal government does not have, we'll be in so deep that people won't be able to pay.
So I voted against all of them.
The State's got to learn to live on what it has.


As I was checking my cheat-sheet about the constitutional amendments--some were good and some were not so good--I heard a woman behind me ask for a new ballot.
She had spoiled her ballot. She sounded frazzled, but the poll-workers reassured her and issued her a new ballot and a magnifying glass (cool, huh?); there was a little hub-bub about how to record the problem. It sounded exactly like a busy classroom.


As I continued to accept and reject specific constitutional amendments, someone came in and could not find his name on the list. I listened with interest as the poll-workers used a cell phone to call the county clerk, and then proceeded to check on how to issue a provisional ballot.
All in a day's work.


In New Mexico, the poll workers cannot turn you away ballotless. They must have you sign an affidavit that you have not voted yet, and then you can cast a provisional ballot. It will not be counted, however, until after it is confirmed that you have not voted elsewhere, and that you are a legitimately registered voter in the same county.
This is what delayed our returns during election 2004, when we were still voting with machines. But I'd rather have late returns so long as no one is disenfranchised and yet every vote is legitimate.
Given the state of patronage politics in New Mexico, however, I have serious questions about both.


Everyone at the precinct sounded awake and cheerful, not yet tired from the long day ahead at the precinct polling place. At 7:17 AM, I fed my ballot into the combination ballot-reader and locked ballot box. It read with no problem.
I had cast the 17th ballot in precinct 553. I wrote that down, too. In case of irregularities, I will go down to the county clerk's offices, as I did in 2000--when Gore won the state by just 400 votes--and be an unofficial watcher--to try to make sure the process is fair.


Now we just await the results.
Along with Rational Jenn, I Can't Look.
In New Mexico, this election will be close. And there is much at stake.


I hope there are no Ohios or Floridas this 'lection.
No hanging chads and pregnant bubbles.
It's going to be close nationwide. And the country is so divided . . .
And I worry about what ACORN may have done to fan the flames of division into a full-scale wildfire.

But I did my civic duty. Even though I have very little faith in the whole electoral process. Such as it is.

Here at Ragamuffin House, we have begun to prepare for the economic devastation of an Obama victory. But that's a different post.


Now. We. Wait.

Noakh: Here Comes the Flood

This past week, as autumn has been deepening in the Sandias, I have been living with Noakh, and the primeval mythos of origins from the Akkadian and ancient Hebrew.

It is an odd juxtoposition.
Such stories might be understood better in the burgeoning life of springtime.
But the Torah has a logic of its own. So we study the Hebrew myths of chaos, creation, the bursting of boundaries, and re-creation all in the weeks following Sukkot, as the earth travels towards the cold sleep of winter in the northern hemisphere.

Last Saturday evening, the Women's Torah Study Group had a late afternoon study session, followed by Havdalah. And since we begin the next week's parashah on Shabbat afternoon, we began the new year of study with Parashat Noakh. And then this week, along with work, news of the election, and neuroscience, I was preparing to leyn (chant) Noach for the Parallel Minyan today. And so I set the gathering stormclouds of political change and national crisis to the tune of the ancient Deluge that beset the Two-Rivers sometime in the long ago.

Parashat Noakh is interesting, following as it does on Parashat B'reshit, which contains two different creation stories and some geneologies. In B'reshit, the first creation myth tells us that creation was essentially about bringing order from chaos through establishing boundaries:

"Once when G-d was about to create the heavens and the earth, the earth was a chaos, unformed, and over the face of the tehom (the great deep) there was darkness . . ." (B'reshit 1:2)

(Note the translation: B'reshit does not mean "in the beginning," a phrase that uses the definite article; rather, the Hebrew word is indefinite, signalling that this is a myth--a story told for the purpose of making meaning, not a factual report).

The first creation story in B'reshit is the younger of the two stories; it is written in classical Hebrew and it is carefully crafted to convey a precise meaning. The use of certain Akkadian words such as tehom, the root of the name of Tiamat, the primeval goddess of the Enumah Elish (the Mesopotamian creation myth) is intended to draw the hearer's attention to the similarities and differences between the two stories. For in B'reshit, the primary act of creation is done by the separation of the forces of nature, bringing order out of chaos. And in B'reshit, the capstone of each act of creation is the acknowledgement that it is good. Human beings are not the accidental product of a war between the gods as in the Enumah Elish, doomed to suffer purposeless and chaotic existence; for in B'reshit, when the human beings are made, they are the capstone of creation, and are pronounced very good. And when human beings, endowed with free-will, choose to leave the garden/womb and become moral beings, they become productive partners with the Eternal, making their living by the creative work of their hands.

From this story we learn two things:
One, that material existence is not only good, but very good. Thus, Judaism rejects Platonism.
And secondly, that bringing order out of chaos by separation and boundaries is very good.
The root of the Hebrew word for holy--kadosh-- means separate, set aside.

Judaism does not interpret the eating of the pommegranite as a fall into sin; the story is interpreted as the human first choice to know the difference between good and evil, with the attendant consequence of the recognition of human mortality. The serpent--nakhash--is the ancient Mesopotamian symbol of wisdom. This interprative difference between B'reshit and the more well-known Christian understanding of Genesis, means that Judaism has no concept of original sin. Rather, in Jewish understanding, humans are moral creatures, and in the exercise of free-will must make choices. And in Torah and in the Midrash, we see that G-d (who is not portrayed as omniscient and omnipotent) is consistently surprised by the consequences of creating human beings--who are set apart from all other animals--by this need to choose, to reach, to strive.

And this is the point of the Hebrew version of the story of the Deluge. The ancient mythos of the middle east has many flood stories, probably due to some dim memory of a great deluge--perhaps at the end of the last ice age. In the Gilgamesh Epic, the flood story is about the fruitless search for immortality, in which the hero learns that he is missing his life by making the search. But in the Hebrew myth, the story seems to be about chaos breaking out due to the transgression of boundaries by humans and by G-d. The story is confused because of the redactor's weaving of numerous older versions of the story so that multiple meanings can be discerned. However, the thread is there.

At the beginning of the story, it is said that the Eternal (Elohim) sees that human choices have made the earth full of corruption and Khamas. Khamas, often translated as 'violence,' can also mean the full range of human evil. No boundaries--no law--has been set on human choices, and so chaos breaks forth due to human choices. But further, the Eternal has not set boundaries on the Eternal. Thus the chaos that breaks forth is deadly to all life. It cannot be punishment for sin, since no law has been set forth, and since such punishment would be confined to human beings. It is rather, the transgression of the primordial boundaries set forth to bring order out of chaos:

". . . on that day all the springs of the tehom--the great deep--broke out, and the firmament opened. Rain fell upon the earth . . ." (B'reshit 7:11)

Note the use of the word tehom here; chaos, in the form of the primeval waters of the great deep, breaks forth ferociously, just as in the Enumah Elish, in the war between the gods.
And at the end of the flood, when the boundaries on chaos are remade, and when Noach makes an altar in some inchoate thankfulness for his return to life, the Eternal understands the divine mistake. Boundaries are set upon human behavior and law is made:

"Be fruitful and multiply and spread out upon the earth. And let the awe and dread of you be upon the land animals . . . moreover, for your own bloodguilt I will require your lives: The one who sheds human blood/ that one's blood shall be shed by another/ for human beings were made in the image of G-d (e.g. willfull and creative, and with an understanding of their own mortality)." (B'reshit 9:1-6)

And boundaries are also set on the Eternal:

". . .never again will I destroy all the living beings as I have just done.
As long as the world exists/ planting and harvesting/ cold and heat/ summer and winter/ day and night/ will never end." (B'reshit 8: 21-22)

The covenant is sealed with the sign of the rainbow, meant to remind both human and G-d about the boundaries set:

"Here is the sign of the covenant that I am establishing between me and you all that breath upon the earth . . . I have hung up my bow in the clouds . . . and when I see it, I will remember the everlasting covenant between G-d and all that breathes upon the earth." (B'reshit 8:13, 16).

We humans are concerned with chaos and with order. Creativity is the process of setting and breaking boundaries, only to remake them; it is the process of bringing holiness--separations--into the world for the purpose of making life good. Human beings have an understanding of chaos and the ticking of time towards our own mortality. In order to live by the work of our hands, we create the Rule of Law, that even the Eternal may not transgress. All of our science, all of our technology, and our very lives rest upon this fragile bridge: the understanding that the universe is a lawful place, that choices have consequences, and that we cannot wish away their reality.

And that when we refuse to see the difference between good and evil, when we try to wish away the reality of consequences, we loose chaos--the Deluge--again upon our worlds.

I have been thinking of all these things this week, as the politicians in this time of election, beguile us with promises that they have the power to set aside reality and its consequences.

"When the night shows, the signals grow on radios,

All the strange things, they come and go as early warnings,

Stranded starfish have no place to hide, still waiting for the swollen Easter Tide,

There's no point in direction, you cannot even choose a side.
Lord, here comes the flood . . . " (Peter Gabriel).

And human hope? It comes not from a politician who has begun to believe his own press.

Hope comes from the memory of past struggles and the establishment of boundaries. We remember that the price of our liberty is that we be mindful of what is true and real.

And that we understand that our task in life is to bring order out of chaos by our mindful choices.

And then, may we remember the rainbow . . .

Blessed are You, Eternal . . . who remembers/is bound by the covenant with all that lives . . .

Feeling the Chill?

For the record: I am not planning to vote for either major party candidate. In fact, I have voted in every presidential election since 1980, and I have yet to vote for a major party candidate. There have been a few elections during which I was mighty tempted to do so, but some messenger from on high kept me on the straight-and-narrow, and I have always voted for third party or independent candidates. In fact, I vote third party whenever I have the option. This year, I am planning to vote for Libertarian Bob Barr.
Yes, I know he will not win. I vote my conscience. Call it a protest vote.

Now to the post . . .
Today, with my DSL working like a charm, I read several blog posts about the smearing of Joe the Plumber. A Chill Wind Blowing over at the Common Room discusses the chill effect that such smear campaigns have on free expression. When I finally had the opportunity to check my overflowing in-box for the home e-mail, I found a message that left me wondering about the chill effect of using the race card in this campaign. The message implied that the reason that John McCain is doing as well as he is this late in the campaign is that, despite his far superior education, Barack Obama is black. Although I think the sender is actually an educational snob (state universities are not good enough), the implication is that if Obama loses, it is because Americans are racist.


Now the smearing of Joe the Plumber has had real world implications for the guy, precisely because Joe the Plumber is not the red-necked schlub the smears make him out to be. If he were, the smears would not matter to anyone.
But since this is a man who wants to be successful, who wants to build a business and get ahead in life, the smears serve as a warning to other Joe's out there: Do not ask the difficult questions whose answers require Obama to tip his hand. If you do, the press will dig up every bad thing you've ever done. They will make sure that your job security is threatened and that the IRS is on your tail. So you'd better make sure you are squeaky clean before you ask an intelligent question. Don't best the press.

If the smearing of Joe the Plumber has implications for him, and for free speech, imagine the chill effect the implications of the e-mail I received today has. Essentially, we are being set up. If Obama loses the election, this reasoning goes, it is not because his policies are irresponsible (although raising taxes and deficit spending during a recession are irresponsible), it is because Americans are racist. The question then becomes, how many people will vote for Obama, not because they believe he is the best man for the job, but because they are afraid of being called racist? By playing the race card as Obama has--he even implied that Bill Clinton was a racist during the primaries--he has set us up. If he loses, it is because America is racist. Here are the Reverend Jeremiah Wright's black liberation theology chickens coming home to roost.

But consider the implications if Obama wins the election. If so, there will be an unspoken question about whether he won because he was indeed the best man for the job in the minds of a majority of the electorate, or whether he won in some crazy reductio ad absurdum of affirmative action.

Either way, this country will be divided and the election will be in question.
Playing the race card in a presidential election is dangerous for the citizens of this country.
These kinds of smears on the American electorate have demonstrated to me more than anything else that has been said and done, that Obama is not ready for the presidency.
He is not a uniter of citizens. He is an intentional divider.
He is not a leader of all the people. He is as partisan as they come.
This is not about the American people, no matter how much he insists that it is.
It is about him winning at all costs.

A further implication of this dangerous use of race to win the election is this.
If Obama's supporters feel that they must smear Joe the Plumber for asking a pointed question, and if they feel that they must smear the American electorate by playing the race card, what will they do when their candidate, as president, faces opposition to his policies?

Such political opposition has been the fate of every President of the United States.
And that is proper.
Will those who oppose the Obama administration's policies also be dragged through the mud personally or smeared as racist?

This playbook is not about uniting people around a cause.
It is about conformity.
It is the boomer's culture-war chickens coming home to roost.
In the culture wars, politcal opposition is not about reason or evidence, it is about a vision of differential rectitude in which the opposition is not only wrong, but evil:

" . . .those who disagree with the prevailing vision are seen as being not merely in error, but in sin. For those who hold this vision of the world, the anointed and the benighted do not argue on the same moral plane or play by the same cold rules of logic and evidence. The benighted are to made "aware," to have their "consciousness rasied," and the wistful hope is held out that they will "grow." Should the benighted prove recalcitrant, however, then their "mean-spiritedness" must be fought and the "real reasons" behind their arguments and actions exposed." Thomas Sowell, The Vision of the Annointed

I find myself simultaneously wishing that this election was over with and a the same time, worrying about what will happen to us when it is.

I am definitely feeling the chill.

The Mother of All Bail-Outs! Shame on the US Senate

Look what happens when I take a few days off from the news for Rosh Hashannah!

The US Senate gave in to everybody EXCEPT their constituents.
We know who the pigs are, lipstick or no.

Go over to Consent of the Governed for a list of who voted AGAINST the Bail-out. Anyone NOT on the list should be voted out of office. In New Mexico, we must vote against Senator Bingaman at the next opportunity . Senator Domenici will be out of in January anyway. I am going to vote for the fiscal conservative running to take his place.

LET'S TAKE OUR COUNTRY BACK!

And for a video refresher about who is responsible for the construction of this paper empire and the looting of the American taxpayer check out this video:






And call your congresspeople. They still have to vote.
Let's give Nancy Pelosi another vote of no confidence--if she is foolish enough to bring this bill to the floor as loaded with pork as it is!

You can find the entire text of the bill here. It is very long and laden with special interest pandering.

I'm so mad at this attempt to make the next generations of Americans tax-slaves that I can barely type.

For more background on the crisis, see this week's Objectivist Round-Up.

Disclaimer: My link to the Objectivist Round-up does not imply that I endorse their philosophy in whole or in part, nor do they endorse mine. Objectivists almost certainly consider me evil for several reasons, my religious affiliation among them. I do not advise posting comments on Objectivist blogs that use words like "selfish" or "greedy" because these words have a different connotation in the Objectivist universe: doing so unadvisedly will get your figurative clock cleaned out before you know what hit you. And even though most O-bloggers are entirely earnest and without a sense of humor, realize that they are top-notch composers of rational arguments--do not comment if you live in any kind of glass palace! However, because they are rational and do great research, you can count on their research even if disagree with some of their conclusions.