Jan 5, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
In an disgusting op-ed in the NY Times, "Bring Back the Draft", Democrat Charlie Rangle states that the guiding principle behind a draft is that of "shared sacrifice", and that a draft will undermine the American government's ability to engage in a war against Iraq because,"...those calling for war knew that their children were likely to be required to serve -- and to be placed in harm's way -- there would be more caution and a greater willingness to work with the international community in dealing with Iraq. A renewed draft will help bring a greater appreciation of the consequences of decisions to go to war."
In regards to the draft Ayn Rand writes in her Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal,
"Of all the statist violations of individual rights in a mixed economy, the military draft is the worst. It is an abrogation of rights. It negates man's fundamental right--the right to life--and establishes the fundamental principle of statism: that a man's life belongs to the state, and the state may claim it by compelling him to sacrifice it in battle. If the state may force a man to risk death or hideous maiming and crippling, in a war declared at the state's discretion, for a cause he may neither approve of nor even understand, if his consent is not required to send him into unspeakable martyrdom--then, in principle, all rights are negated in that state, and its government is not man's protector any longer. What is there left to protect?"
Of course, the protection of individual rights is not Mr. Rangles concern--the enslaving of American adults through "national service" is. After all, are not our children forced to "serve" through mandatory "volunteerism"? Now that we have conscripted American children, are not America's young adults the next logical step?
Jan 4, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
According to a January 3rd, 2003 article in the Daily Telegraph, " 'Gang rape' victim faces jail on adultery charges,"Touria Tiouli, 39, from Limoges, in France, has had her passport confiscated and cannot leave Dubai after being charged under the emirate's Sharia law. This declares any sexual relationship outside marriage to be illegal. Mme Tiouli was on a business trip last October when, she alleges, she was raped by three men who offered her a lift home from a nightclub. She reported the attack immediately to the Dubai police, who after investigating her claim arrested her rather than those she accused. One of the men admitted to having "consensual sex" with Mme Tiouli, which made her, in the eyes of Dubai's judiciary, guilty of both adultery and making a false rape accusation. She could face up to 18 months in prison. None of the men has been charged....Sharia law is applied with varying severity in many Muslim countries. In Nigeria, adultery is punishable by stoning to death, while in Dubai a prison sentence is usual.
To the multiculturalist who says "Who are we to judge another culture, and their laws?" I suggest they get gang raped in Dubai.
Jan 4, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
An editorial in yesterday's New York Sun recommends the English-language site of South Korean newspaper Chosun Ilbo; the paper has an entire section on North Korea. Among the articles is this account of the North Korean concentration camps:
North Korea is known to operate five concentration camps now, accommodating a total of over 200,000. Once condemned as political criminals in the North, not only [convicts] themselves, but also their families are incarcerated in concentration camps without trial....
[I]nmates get up at between 5:00am and 6:00am and work until 8:00pm, engaged in farming, coal mining and digging other minerals. After a day of hard work, they have to undergo ideological study sessions and roll calls before going to bed at around 10:00pm.... The basic daily ration ... has been slashed to 200-300g since the food crisis hit the country several years ago. As a consequence, the inmates, it is said, always suffer from hunger, catch and eat snakes, frogs and rabbits whenever possible, let alone tree barks and plant roots. Many inmates perish eventually after suffering from such diseases as pellagra, tuberculosis and hepatitis. [Digital Chosunilbo, 12/5/02]
Among other articles, the paper also provides this account of a 1987 massacre of 5,000 camp prisoners, this aerial photo of a camp, and this description of the Hoeryong camp, which holds 50,000.Jan 3, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
The day after Christmas the New York Times ran a reprehensible whitewash of Zimbabwe's "land reform," treating it as if it sprang from an idealistic concern for justice, albeit with some unfortunate practical problems. Tuesday we learned of one such "reformer" who explicitly calls for eliminating half his country's population:Eight years after Rwanda, the world may be witnessing another genocide on the African continent.... The government has only permitted half a million tons of maize into Zimbabwe, all of it distributed through the state-operated Grain Marketing Board, one of whose managers told The Times of London, "We only sell to Shona-speakers." Reports of desperate hunger have been trickling out of Matabeleland for months. And Didymus Mutasa, ZANU-PF's administrative secretary and senior bureaucrat, recently admitted that whittling down Zimbabwe's population from its current twelve million is his government's explicit plan. "We would be better off," he said, "with only six million people ... who support the liberation struggle. ... We don't want all these extra people." [New Republic Online, 12/30/02]
Where land in Zimbabwe had been stolen by whites, a legitimate legal process would identify the specific parcels of stolen land, identify the specific victims, and determine the specific value they deserved in compensation. What is happening in that country now--what the Times identifies as "land reform"--is just theft by thugs who have seized government power.
Yet, altruism is behind it; the Times is right about that. Altruism says that people's lives are not their own but belong to the community; in Zimbabwe the community has claimed those lives. Altruism demands human sacrifices--and human sacrifice is its inexorable result.
Jan 3, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
IRVINE, CA--The recent well-publicized PBS special "Muhammad" was a total whitewash of Islam, according to Edwin A. Locke, senior writer at the Ayn Rand Institute.
"The documentary," focusing on the life of Muhammad, noted Locke "presented him as a wise, self-effacing, illiterate mystic who preached nothing but tolerance, benevolence and peace toward non-Muslims. But the simple fact is the Koran, dictated by Muhammad to his followers, is filled with exhortations to violence against non-believers, such as, 'I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Therefore cut off their heads and cut off every fingertip of them.' Here are others, 'Fight and kill the Pagans wherever you find them;' 'Those who reject our signs, we shall soon cast into the fire;' 'But as for those who disbelieve, garments of fire will be cut out for them; boiling fluid will be poured down on their heads;' 'As to the deviators, they are fuel of hell.'"
"Following Muhammad's death," Locke noted, "his followers launched attacks on nonbelievers in many countries, slaughtering untold numbers. And throughout the centuries the Koran's rhetoric has incited many of the prophet's followers to violence against "infidels." Although not all Muslims are violent, the terrorists among them are acting consistently with exhortations from the Koran. And like all mystical cults based on blind faith, the Muslim religion does not recognize reason as a means of gaining knowledge or of persuading others of one's viewpoint. Thus, they believe, the men of reason must be subdued by force or destroyed entirely.
"Until the Muslim world is secularized, as was the Christian world, it is a danger to all who do not agree with its ideas."Jan 2, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Everyone seems to believe the U.S. is (and has been) suffering from 'deflation.' At least that is what Alan Greenspan and his cohorts keep saying, and everyone seems to believe him. Not Richard M. Salsman, CFA. According to Mr. Salsman, "The gold price has risen by 25% this year -- and that's inflation. It's bearish. Until and unless it stops, no U.S. bull market can take hold." Quoting him in the December 31, 2002 edition of the The InterMarkerForecaster,No market price is more important -- as a summary measure of what global investors think of a country's prospects (or its political leadership) and as a forecaster of financial asset returns -- than the local-currency gold price. A rising gold price-- which means a currency is worth less-and-less--implies a vote of 'no (or lesser) confidence' and is bearish for financial asset returns. In contrast, a declining gold price -- which means a currency is worth more-and-more -- implies a vote of confidence and is bullish for financial asset returns.
Continues, Mr. Salsman,
"The fast-rising dollar-gold price means that global investors are casting a vote of diminishing confidence in the Bush Administration. It's not because the U.S. is acting in a war-like manner -- but because it isn't. Notice that U.S. markets had begun to improve in early October, when Congress (finally) approved a war powers resolution; that made war more likely, not less. But President Bush and Secretary Powell have continued to appease terror regimes and gangs -- and appease more cravenly the more brazen the foreign dictators and terrorists become. U.S. appeasement has intensified the war-mongering of those savages who run North Korea."
