Thomas E. Nugent on Inflation and Growth on NRO Financial
Why are interest rates and budget deficeits inextricably linked? Read this piece.
Monday, August 23, 2004
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.
Monday, June 07, 2004
Dinesh D'Souza on Ronald Reagan & Cold War on National Review Online
Dinesh D'Souza on Ronald Reagan & Cold War on National Review Online
With the loss of Renauldus Magnus, Ronald the Great to us Anglophones, we have a mixed bag of commentary on his successes. The best analysis of how powerful was Reagan's legacy is the great Indian turned Reagan staffer turned US citizen, Dineash D'Souza.
Mr. D'Souza has inherited the literary greatness of de Tocqueville but taken it one step further -- he has choosen to become a part of the Great American Experiment. Mr. D'Souza came to America from India for college and quickly thereafter joined the Reagan White House. Only then did he become a U.S. citizen.
Based on Mr. D'Souza's different life experience in India, he is more easily struck to comment about what we natural-born U.S. citizens take as a given proposition. Mr. D'Souza then applies his impressive intellect to take these small observations and make enormously insightful yet simple comments. This is the hallmark of true intellect -- reducing insights into simple, understandable statements.
On Reagan, Mr. D'Souza points out the truly bizarre appointment of Mr. Gorbachev was done for a reason. Why would a octogenarian-ocracy appoint a fifty-year-old minister of agriculture? Because they faced a U.S. president that knew how to strike to the Soviet quick. They needed a new way of thinking that the quick-to-die octagenarians were not able to do in their 15 month "terms" as general secretary. They needed a new way of thinking that the defense establishment and KGB directorates could not offer. They needed someone that was already trying to change the creaky system.
Ironically, this move to Perestroika and Gorbachev violated a key tenet of the Soviet system's long-lasting power -- terror. Since Lenin and Stalin had killed off free-thinkers aka counter-revolutionaries, the Soviet population had tolerated the Politburo's stupidities because to do otherwise meant certain death. Perestroika failed the Soviet system by removing what the republican Nicolo Machiavelli had noted in the Prince as the most important component of tyranny -- fear of certain death. Once that fear was removed by Perestroika, it only took a quick four years for the Soviet Union to disappear from the face of the earth.
Can we or should we attribute the fall of the Soviet Union to Mr. Reagan? If the Politburo's choice of Gorbachev can be attributed to a reaction to Mr. Reagan and the implmentation of his policies, the answer is an unequivocal "yes." This seems the inevitable conclusion were we to rely on Mr. D'Souza's highlighted statements from Izvestia - the official voice of the Politburo through its Party apparatus --from the era surrounding the rise of Mr. Gorbachev.
With the loss of Renauldus Magnus, Ronald the Great to us Anglophones, we have a mixed bag of commentary on his successes. The best analysis of how powerful was Reagan's legacy is the great Indian turned Reagan staffer turned US citizen, Dineash D'Souza.
Mr. D'Souza has inherited the literary greatness of de Tocqueville but taken it one step further -- he has choosen to become a part of the Great American Experiment. Mr. D'Souza came to America from India for college and quickly thereafter joined the Reagan White House. Only then did he become a U.S. citizen.
Based on Mr. D'Souza's different life experience in India, he is more easily struck to comment about what we natural-born U.S. citizens take as a given proposition. Mr. D'Souza then applies his impressive intellect to take these small observations and make enormously insightful yet simple comments. This is the hallmark of true intellect -- reducing insights into simple, understandable statements.
On Reagan, Mr. D'Souza points out the truly bizarre appointment of Mr. Gorbachev was done for a reason. Why would a octogenarian-ocracy appoint a fifty-year-old minister of agriculture? Because they faced a U.S. president that knew how to strike to the Soviet quick. They needed a new way of thinking that the quick-to-die octagenarians were not able to do in their 15 month "terms" as general secretary. They needed a new way of thinking that the defense establishment and KGB directorates could not offer. They needed someone that was already trying to change the creaky system.
Ironically, this move to Perestroika and Gorbachev violated a key tenet of the Soviet system's long-lasting power -- terror. Since Lenin and Stalin had killed off free-thinkers aka counter-revolutionaries, the Soviet population had tolerated the Politburo's stupidities because to do otherwise meant certain death. Perestroika failed the Soviet system by removing what the republican Nicolo Machiavelli had noted in the Prince as the most important component of tyranny -- fear of certain death. Once that fear was removed by Perestroika, it only took a quick four years for the Soviet Union to disappear from the face of the earth.
Can we or should we attribute the fall of the Soviet Union to Mr. Reagan? If the Politburo's choice of Gorbachev can be attributed to a reaction to Mr. Reagan and the implmentation of his policies, the answer is an unequivocal "yes." This seems the inevitable conclusion were we to rely on Mr. D'Souza's highlighted statements from Izvestia - the official voice of the Politburo through its Party apparatus --from the era surrounding the rise of Mr. Gorbachev.
Tuesday, May 04, 2004
The Weekly Dish - The Washington Times: Editorials/OP-ED - April 30, 2004
The Weekly Dish - The Washington Times: Editorials/OP-ED - April 30, 2004
Andrew Sullivan in this one column shows why you can both love him and hate him in just a few column-inches. His quotes from Iraq are wonderful. His commentary on Welch's re-marriage is insane, particularly taken from the perspective of Karl Marx's desire for the fall of the institution of marriage.
And here is the focus of this post: Marx believed that Communism would win through a process of destroying the protestant capitalism that dominated his Victorian era; here showing a bit of Darwinistic style. Marx wanted no marital institution, just 1960's Free Love (a Marx's phrase, by the way).
We are living out in homosexual marriage the injection of Communist philosophy into modern life without the acknowledgment of Communist sources.
Marx would have suggested loosening the bounds of marriage through easier divorce. If divorce is more easily had, then marriage is less significant. If marriage is not then that significant, why cannot just anyone participate in such an institution, i.e., gays? This is Sullivan's argument about Welch's disrespect for marriage as an institution. Why save marriage for people that use marriage just the way Marx described it in his day?
This is a strong argument about the status quo of marriage. It does not address marriage as the institution it should be. The concept of covenant marriage, which raises the hurdles to divorce to a more pre-1960's concept, would undermine the Welch argument. Easy divorce would disappear as a source of "why not gays, too" argument. That still does not address why marriage at all.
Why marriage at all is the question that this debate needs to focus on. This question is where I struggle. I still cannot answer why today as easily as a bumpersticker would. Allow me to divert into why marriage in the past.
Marriage has historically been at its core about birth control and management. Without paternity tests, marriage allowed for control over men's obligation to support children and determine who could inherit from fathers. This protected children and women from men's sexual wanderlust causing financial devistation to the family. This was particularly true when men had all political control limited to the male sex. Few repercussions for his sexual wanderlust, just limited liability to the family for the wanderlust.
The classic examples in the extreme of kings like King Louis XIV having concubines while not letting his bastard children have any right to inherit the throne. Not unusual in that model of marriage.
The safety net for men was that the children born of their wives were presumed his.
Now with paternity tests, these legal constructs cannot do anything but fail. The true parental heritage is easily determinable. The institution as a safety net for presumed fidelity cannot survive the truth. So we see the question of why marriage in the past fails today. Science undermines legal expedience. Here I fear I have yet to answer why marriage today. Since I have little more time this morning to write, let me jump back to Sullivan's attack on Welch's example.
Does this allow us to use the bad examples to show the false reliance on the old insitution? Does a banana left in the kitchen for 3 weeks show that our institution of food delivery should be dismantled? That is non-sense. All the old banana proves is that one consumer failed to eat the banana as soon as the delivery system was designed. Welch's misuse of the system or the regularity of this abuse proves nothing about the propriety of homosexual marriage.
The answer must arise from determining why marry at all in today's environment? It cannot be about the fringe benefits: retirement plans, health insurance, etc. That can be handled in other ways. Why do we marry? Why do young and old alike seek marriage?
Andrew Sullivan in this one column shows why you can both love him and hate him in just a few column-inches. His quotes from Iraq are wonderful. His commentary on Welch's re-marriage is insane, particularly taken from the perspective of Karl Marx's desire for the fall of the institution of marriage.
And here is the focus of this post: Marx believed that Communism would win through a process of destroying the protestant capitalism that dominated his Victorian era; here showing a bit of Darwinistic style. Marx wanted no marital institution, just 1960's Free Love (a Marx's phrase, by the way).
We are living out in homosexual marriage the injection of Communist philosophy into modern life without the acknowledgment of Communist sources.
Marx would have suggested loosening the bounds of marriage through easier divorce. If divorce is more easily had, then marriage is less significant. If marriage is not then that significant, why cannot just anyone participate in such an institution, i.e., gays? This is Sullivan's argument about Welch's disrespect for marriage as an institution. Why save marriage for people that use marriage just the way Marx described it in his day?
This is a strong argument about the status quo of marriage. It does not address marriage as the institution it should be. The concept of covenant marriage, which raises the hurdles to divorce to a more pre-1960's concept, would undermine the Welch argument. Easy divorce would disappear as a source of "why not gays, too" argument. That still does not address why marriage at all.
Why marriage at all is the question that this debate needs to focus on. This question is where I struggle. I still cannot answer why today as easily as a bumpersticker would. Allow me to divert into why marriage in the past.
Marriage has historically been at its core about birth control and management. Without paternity tests, marriage allowed for control over men's obligation to support children and determine who could inherit from fathers. This protected children and women from men's sexual wanderlust causing financial devistation to the family. This was particularly true when men had all political control limited to the male sex. Few repercussions for his sexual wanderlust, just limited liability to the family for the wanderlust.
The classic examples in the extreme of kings like King Louis XIV having concubines while not letting his bastard children have any right to inherit the throne. Not unusual in that model of marriage.
The safety net for men was that the children born of their wives were presumed his.
Now with paternity tests, these legal constructs cannot do anything but fail. The true parental heritage is easily determinable. The institution as a safety net for presumed fidelity cannot survive the truth. So we see the question of why marriage in the past fails today. Science undermines legal expedience. Here I fear I have yet to answer why marriage today. Since I have little more time this morning to write, let me jump back to Sullivan's attack on Welch's example.
Does this allow us to use the bad examples to show the false reliance on the old insitution? Does a banana left in the kitchen for 3 weeks show that our institution of food delivery should be dismantled? That is non-sense. All the old banana proves is that one consumer failed to eat the banana as soon as the delivery system was designed. Welch's misuse of the system or the regularity of this abuse proves nothing about the propriety of homosexual marriage.
The answer must arise from determining why marry at all in today's environment? It cannot be about the fringe benefits: retirement plans, health insurance, etc. That can be handled in other ways. Why do we marry? Why do young and old alike seek marriage?
News from the war zone - The Washington Times: Editorials/OP-ED - May 04, 2004
News from the war zone - The Washington Times: Editorials/OP-ED - May 04, 2004
Need I say more than this editorial says?
Need I say more than this editorial says?
Tuesday, December 16, 2003
OnNew York Post Online Edition: business
New York Post Online Edition: business
Just a quick thought . . . Gore wants to start a left-leaning channel focused at youth.
This is not the first time that a Democrat wants control over children's education: the NEA, for example.
What philosopher of the 20th century preached similar tenets?
"Our educational policy must enable everyone who receives an education to develop morally, intellectually and physically and become a worker with both socialist consciousncss and culture."
Mao Tse-Tung, On the Correct Handling of Contradiction (1959), quoted in the Little Red Book, chap. 16.
Interestingly, Mao had more interest in teaching facts than Democrats. See Little Red Book.
Just a quick thought . . . Gore wants to start a left-leaning channel focused at youth.
This is not the first time that a Democrat wants control over children's education: the NEA, for example.
What philosopher of the 20th century preached similar tenets?
"Our educational policy must enable everyone who receives an education to develop morally, intellectually and physically and become a worker with both socialist consciousncss and culture."
Mao Tse-Tung, On the Correct Handling of Contradiction (1959), quoted in the Little Red Book, chap. 16.
Interestingly, Mao had more interest in teaching facts than Democrats. See Little Red Book.
Monday, December 15, 2003
Free speech defeated - The Washington Times: Editorials/OP-ED
Free speech defeated - The Washington Times: Editorials/OP-ED
Should the recent case of McConnell v. FEC be seen by Republicans as a victory for the strict constructionists? Is Justice O’Connor pulling the left wing into understanding that speech is ideas communicated through movement of the lips, tongue, vocal chords, etc. Justice O’Connor has maneuvered the left wing to reading the Constitution as allowing Congress to regulate elections. She has put all this together to show that spending money is not about the movement of lips to communicate ideas.
Since the Warren Court, the left wing has been happily following Justice Brennan’s doctrine of the Constitution as a living document. Brennan believed that the Constitution should be read today with the understanding of the words’ meaning as based on the most recent edition of Webster’s and interpreted to allow that definition to apply. It lead to interpretations of flag-burning and pornography as protected speech. See Scalia’s dissent in McConnell.
This means that the Constitution never means the same thing from day to day, as President Bush discovered in this case. Speech had a fifty year or more precedent of allowing expression. Now expression is limited when it comes to spending money.
Never mind that in reading the rules of the Constitution, the first amendment is more important than Congress’s right to regulate elections, since the first amendment was enacted later. The first amendment is very simple. Congress shall pass no law. If it does, the law would seem to be void on its face. But this is irrelevant in this case because speech is not spending.
But if we look at the actual law more closely, the law does not prevent all spending. Just spending by corporations. This would seem to mean corporations have less freedom of speech than individuals. Strange result, but okay. Individuals vote. Not corporations. Individuals speak. Not corporations.
Maybe if the strict constructionists play their public relations campaign well, they can usurp this decision for their own benefit. They can point out that this is the death of Brennan’s intellectual non-sense. Even Justice Ginsberg sees that reading the Constitution strictly makes more sense than trying to have a string of cases decide without any logical connection to the words of the Constitution. The speech cases have broke free of any reigns controlling the case law. This is the beginning of the end for that string of cases.
That, other happy thoughts, and a little pixie dust will get me to fly.
Should the recent case of McConnell v. FEC be seen by Republicans as a victory for the strict constructionists? Is Justice O’Connor pulling the left wing into understanding that speech is ideas communicated through movement of the lips, tongue, vocal chords, etc. Justice O’Connor has maneuvered the left wing to reading the Constitution as allowing Congress to regulate elections. She has put all this together to show that spending money is not about the movement of lips to communicate ideas.
Since the Warren Court, the left wing has been happily following Justice Brennan’s doctrine of the Constitution as a living document. Brennan believed that the Constitution should be read today with the understanding of the words’ meaning as based on the most recent edition of Webster’s and interpreted to allow that definition to apply. It lead to interpretations of flag-burning and pornography as protected speech. See Scalia’s dissent in McConnell.
This means that the Constitution never means the same thing from day to day, as President Bush discovered in this case. Speech had a fifty year or more precedent of allowing expression. Now expression is limited when it comes to spending money.
Never mind that in reading the rules of the Constitution, the first amendment is more important than Congress’s right to regulate elections, since the first amendment was enacted later. The first amendment is very simple. Congress shall pass no law. If it does, the law would seem to be void on its face. But this is irrelevant in this case because speech is not spending.
But if we look at the actual law more closely, the law does not prevent all spending. Just spending by corporations. This would seem to mean corporations have less freedom of speech than individuals. Strange result, but okay. Individuals vote. Not corporations. Individuals speak. Not corporations.
Maybe if the strict constructionists play their public relations campaign well, they can usurp this decision for their own benefit. They can point out that this is the death of Brennan’s intellectual non-sense. Even Justice Ginsberg sees that reading the Constitution strictly makes more sense than trying to have a string of cases decide without any logical connection to the words of the Constitution. The speech cases have broke free of any reigns controlling the case law. This is the beginning of the end for that string of cases.
That, other happy thoughts, and a little pixie dust will get me to fly.
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