Jul 30, 2007 | Dollars & Crosses
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Contact Us if you are interested.Jun 28, 2007 | Dollars & Crosses
Irvine, CA--Senator John Kerry joined other Democratic lawmakers in calling for the return of the Fairness Doctrine, which demands that television and radio broadcasters give a balanced presentation of all sides of controversial issues.
"The Fairness Doctrine is a violation of broadcasters' right to free speech," said Dr. Yaron Brook, executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute. "Broadcasters should not be forced to promote ideas they may disagree with.
"Defenders of the Fairness Doctrine claim that, left unrestrained, broadcast corporations will stop some views from being heard. But no private individual or organization can keep people from voicing dissenting views--it is only the government that has the power to suppress speech. By granting a cabal of government bureaucrats the power to arbitrarily dictate what ideas should and should not be heard on the air, the Fairness Doctrine represents the real threat to free speech.
"Those who think their views are not being heard have every opportunity to promote them--on television, on radio, in print, online--but they must earn their audience, not demand that it be provided to them ready-made. As Ayn Rand put it, 'The right of free speech means that a man has the right to express his ideas without danger of suppression, interference or punitive action by the government. It does not mean that others must provide him with a lecture hall, a radio station or a printing press through which to express his ideas.'
"Those who value the First Amendment must oppose the Fairness Doctrine as a grave threat to freedom of speech."Jun 22, 2007 | Dollars & Crosses
Irvine, CA--President Bush vetoed a measure promoting embryonic stem cell research Wednesday, claiming that "Destroying human life in the hopes of saving human life is not ethical." Bush went on to trumpet new research which suggests that scientists will one day be able to create pluripotent stem cells (i.e., cells that can develop into multiple cell types) from non-embryonic skin cells, supposedly making the "unethical" destruction of embryonic cells unnecessary.
"There is nothing unethical about destroying embryos in the course of scientific research," said Dr. Keith Lockitch, resident fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute. "An embryo is a potential, not an actual, human being, just as canvas is a potential, not an actual, work of art. It is a primitive cluster of cells, which is no more unethical to destroy than the cells that make up one's appendix.
"Calling an embryo 'human life' is an evasion of the distinction between a mass of undifferentiated cells in a test tube and an actual, living human being. Only the mystical doctrines of religion, which hold that a human being is, not a biological entity with certain natural properties--i.e., an independent organism possessing a rational faculty--but a transcendent soul temporarily trapped in a body, could cloud that distinction.
"Stem cell research has the potential to improve the lives of millions by revolutionizing treatments for a number of afflictions, from Parkinson's disease to spinal cord injuries to cancer. Scientists should pursue every possible avenue in an effort to realize this promising technology. If one day they successfully create pluripotent cells from non-embryonic cells, we should cheer that as an additional avenue for research--not clamor for them to stop investigating the properties of embryonic cells. To do so would only hamstring scientists and prolong the suffering of actual human beings.
"We should praise embryonic stem cell research for the life-enhancing breakthroughs it promises--and condemn the immoral attempt to return us to the Dark Ages, before science was liberated from the chains of religious dogmatism."Jun 8, 2007 | Dollars & Crosses
Great article by Lisa VanDamme on "The False Promise of Classical Education" in the latest Objective Standard.Jun 6, 2007 | Dollars & Crosses
Irvine, CA--Two years ago the G-8 pledged $50 billion more in aid for Africa, but that promise, aid advocates charge, has been broken. They claim that several countries failed to ramp up aid, that last year donations from some countries actually declined--and that the world's richest countries must give far more.
Nations accused of giving too little say that they wrote-off millions in African debts, which they say should be counted as aid. And, perhaps to preempt criticism, President Bush last week announced plans to spend $30 billion to fight AIDS in Africa--doubling America's current commitment.
"But instead of disputing how aid is measured or guiltily promising billions more, the G-8 should repudiate the alleged moral duty to selflessly serve the world's poor," said Elan Journo, junior fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute.
"We have no moral duty to sacrifice for the poor. Those who earn their prosperity by production and trade have a moral right to every penny of their riches. The notion that the richest nations must serve the 'needy' is based on the vicious moral code of altruism.
"Altruism holds that one's highest moral duty is to selflessly serve others--and thus that the world's 'haves' must sacrifice for the sake of its 'have-nots.' The productive, on this abhorrent view, have no moral right to pursue their own interests and keep their wealth; their only justification for existing is to serve the needy. Thus the world's richest nations must atone for their prosperity by sacrificing for the sake of those who lack, or don't care to earn, values.
"Africa is poor because it is rife with bloody tribalism and superstition--ideas that in the Dark Ages kept the Western world as poor, if not poorer, than today's Africa. If aid advocates were genuinely concerned with helping Africans, they would campaign for political and economic freedom, for individualism, reason and capitalism, for the ideas necessary to achieve prosperity.
"Instead, advocates barrage wealthy nations with reproaches and accusations of stinginess. Such abuse is necessary to induce the unearned guilt which impels Western leaders to do penance by sacrificing billions more in aid. While posturing as humanitarians, aid advocates are unmoved by the financial burdens imposed on productive individuals in donor countries who are bled dry to pay for foreign aid.
"It is past time that we repudiated the perverse bandwagon for aid to Africa. We should reject the corrupt moral principle that demands self-sacrifice--and proudly assert our unconditional right to our lives and to our wealth."Jun 4, 2007 | Dollars & Crosses
There has been a resurgence in calls for compulsory universal national service, most recently by former defense secretary Melvin R. Laird, who declared, "Young Americans . . . need to serve their country."
But according to Dr. Yaron Brook, executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute, "Compulsory national service is anti-American.
"According to the advocates of compulsory service, young people take America's freedom for granted, being more concerned with selfishly pursuing an education and a fulfilling career than serving their country. To remedy that, they propose forcing young people to spend a few years working in the Peace Corps, nursing homes, or soup kitchens. This, supposedly, will make them appreciate freedom. But if the government can order a young person to stop pursuing the career he passionately loves in order to plant trees or clean bed pans, there is no freedom left for him to appreciate.
"America's distinctive virtue is that it was the first nation to declare that each individual is an end in himself, that he possesses an inalienable right to pursue his own happiness, and that the government's only function is to safeguard his freedom. Compulsory national service turns young people into temporary slaves in order to inculcate in their minds the opposite premise: that they have a duty to selflessly serve society. To justify such a policy on the grounds of promoting appreciation for freedom is perverse. To call it patriotic is obscene.
"Compulsory national service is a threat to freedom. It should be condemned for the anti-American policy that it is."