What We Owe Our Soldiers on Memorial Day

May 22, 2015 | Politics

From Memorial Day: What We Owe Our Soldiers - Capitalism Magazine:

Every Memorial Day, we pay tribute to the American men and women who have died in combat. With speeches and solemn ceremonies, we recognize their courage and valor. But one fact goes unacknowledged in our Memorial Day tributes: all too many of our soldiers have died unnecessarily–because they were sent to fight for a purpose other than America’s freedom.The proper purpose of a government is to protect its citizens’ lives and freedom against the initiation of force by criminals at home and aggressors abroad. The American government has a sacred responsibility to recognize the individual value of every one of its citizens’ lives, and thus to do everything possible to protect the rights of each to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness. This absolutely includes our soldiers.Soldiers are not sacrificial objects; they are full-fledged Americans with the same moral right as the rest of us to the pursuit of their own goals, their own dreams, their own happiness. Rational soldiers enjoy much of the work of military service, take pride in their ability to do it superlatively, and gain profound satisfaction in protecting the freedom of every American, including their own freedom.

How Moderate Muslims Should React To The Mohammed Cartoons

May 14, 2015 | Politics

From Defying the Islamic Totalitarians:

Although it is true that any form of mysticism, including religion, is philosophically an enemy of freedom, what is at issue here is a political enemy—an enemy who is willing and able to use force against us. The act of drawing figures of Mohammed was directed against the Islamic jihadists. It is they who want to forcibly impose their religious beliefs upon others. It is they who kill infidels and seek to establish a global caliphate. And it is they who must be publicly denounced and resisted.The so-called moderate Muslim—if that term is to have any real meaning—is someone who renounces force. He practices his religion but acknowledges everyone’s right to reject or ridicule it. Such a person is no threat to our freedom; he can, in fact, be an ally in this conflict. But anyone who believes that the denigration of Islam must not be allowed is in the camp of the jihadists.  That camp consists of not only the people who perform the beheadings and the machine-gunnings of non-believers, but also their tacit supporters. This includes all the Muslim states that have penalties for any type of blasphemy or apostasy—i.e., the practitioners of legalized jihadism—along with all the people who endorse such penalties. The jihadists and the jihadist-sanctioners are the enemy we need to stand up to.The “Draw Mohammed” event did just that.Was the peaceful Muslim offended by the Mohammed cartoons? Perhaps. His response, however, should be, first, thankfulness that he lives in a free, secular society, in which one is allowed to praise or to condemn Allah because the government neither inhibits nor promotes religion; second, anger against the jihadists, who are a threat to his rights as well; and third, enthusiastic support for the imperative of confronting that threat.

No “Hate Speech” Exemption To The First Amendment

May 8, 2015 | Politics

From No, there’s no “hate speech” exception to the First Amendment - The Washington Post:

I keep hearing about a supposed “hate speech” exception to the First Amendment, or statements such as, “This isn’t free speech, it’s hate speech,” or “When does free speech stop and hate speech begin?” But there is no hate speech exception to the First Amendment. Hateful ideas (whatever exactly that might mean) are just as protected under the First Amendment as other ideas. One is as free to condemn Islam — or Muslims, or Jews, or blacks, or whites, or illegal aliens, or native-born citizens — as one is to condemn capitalism or Socialism or Democrats or Republicans.To be sure, there are some kinds of speech that are unprotected by the First Amendment. But those narrow exceptions have nothing to do with “hate speech” in any conventionally used sense of the term. For instance, there is an exception for “fighting words” — face-to-face personal insults addressed to a specific person, of the sort that are likely to start an immediate fight. But this exception isn’t limited to racial or religious insults, nor does it cover all racially or religiously offensive statements.

Taqiyya in America

May 7, 2015 | Politics

From Texas Attack: It's Not (Just) About the Cartoons:

A misleading and dangerous narrative has formed in the wake of the shooting in Garland, Texas that is music to the ears of Islamists.

"The Islamic Community Center of Phoenix says Simpson was a consistent attendee and Soofi sometimes also came. Simpson was popular among the other young attendees."As pointed out by former CIA officer Clare Lopez, the mosque's Facebook page says it is owned by the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), a U.S. Muslim Brotherhood entity whose links to Hamas earned it being called an unindicted co-conspirator designation in a terrorism-financing trial."Lopez also notes that the mosque's imam, Sheikh Mahmoud Abdul-Aziz Ahmad Sulaiman, is a member of a the North American Imams Federation, a group so radical that it is interconnected with the Assembly of Muslim Jurists of America, an anti-American Islamist organization that supports Hamas and forbids Muslims from serving food to the U.S. military."The Federation had (or has) an official linked to the Jamaat-e-Islami group in Bangladesh; Sulaiman was even convicted as a war criminal there. Daniel Greenfeld discovered that the mosque held an event with Lauren Booth from PressTV, a propaganda outlet for the Iranian regime. Lopez also noticed that Simpson converted to Islam around the same time as he began attending the mosque, strongly indicating that his original interpretations of Islam were shaped by what was being preached at the mosque."

Equal Opportunity Failure: Baltimore Riots Are About 50 Years of Progressive Misrule

May 7, 2015 | Politics

From Baltimore Is Not About Race - WSJ:

...the disaster of inner cities isn’t primarily about race at all. It’s about the consequences of 50 years of progressive misrule—which on race has proved an equal-opportunity failure.Baltimore is but the latest liberal-blue city where government has failed to do the one thing it ought—i.e., put the cops on the side of the vulnerable and law-abiding—while pursuing “solutions” that in practice enfeeble families and social institutions and local economies.These supposed solutions do this by substituting federal transfers for fathers and families. They do it by favoring community organizing and government projects over private investment. And they do it by propping up failing public-school systems that operate as jobs programs for the teachers unions instead of centers of learning.If our inner-city African-American communities suffer disproportionately from crippling social pathologies that make upward mobility difficult—and they do—it is in large part because they have disproportionately been on the receiving end of this five-decade-long progressive experiment in government beneficence.How do we know? Because when we look at a slice of white America that was showered with the same Great Society good intentions—Appalachia—we find the same dysfunctions: greater dependency, more single-parent families and the absence of the good, private-sector jobs that only a growing economy can create.

New York Times Condones Terrorist Acts of Violence When It Says “We Are For Free Speech, But…”

May 7, 2015 | Politics

From Free Speech vs. Hate Speech - NYTimes.com:

There is no question that images ridiculing religion, however offensive they may be to believers, qualify as protected free speech in the United States and most Western democracies. There is also no question that however offensive the images, they do not justify murder, and that it is incumbent on leaders of all religious faiths to make this clear to their followers.

But it is equally clear that the Muhammad Art Exhibit and Contest in Garland, Tex., was not really about free speech. It was an exercise in bigotry and hatred posing as a blow for freedom.

Here is the cartoon that the NY Times has written such hateful and disparaging things about -- you decide.

Comments Steve Simpson at Voices for Reason - Attacks on Free Speech Come to the U.S. | The Ayn Rand Institute:

As I wrote last week, many intellectuals in America and elsewhere have taken an attitude of appeasement toward the terrorists and their sympathizers, thus ensuring that their attacks will continue. Of course, violence is not justified, they say, but should we really go out of our way to celebrate those who offend others or humiliate “marginalized” groups? (In this case, the answer is “yes.”)Already, we are seeing that attitude toward the organizers of the event in Garland, who are being called “Islamophobes” and purveyors of “hate speech,” always with the caveat that of course violence is not justified.But this attitude is a form of justifying violence, in the same way that criticizing a rape victim for dressing provocatively is a justification of rape. It says, you brought this on yourself, or you provoked your assailant, or you are the type of person who deserved this. In all events, the message is that your actions, not the actions of your assailants, are the relevant cause of the attack.There are many circumstances in which it’s appropriate not to take sides in a debate or to criticize one side or the other or both. But that applies only when there actually is a debate to take sides in or to ignore. It seems too obvious to point out, but a debate does not exist when one side is trying to kill the other.The moment someone resorts to violence in response to speech is the moment that the issue is no longer about the merits of any side’s position or the character of the speakers but about whether we are going to have the freedom to take positions — that is, to think for ourselves — at all. If we fail to support those who are trying to speak, we necessarily end up condoning, and therefore supporting, those who are willing to resort to violence. There’s no middle ground in a dispute like this, because there’s no middle ground between speech and force. Free speech cannot exist when some people are willing to resort to force.Whatever one thinks about Charlie Hebdo and the organizers of the Garland event or of any of the arguments or positions they take or support, there is no question that Islamists who threaten and use violence want to shut down all debate, all discussion, all thought, and all criticism of their religion. That is why they resort to violence.

Are you yellow-smiley-face-ophobic?

May 6, 2015 | Politics

Ban of Drawing Muhammad is a Modern Construct

May 6, 2015 | Politics

From How images of the prophet Muhammad became ‘forbidden’ - The Washington Post:

It’s so commonly reported that Islam forbids Muhammad’s portraiture that it seems almost a waste of space to repeat it. After all, isn’t that why some Muslims were so outraged in 2006 when the Danish daily Jyllands-Posten depicted Muhammad in an unflattering light? Isn’t that why the Metropolitan Museum of Art pulled three paintings of the prophet? Isn’t that why the TV show South Park had to censor all mentions of Muhammad in a 2010 episode?  “Islam forbids images of Muhammad,” CNN boomed in a headline last week.But the reality is substantially more complicated. The Koran, in fact, does not directly forbid the portrayal of Muhammad. And the second most important Islamic text, the Hadith, “presents us with an ambiguous picture at best,” wrote Christine Gruber of the University of Michigan. “At turns we read of artists who dared to breathe life into their figures and, at others, of pillows ornamented with figural imagery.” The most explicit fatwa banning the portrayal of Muhammad, she notes, isn’t tucked into some ancient text. It arrived in 2001. And its creator was the Taliban. The ban is a very modern construct.

Mohammed Cartoons: Diana West on the Media’s Embrace of “Dhimmitude”

May 6, 2015 | Politics

When a group of people peacefully gathering for an afternoon to discuss or protest or otherwise exercise their lawful rights to free speech regarding Islam and its noxious prophet require thousands of dollars' worth of security to protect their lives from jihad killers (and thank goodness, otherwise the slaughter would likely have far exceeded the death toll of the Charlie Hebdo/Jewish market attacks), freedom, in the Western sense of the word, no longer exists. The "public square" is a war zone.That means that the liberty that is (was) the foundation of our republic is not "threatened," but rather has already been engulfed by the advance of Islam, its law, its culture, into our society. (Airport security is another tip-off.) Here -- not in the Middle East, not in the Turkish, Pakistani and other Islamic sectors of the EU -- it is now accepted that silence buys safety, that submission to sharia is the norm. By this process, Dar al Harb (House of War) becomes Dar al Islam (House of Islam/Submission), and without a fight.Not so for the artists, writers, spectators and one politician, Geert Wilders, who participated in Geller's cartoon-contest-homage to Charlie Hebdo, and voluntarily placed themselves on the front lines of a very real fight for liberty against followers of Islam's creed of violence, repression, and exploitation of women, children and non-Muslims (as exemplified by the example of its prophet). A low-ebb marker is the extent to which their fellow-citizens in media and politics prefer to embrace "dhimmitude" through sharia-compliance rather than support the defense and defenders of their own God-given liberties.

Government Funded Blasphemy Against Christianity is Illuminating According To the Left

May 6, 2015 | Politics

In 1987, Andres Serrano submerged a crucifix in a glass of his own urine and took a picture. Entitled “Piss Christ,” the photograph won first place in a contest sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts.In 1996, another avant-garde artist, Chris Ofili, smeared elephant dung on a portrait of the Blessed Mother and displayed it in a government-funded Brooklyn museum.And so the stage was set for the ensuing nightmare of Christian terror and violence that descended on the American art community.

Just kidding. Nothing of the sort happened. There were no canonical death warrants issued, no attempts on the artists’ lives, and no threats of violence against the artists, the contest organizers, the museum curators, or anyone else.To be sure, Christians objected to “Piss Christ” and the feces-covered Holy Virgin. And they rightfully wondered why their tax dollars had been used to promote these blasphemies. But their objections and questions were condescendingly dismissed by the secular left in the media and intelligentsia. As one prominent art critic sniffed, Ofili’s “The Holy Virgin Mary” was “deliberately provocative” in order to “jolt viewers into an expanded frame of reference, and perhaps even toward illumination.”As if in one voice, the mainstream media and self-anointed intelligentsia argued that antiquated religious sensitivities must not be allowed to interfere with either an artist’s free expression or his right to government funding regardless of how offensive his work may be to Christians.Well, it seems that things have changed.

Egalitarianism Questions Reading To Your Kids at Bedtime

May 5, 2015 | Politics

I don't think the Onion cannot make this stuff up!From Reading to children at bedtime: ABC questions value of time-honoured practice | DailyTelegraph:

THE ABC has questioned whether parents should read to their children before bedtime, claiming it could give your kids an “unfair advantage” over less fortunate children.“Is having a loving family an unfair advantage?” asks a story on the ABC’s website.“Should parents snuggling up for one last story before lights out be even a little concerned about the advantage they might be conferring?”The story was followed by a broadcast on the ABC’s Radio National that also tackled the apparently divisive issue of bedtime reading.“Evidence shows that the difference between those who get bedtime stories and those who don’t — the difference in their life chances — is bigger than the difference between those who get elite private schooling and those that don’t,” British academic Adam Swift told ABC presenter Joe Gelonesi.

Gelonesi responded online: “This devilish twist of evidence surely leads to a further conclusion that perhaps — in the interests of levelling the playing field — bedtime stories should also be restricted.”Contacted by The Daily Telegraph, Gelonesi said the bedtime stories angle was highlighted by the ABC “as a way of getting attention”.Asked if it might be just as easy to level the playing field by encouraging other parents to read bedtime stories, Gelonesi said: “We didn’t discuss that.”

That would be "blaming" the parent who does not read to their kids. Perish the thought. As one reader notes, "The fact that people like this are given a respectful hearing, rather than being run out of polite company, is a sad commentary on our cultural decline."

Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Jihad Comes to Texas

May 5, 2015 | Politics

From Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Jihad Comes to Texas | TIME:

The right to think, to speak, and to write in freedom and without fear is ultimately a more sacred thing than any religion.

[...]

There is no “but” in the First Amendment.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Jihad Comes to Texas

May 5, 2015 | Politics

From Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Jihad Comes to Texas | TIME:

The right to think, to speak, and to write in freedom and without fear is ultimately a more sacred thing than any religion.

[...]

There is no “but” in the First Amendment.

Victims of Communism Day

May 3, 2015 | Politics

From Victims of Communism Day - The Washington Post:

Today is May Day. Since 2007, I have advocated using this date as an international Victims of Communism Day. I outlined the rationale for this idea (which I did not originate) in my very first post on the subject:

May Day began as a holiday for socialists and labor union activists, not just communists. But over time, the date was taken over by the Soviet Union and other communist regimes and used as a propaganda tool to prop up their regimes. I suggest that we instead use it as a day to commemorate those regimes’ millions of victims. The authoritative Black Book of Communism estimates the total at 80 to 100 million dead, greater than that caused by all other twentieth century tyrannies combined. We appropriately have a Holocaust Memorial Day. It is equally appropriate to commemorate the victims of the twentieth century’s other great totalitarian tyranny. And May Day is the most fitting day to do so….The main alternative to May 1 is November 7, the anniversary of the communist coup in Russia. However, choosing that date might be interpreted as focusing exclusively on the Soviet Union, while ignoring the equally horrendous communist mass murders in China, Cambodia, and elsewhere. So May 1 is the best choice.

Our relative neglect of communist crimes carries a real cost. Victims of Communism Day can serve the dual purpose of appropriately commemorating the millions of victims, and diminishing the likelihood that such atrocities will recur. Just as Holocaust Memorial Day and other similar events have helped sensitize us to the dangers of racism, anti-Semitism, and radical nationalism, so Victims of Communism Day can increase awareness of the dangers of extreme government control of the economy and civil society.