Oct 26, 2006 | Dollars & Crosses
I just finished reading Bradley Thompson's article "The Decline and Fall of American Conservatism." It succinctly shows how the two factions of conservatism -- "compassionate conservatism" and the "neo-conservatism" -- both unite on their fundamental opposition to individual rights and capitalism in favor of forced sacrifice of a fascist redistributive welfare state -- in other words they have embraced the philosophy of the Left, while claiming to be defenders of capitalism.
Writes, Thompson:
What the mandarins of the conservative establishment do not and cannot understand, given their philosophy, is that conservatives—to the extent that they ever had any interest in defending individual rights and limited government—lost the fight because they never engaged the enemy with the only kind of weapon that could win: a moral argument against the claim that those in "need" have a moral claim on one's life, liberty, and property. More importantly, mainstream conservatives have never made a philosophic argument for individual rights, limited government, and capitalism on explicitly moral grounds. Ultimately, they are embarrassed by, and have always worked very hard to hide, the fact that capitalism can only be justified if each and every man has a moral right to live and work for his own sake and not as a sacrificial beast of burden to the "needs" of society.
It is true that the GOP and its intellectual allies in the conservative movement have employed the rhetoric of rights, but there has never been any philosophic substance to their arguments. Once one peels away the folksy rhetoric, the hollow bromides, and the patriotic slogans, the conservative position comes down to this: The free-enterprise system is good because it "works" better than any other system, because it produces more wealth that can be subsequently "shared" with the less fortunate.
Not even Goldwater conservatives can offer an alternative to the welfare state, because they too accept its moral premises. Why? Why do all conservatives accept the moral premises of the liberals? The answer, in a word, is religion.
[...]
Liberalism invokes the altruism of Marx; conservatism invokes the altruism of Jesus; and both camps are indebted to Rousseau for his emphasis on compassion. With respect to individual rights, there is and can be no fundamental difference between a secular-liberal welfare state and a religious-conservative welfare state. It matters not one whit to me whether my earned wealth is forcibly redistributed by a Hillary Clinton or a George Bush government; either way, my money is seized. The political subjugation of the individual in the name of the morality of sacrifice is the essence of both.
Compassionate conservatism and neoconservatism have not corrupted the GOP as some conservatives have argued; they have simply exploited and brought to the surface principles that have been at the heart of the conservative intellectual movement from the beginning. Consequently, after decades of an impossible struggle in which conservatives fought liberal government programs while accepting and agreeing with liberal altruism, they have finally and officially given up, abandoned their former half-formed principles, and openly embraced the philosophical roots of the Left.
Be sure to read the rest of this insightful in The Decline and Fall of American Conservatism, available online at Craig Biddle's The Objective Standard.Oct 25, 2006 | Dollars & Crosses
From the New Zealand Herald:
A New Zealand peace activist has been jailed in Britain for eight months for attacking a rock singer leaving him in a coma. Christiaan Briggs, who acted as a human shield in Iraq, admitted punching 19-year-old singer Billy Leeson following an argument on a late night bus. [...] Briggs spent three weeks in Iraq with the Truth Justice Peace Human Shield Action Group in 2003 and was a former British Green Party candidate. [...] According to court testimony, Leeson had been on a bus coming back from a sell-out London gig when his girlfriend complained that Briggs was staring at her. Leeson told Briggs to "look elsewhere" and, after they exchanged words, got off the bus in Camden. Briggs followed and as Leeson walked off, punched him on his left cheek. [..] The singer suffered a fractured skull and had to undergo a five-hour operation during which surgeons removed a piece of bone to lessen pressure on his brain. He was in hospital for six weeks and had to learn to walk again. According to the BBC website, Briggs' defence counsel Bartholomew Cosella said Briggs was a "committed pacifist" who had devoted himself to "trying to make the world a better place". ["NZer jailed for attacking British rock singer"]
Perhaps, the world would be a better place if Briggs had been put into a coma.Oct 25, 2006 | Dollars & Crosses
Irvine, CA--Iran is apparently expanding its nuclear program, and North Korea has hinted that it might test another nuclear bomb. Washington has committed itself to a "diplomatic" solution and is pushing for U.N. sanctions against Iran or North Korea. These sanctions, though, might be sunk if opposed by Russia or China or another country. So U.S. diplomats are busy trying to build international support for supposedly "tough" U.N. sanctions.
"But this entire approach is dead wrong. It sacrifices our self-defense to the whims of the so-called international community," said Elan Journo, a junior fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute.
"Our self-defense should not be left to the mercy of the dictatorship-infested United Nations, an organization corrupt to its core and manifestly hostile to America.
"We have a moral right to exist and defend our freedom. But our leaders do not believe that. That is why they want the approval of others, the endorsement of a 'consensus' supporting U.S. actions. Our leaders lack the confidence to act self-assertively to defend U.S. interests. But such independence--grounded in rational judgment and moral self-confidence--is indispensable to protecting our lives.
"Today's crisis is a product of U.S. inaction and appeasement of Iran. Taking military action against Iran is not only within America's rights, but overdue."Oct 24, 2006 | Dollars & Crosses
On Oct. 13 President Bush signed into law the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, a measure restricting Internet gambling.
"This measure, which requires financial institutions to block credit card and other payments to Internet wagering businesses, is an infringement on our rights," said Dr. Yaron Brook, executive director of the Ayn Rand Institute.
"Gambling, when practiced responsibly, can be a totally legitimate form of entertainment. The government has no right to prohibit adults from doing it--on the Internet or anywhere else--and no right to prohibit businesses from offering gambling opportunities to potential customers.
Cartoon by Cox and Forkum.
"Why do supporters of the law deny individuals the freedom to spend their hard-earned money on gambling? Because, they say, people will bet and lose more than they can afford. In other words, individuals are inherently incapable of making rational decisions, and thus it is the government's job to protect us from ourselves. This vicious, paternalistic idea has no place in a free society."Oct 23, 2006 | Dollars & Crosses
Irvine, CA--Upon hearing the news that former Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling was sentenced to 24 years, most Americans, trusting the newspaper articles and books they have read on Enron, think that justice has been served. But, said Alex Epstein, a junior fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute, "Jeff Skilling has not gotten justice, and the media bear a major portion of the blame.
"Few Americans know that during Skilling's trial, the prosecution came nowhere near proving its central allegation that Jeff Skilling engineered a conspiracy to defraud investors. Few know that Skilling, upon leaving Enron five months before its collapse, destroyed no documents, nor did anything else resembling a criminal cover-up. Few know that the prosecution, unable to prove a conspiracy, spent huge swaths of the trial taking pot-shots at Skilling with issues not even mentioned in the indictment, such as the failure of Skilling, a multi-millionaire many times over, to disclose a failed $50,000 investment to Enron's board.
"The media's misportrayal of the case against Skilling long predates the trial. Ever since the fall of Enron, most of the media have treated as fact every conceivable smear against Skilling made by ax-grinding prosecutors or ex-Enron employees, while treating as absurd Skilling's claim that he neither engineered a conspiracy nor lied to investors.
"There can be no doubt that the media's treatment of Skilling contributed to his conviction for a phantom conspiracy--and to the outrageous 24-year sentence that he has now received. And the mistreatment of Skilling is part of a broader trend: the trend of treating businessmen as guilty until proven innocent. Our journalists and intellectuals, accepting the idea that the pursuit of profit is morally tainted, assume that whenever anything goes wrong in business, it is the result of crooked behavior by greedy, rich CEOs--and slant their coverage accordingly. This practice is putting numerous innocent men in jail, and instilling terror throughout corporate America.
"During Skilling's appeal, let us call for the media to start treating Skilling--and all businessmen--fairly."Oct 23, 2006 | Dollars & Crosses
Irvine, CA--"Britain is embroiled in a fierce debate over British Muslim women who wear a niqab--an opaque veil that covers a woman's entire face. Many British Muslims have expressed outrage that a public schoolteacher was ordered to remove her veil--while many other Britons have defended the school, criticized the wearing of niqabs, and called for the greater assimilation of Muslims into British society."Britons are absolutely right to criticize the niqab," said Alex Epstein, junior fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute. "It is a demeaning, barbaric article of clothing that inculcates shame in women, depriving them of individuality and femininity.""But to criticize niqabs will not go very far in making Britain a more integrated, less balkanized nation. Britons' most powerful tool of assimilation is to understand and proudly and convincingly proclaim Western ideals. They must understand that what made the West great is individualism, reason, the pursuit of happiness--and that this is objectively superior to the tribalism, superstition, and earthly deprivation that many Muslims seek to live out and bring to Europe. Britons must reject the insidious idea of multiculturalism, which holds that all cultures are of equal value. Cultures are not of equal value: prosperity is superior to poverty, happiness is superior to misery, freedom is superior to slavery, and a visible face is superior to a slit revealing two anonymous eyes."
