Richard Vedder on College Tuition on National Review Online
The law of unintended consequences may yet kill the middle class. Kerry wants more application of unintended consequences by "making college more affordable." He will likely make it more expensive and cause more twentysomethings to live off of mom and dad for far longer.
Friday, September 24, 2004
Victor Davis Hanson on Dan Rather and Liberal Hypocrisy on National Review Online
Victor Davis Hanson on Dan Rather and Liberal Hypocrisy on National Review Online
I love pieces like this. Long, detailed, devastating.
I love pieces like this. Long, detailed, devastating.
Tuesday, September 21, 2004
WorldNetDaily: The left thinks legally, the right thinks morally
WorldNetDaily: The left thinks legally, the right thinks morally
This analysis has disturbing aspects to it. Lawrence Kohlberg had a theory of moral development that he originally defined in six stages. The final, sixth stage could not be scientifically borne out so he shaved the theory back to five stages.
The relevance here is that the fourth stage of "law and order" or moarality defined by societal legislation perfectly fits with Prager's description of the Democrats. The fifth stage or morality defined by the greater principle of societal good which law may strive to accomplish by usually fails. Henry David Thoreau's civil disobedience is seen as a means of forcing law to rise to the greater principle. I do not mean to imply that Kohlberg subscribed to Thoreau, but I do suggest that Thoreau was exhibiting a theory that fit with the fifth stage of moral development.
Back to the point, if the Democrats are focused on hyperlexis, or heavy reliance on law, as a means to define morality, they are in the fourth stage. In the Kohlberg model, by definition then, they would have no unified moral structure to verify if those laws themselves are moral.
That verification process are what articulate Republicans should push. Verification of accomplishment of goals causes most Democrat programs or proposals to fail: more money for schools but no testing; more money for welfare without standards of accomplishment (e.g., workfare) to move back to self-reliance; more money for government healthcare without standards to measure if quality of service or speed of service can be retained.
Republicans should state their vision and how they want to measure if we are accomplishing the vision: a measurable, accountable system for success and most importantly improvement.
The reason capitalism works is that it is the only self-healing economic system. One person does not need to decide that more wood is needed in hurricane ravaged Florida. The price goes up, many suppliers jump in.
The problem with morality by law is that it is not self-healing. Politics faces the issue for a moment then moves to the next issue without fixing problems left in the law. Medicare costs continually rise, but no system will fix it a little piece at a time. The Medicare system has to creak so loudly that Congress can no longer ignore it.
Republicans agree that we should care for the less fortunate. We just want systems that will improve themselves without continual legislation. Republicans want a moral system that leaves less to the law to fix, because the law is too slow. As a lawyer, I prefer to rely on a string of cases going back 50 years because it is predictable. New legislation won't be clear for 15-20 years as to what it truly means. Just look at the McCain-Feingold mess this year: what rules apply to the 2004 presidential race?
Morality at the fifth level creates more predictable behavior and stable societies with each person having more liberty. Is that bad?
Why do the Democrats want to cause a different result?
This analysis has disturbing aspects to it. Lawrence Kohlberg had a theory of moral development that he originally defined in six stages. The final, sixth stage could not be scientifically borne out so he shaved the theory back to five stages.
The relevance here is that the fourth stage of "law and order" or moarality defined by societal legislation perfectly fits with Prager's description of the Democrats. The fifth stage or morality defined by the greater principle of societal good which law may strive to accomplish by usually fails. Henry David Thoreau's civil disobedience is seen as a means of forcing law to rise to the greater principle. I do not mean to imply that Kohlberg subscribed to Thoreau, but I do suggest that Thoreau was exhibiting a theory that fit with the fifth stage of moral development.
Back to the point, if the Democrats are focused on hyperlexis, or heavy reliance on law, as a means to define morality, they are in the fourth stage. In the Kohlberg model, by definition then, they would have no unified moral structure to verify if those laws themselves are moral.
That verification process are what articulate Republicans should push. Verification of accomplishment of goals causes most Democrat programs or proposals to fail: more money for schools but no testing; more money for welfare without standards of accomplishment (e.g., workfare) to move back to self-reliance; more money for government healthcare without standards to measure if quality of service or speed of service can be retained.
Republicans should state their vision and how they want to measure if we are accomplishing the vision: a measurable, accountable system for success and most importantly improvement.
The reason capitalism works is that it is the only self-healing economic system. One person does not need to decide that more wood is needed in hurricane ravaged Florida. The price goes up, many suppliers jump in.
The problem with morality by law is that it is not self-healing. Politics faces the issue for a moment then moves to the next issue without fixing problems left in the law. Medicare costs continually rise, but no system will fix it a little piece at a time. The Medicare system has to creak so loudly that Congress can no longer ignore it.
Republicans agree that we should care for the less fortunate. We just want systems that will improve themselves without continual legislation. Republicans want a moral system that leaves less to the law to fix, because the law is too slow. As a lawyer, I prefer to rely on a string of cases going back 50 years because it is predictable. New legislation won't be clear for 15-20 years as to what it truly means. Just look at the McCain-Feingold mess this year: what rules apply to the 2004 presidential race?
Morality at the fifth level creates more predictable behavior and stable societies with each person having more liberty. Is that bad?
Why do the Democrats want to cause a different result?
Monday, September 20, 2004
Yahoo! News - Kerry Questions Bush's Judgment on Iraq
Yahoo! News - Kerry Questions Bush's Judgment on Iraq
Kerry gave us a four point program to fix Iraq today.
1. Get more help from our allies (France has already said that it is not willing to listen to Kerry on this point to any great extent).
2. Provide better training to Iraq (a completely empty politician's phrase; a businessman would have named a quantifiable standard and stated how he would seek to change that number or numbers).
3. Provide benefits to the Iraqi people (buy off the electorate; in other words, give socialism to the Iraqis thereby dooming the merits of self-sufficiency and republican government most likely to provide long-term success of a republican governmental system).
4. Ensure elections next year (so what? so does Bush!)
Kerry has offered a plan that offers no content or to the extent it does allows more room for Kerry to flip-flop later on what this means.
Kerry gave us a four point program to fix Iraq today.
1. Get more help from our allies (France has already said that it is not willing to listen to Kerry on this point to any great extent).
2. Provide better training to Iraq (a completely empty politician's phrase; a businessman would have named a quantifiable standard and stated how he would seek to change that number or numbers).
3. Provide benefits to the Iraqi people (buy off the electorate; in other words, give socialism to the Iraqis thereby dooming the merits of self-sufficiency and republican government most likely to provide long-term success of a republican governmental system).
4. Ensure elections next year (so what? so does Bush!)
Kerry has offered a plan that offers no content or to the extent it does allows more room for Kerry to flip-flop later on what this means.
Thursday, September 16, 2004
Criminal Resource Manual 941 18 U.S.C. 1343 -- Elements of Wire Fraud
Criminal Resource Manual 941 18 U.S.C. 1343 -- Elements of Wire Fraud
Even though I am a lawyer, if I practice in the criminal area, it is what lawyers call "negligence per se," i.e., negligence in and of itself. Nevertheless, let suggest that this Rathergate on the Bush National Guard records bears some hallmarks of criminal activity.
The above link is to the website purportedly by the United States Attorneys' Manual. It suggest using a wire transmission to cause fraud is wire fraud. Remember fraud usually requires that the party receiving the wired information must suffer damage. In this case, the most likely victim is Dan Rather and his C-BS News organization. That would be enough -- if Dan and crew were not participants or accomplices in the crime itself.
Apparently in this case though, damage is not necessary. Manual on Section 943
Impersonating a federal officer is a crime. Manual on section 1469. If the deceased colonel did not write the C-BS memos, then this crime probably happened. If impersonating occurred, wire fraud likely occurred. Rep. Cox's request for a Congressional investigation may be even more powerful, especially if the faxing involved was from near Abeline, TX to CBS News in New York City -- interstate transmission of fraudulent material.
This is a bigger problem if Rather knew about or should have known about it. Is he an accomplice after the fact? That would be bad news indeed for CBS News!
Even though I am a lawyer, if I practice in the criminal area, it is what lawyers call "negligence per se," i.e., negligence in and of itself. Nevertheless, let suggest that this Rathergate on the Bush National Guard records bears some hallmarks of criminal activity.
The above link is to the website purportedly by the United States Attorneys' Manual. It suggest using a wire transmission to cause fraud is wire fraud. Remember fraud usually requires that the party receiving the wired information must suffer damage. In this case, the most likely victim is Dan Rather and his C-BS News organization. That would be enough -- if Dan and crew were not participants or accomplices in the crime itself.
Apparently in this case though, damage is not necessary. Manual on Section 943
Impersonating a federal officer is a crime. Manual on section 1469. If the deceased colonel did not write the C-BS memos, then this crime probably happened. If impersonating occurred, wire fraud likely occurred. Rep. Cox's request for a Congressional investigation may be even more powerful, especially if the faxing involved was from near Abeline, TX to CBS News in New York City -- interstate transmission of fraudulent material.
This is a bigger problem if Rather knew about or should have known about it. Is he an accomplice after the fact? That would be bad news indeed for CBS News!
Monday, August 23, 2004
Thomas E. Nugent on Inflation and Growth on NRO Financial
Thomas E. Nugent on Inflation and Growth on NRO Financial
Why are interest rates and budget deficeits inextricably linked? Read this piece.
Why are interest rates and budget deficeits inextricably linked? Read this piece.
Tuesday, August 10, 2004
Kerry's Lawyers vs. Bush's Warriors
Kerry?s Lawyers vs. Bush?s Warriors
This is a slightly different view of something I wrote about months ago. This writer suggests that war is what happens when law breaks down. That is not quite right. Law is what happens once security is established and maintained without attacked with violence. The difference is important.
If you use the "law breaks down" model, you are relying on a supposition that will need to fallacious conclusions. You then seek solutions that prevent "breakdown of the law."
In fact Usama seeks to stay outside of the law. Even seeks locations where the law has not operated in decades. The tribal region between Afghanistan and Pakistan has not a government operationally controlling the criminal actions of residents. It does not have a government providing security to its residents. It is the home of tribal leaders and warlords that see a situation more similar to the era of the Apache or the feudal era than to modern government.
This is important because the establishment of legal rights and the yearning to have property and person remain protected by judicious application of law require government first.
"Bush's Warriors," as the author defines it, is acting properly in attacking the enemy. Yet, today's news story that American general in command in Afghanistan has agreed to "kinder, gentler" search techniques in Eastern Afghanistan shows the complaints of persons having a growing expectation of protection of property and legal rights. Leaving aside the obvious potential abuses for propoganda purposes of the warlords, this is the kind of expectation of proper treatment by the government of Afghistan through its proxy of the US Army that we want to see.
I do not suggest that this is always militarily feasible, but the yearning for it is important.
Compare this to a scenario where we act as if a legal system were operating there. We would try to impose warrants for searches and seizures too early in the hunt for terrorists. The warlords would seize on this attempt at law as means to design ambushes while the heaviest fighting was yet to be had. In comparison of the war-first, law-second method of fighting in warlord areas, the risks of widespread military fighting is minimized, then law creeps in as the population begins to expect more fair treatment.
Introduction of kinder, gentler techniques does not mean a complete switch to warrant searches and seizures. Even in the Anglo-American system this took centuries from 1253 to the 1600's to fully establish. It should be implemented in a more complete model in Afghanistan in the first five to ten years after the Taliban's fall. Any faster and we can expect failure by the warlords' continued commitment to Clausewitz's destruction of the nascent political system through guerilla activities and Maoist methods of undermining the government's security for the population or at least the population's belief that security is possible.
This is a slightly different view of something I wrote about months ago. This writer suggests that war is what happens when law breaks down. That is not quite right. Law is what happens once security is established and maintained without attacked with violence. The difference is important.
If you use the "law breaks down" model, you are relying on a supposition that will need to fallacious conclusions. You then seek solutions that prevent "breakdown of the law."
In fact Usama seeks to stay outside of the law. Even seeks locations where the law has not operated in decades. The tribal region between Afghanistan and Pakistan has not a government operationally controlling the criminal actions of residents. It does not have a government providing security to its residents. It is the home of tribal leaders and warlords that see a situation more similar to the era of the Apache or the feudal era than to modern government.
This is important because the establishment of legal rights and the yearning to have property and person remain protected by judicious application of law require government first.
"Bush's Warriors," as the author defines it, is acting properly in attacking the enemy. Yet, today's news story that American general in command in Afghanistan has agreed to "kinder, gentler" search techniques in Eastern Afghanistan shows the complaints of persons having a growing expectation of protection of property and legal rights. Leaving aside the obvious potential abuses for propoganda purposes of the warlords, this is the kind of expectation of proper treatment by the government of Afghistan through its proxy of the US Army that we want to see.
I do not suggest that this is always militarily feasible, but the yearning for it is important.
Compare this to a scenario where we act as if a legal system were operating there. We would try to impose warrants for searches and seizures too early in the hunt for terrorists. The warlords would seize on this attempt at law as means to design ambushes while the heaviest fighting was yet to be had. In comparison of the war-first, law-second method of fighting in warlord areas, the risks of widespread military fighting is minimized, then law creeps in as the population begins to expect more fair treatment.
Introduction of kinder, gentler techniques does not mean a complete switch to warrant searches and seizures. Even in the Anglo-American system this took centuries from 1253 to the 1600's to fully establish. It should be implemented in a more complete model in Afghanistan in the first five to ten years after the Taliban's fall. Any faster and we can expect failure by the warlords' continued commitment to Clausewitz's destruction of the nascent political system through guerilla activities and Maoist methods of undermining the government's security for the population or at least the population's belief that security is possible.
Tuesday, July 20, 2004
City Journal Summer 2004 | Redefining Marriage Away by David L. Tubbs, Robert P. George
City Journal Summer 2004 | Redefining Marriage Away by David L. Tubbs, Robert P. George
This article starts to touch on some of the reasons that same-sex marriage makes little sense. However, it stops at the point that needs greater clarification to convince liberals: it protects women and children, but is marriage necessary to provide this protection? Unfortunately, that is the wrong question, yet liberals set up the defense of same sex-marriage on it. Can liberals be convinced that another question is more appropriate?
This article starts to touch on some of the reasons that same-sex marriage makes little sense. However, it stops at the point that needs greater clarification to convince liberals: it protects women and children, but is marriage necessary to provide this protection? Unfortunately, that is the wrong question, yet liberals set up the defense of same sex-marriage on it. Can liberals be convinced that another question is more appropriate?
Sunday, July 11, 2004
Regulation therapy - The Washington Times: Commentary - July 11, 2004
Regulation therapy - The Washington Times: Commentary - July 11, 2004
Mr. Rahn has proposed a brilliant way for us lawyers to make money AND help the economy. Sorry, Sen. Edwards, business is helped by this proposal.
Mr. Rahn has proposed a brilliant way for us lawyers to make money AND help the economy. Sorry, Sen. Edwards, business is helped by this proposal.
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