Here We Go Again

[This written in 1943.]

“It is generally recognized that mankind has achieved, since its rise from savagery, a miraculous progress in the realm of its material culture – and none whatever in the realm of its ethics. Our homes are superior to the cave of the Neanderthal man, but our morals are no better than his – worse, if anything, for we do not have his excuse for ignorance. There is no act of inhumanity which he perpetrated and which we do not perpetrate, except that he did not possess our exquisite means of perpetrating it and he could never equal our present scale. In a recently published book (The Spirit of Enterprise by Edgard M. Queeny), the author – intent upon a hymn to human progress – spends five pages describing man’s material triumphs. Then he adds: “Our morals have come a long way too. The mere thought of a feast on a loose piece of human flesh, which to the Bushmen brings mouth-watering longing, is to us horrid and nauseating.” This is all he can offers, without equivocation, for ten thousand years of man’s spiritual growth. And even this claim is open to question, because cannibalism occurred in Soviet Russia in the famines of 1921 and 1933, and God only knows or can bear the sight of what is occurring in Europe now.

“Why has man displayed such magnificent capacity for progress in the material realm and yet remained stagnant on the level of savagery in his spiritual stature? This discrepancy has been recognized, decried, deplored denounced by everyone. It has never been explained. Countless explanations of evil and remedies for it have been offered through the centuries. None of them worked. None of them cured or explained anything.

“Yet that which mankind holds as its moral ideal has been known and accepted for centuries. The basic principle of men’s morality has not changed since the beginning of recorded history. Under their superficial differences of symbolism, ritual and metaphysical justification, all great ethical systems from the Orient up, all religions, all human schools of thought have held a single moral axiom; the idea of selflessness. That which proceeds from love of self is evil; that which proceeds from love of others is good. Self-sacrifice, self-denial and self-renunciation have ever been considered the essence of virtue. In no other matter has mankind held to such total unity, so completely and for so long. Altruism is the doctrine which holds that man must live for others and place others above self. Humanity has proclaimed its moral ideal unanimously. It has never been questioned. It has always been the ideal of altruism. [Later in this chapter, AR notes that the cultures of ancient Greece and capitalist America were at least partial exceptions to this rule. ed.]

“This ideal has never been reached. In spite of its statement and restatement, in every land, in every age, in every language, in spite of its professed acceptance by all, mankind’s history has not been a growing record of benevolence, justice and brother-love, but an accelerating progression of horror, cruelty, and shame. Baffled, men have accepted the explanation that man is essentially evil; man is weak and imperfect; he doesn’t want to do good. The noble ideal of altruism is never quite to be achieved, only approximated; man is immoral by nature.

“But look back at mankind’s record. Every major horror of history was perpetrated – not by reason of and in the name of that which men held as evil, that is , selfishness – but through, by, for and in the name of an altruistic purpose. The Inquisition. Religious wars. Civil wars. The French Revolution. The German Revolution. The Russian Revolution. No act of selfishness has ever equaled the carnages perpetrated by disciples of altruism. Nor has any egoist ever roused masses of fanatical followers by enjoining them to go out to fight for his personal gain. Every leader gathered men through the slogans of a selfless purpose, through the plea for this self-sacrifice to a high altruistic goal: the salvation of others’ souls, the spread of enlightenment, the common good of their state.

“It is said that self-seeking hypocrites used these virtuous sentiments to delude their followers and achieve personal ends. Doubtless, there have been such and a great many of them. But they never caused the bloody terrors caused by the purest 'idealists.' The worst butchers were the most sincere. Robespierre asked and wished nothing for himself. Lenin asked and wished nothing for himself. But the record of Attila is that of an amateur compared to theirs. At the apex of every great tragedy of mankind there stands the figure of an incorruptible altruist. Yet, after every disaster men have said: 'The ideal was right, but Robespierre was the wrong man to put it into practice,' (of Torquemada, or Cromwell, or Lenin, or Hitler, or Stalin) and have gone on to try it again. [Watch The Triumph of the Will and notice how sincere Hitler is when he expresses his ideal for all the German people. SCB]

“But what is one to think of creatures who are willing, century after century, to bear every form of agony, every kind of martyrdom, for the sake of that which they consider their moral ideal? Are they creatures devoid of moral instinct? Is not the determination to act according to one’s conception of right, no matter what the price, precisely the attribute of a high moral sense? Men have been robbed, enslaved, tortured, slaughtered in the name of altruism. They have accepted, forgiven, and borne it, because their ideal demanded it of them. The price they have paid in unspeakable suffering should have granted them, at least, a badge of virtue.

“But the nature of their ideal has robbed them even of this earned honor.

“A true premise, once accepted, leads to a greater truth and a clearer knowledge with each subsequent step deduced from it. A false premise leads to a greater falsehood and a blacker evil, until, followed to its ultimate conclusion, it brings total destruction, as it must. The spiritual tragedy of mankind has now reached this last step. The spectacle of horror which the world presents at this moment has never been equaled and cannot be surpassed. This is the end of the blind alley of men’s thinking. And there is no way out – save all the way back, to the beginning, to the first principle which permitted men to be led into this.

“The ideal of altruism has now taken its ultimate toll. We are the witnesses of its climax. We see mankind destroying itself before our eyes. We see the price it is paying. We glance back at its history and we see the prince it has paid. But we look on and say: 'This noble ideal is beyond human nature, because men are imperfect and evil.'

“Isn’t it time to stop and to question that noble ideal instead?”

[This was written by Ayn Rand, September 4, 1943, in the middle of WWII. The source for this excerpt is Journals of Ayn Rand. This writing was never published in this form during her lifetime. It became the basis of Atlas Shrugged and the final form of her philosophy. After the publishing of Atlas Shrugged, she worked to present her philosophy in non-fiction form and published many books and articles to that effect. Fifty two years after Atlas Shrugged published in 1957, people are looking for a new philosophical basis for human action and the organization of society. Many can see that the United States is now poised to be the last great country to topple into this same abyss.

Ayn Rand's ideas are no less true today. We are in the grip of a major call to this same destructive ideal carried out by his dictatorship in the form of Barack Obama. Socialism and dictatorship fail wherever tried. But it is not socialism per se that has his words live for people. It is this horrible, stinking moral ideal which has been spread through every institution and church. The attempt to achieve it will not achieve it.

But I don't think that Obama cares to achieve it. His actions belie his rhetoric. He does care to use what you erroneously consider the best within you to mold you to his power. This is how he keeps his motives invisible to the unquestioning masses.

It is the moral ideal that is false as an ideal. People are not inherently evil. They possess free will and choose whether to be right or wrong, good or evil.

A person who is called to make a difference for other people as his primary motivation for living in the world is called by this error. It is not the proper call to goodness. No.

You do that which you want your life to be comprised of, present the results of your work, and when someone wants what you have to offer, he will buy it and accept it – of his own free will. He doesn't have to accept YOU. You've done that already if your moral base is correct. But this motivation depends on what Rand later calls the Virtue of Selfishness.

America has a fairly strong grasp of rational self-interest, rational egoism. Dont' let that go.

To hell, I say, with the sonorous siren song of Barack Obama. SCB]

US Representatives - Who Voted YES for Cap and Trade

Before I get to the list of YES voters, here is John Boehner's speech before the House beginning a little over an hour before the vote. Clearly Henry Waxman wanted to cut Boehner's speech several times.

Clip 1, Clip 2, Clip 3, Clip 4, Clip 5.


Alabama
(4-3 Republican)

Alaska
(1 Republican)

Arizona
(5-3 Democratic)
• 4. Ed Pastor (D) Yes
• 7. Raúl M. Grijalva (D) Yes
• 8. Gabrielle Giffords (D) Yes

Arkansas
(3-1 Democratic)
• 2. Vic Snyder (D) Yes

California
(33-19 Democratic, 1 vacancy)
• 1. Mike Thompson (D) Yes
• 5. Doris Matsui (D) Yes
• 6. Lynn Woolsey (D) Yes
• 7. George Miller (D) Yes
• 8. Nancy Pelosi (D) Yes
• 9. Barbara Lee (D) Yes
• 10. Ellen Tauscher (D) Yes
• 11. Jerry McNerney (D) Yes
• 12. Jackie Speier (D) Yes
• 14. Anna Eshoo (D) Yes
• 15. Mike Honda (D) Yes
• 16. Zoe Lofgren (D) Yes
• 17. Sam Farr (D) Yes
• 18. Dennis Cardoza (D) Yes
• 23. Lois Capps (D) Yes
• 27. Brad Sherman (D) Yes
• 28. Howard Berman (D) Yes
• 29. Adam Schiff (D) Yes
• 30. Henry Waxman (D) Yes
• 31. Xavier Becerra (D) Yes
• 33. Diane Watson (D) Yes
• 34. Lucille Roybal-Allard (D) Yes
• 35. Maxine Waters (D) Yes
• 36. Jane Harman (D) Yes
• 37. Laura Richardson (D) Yes
• 38. Grace Napolitano (D) Yes
• 39. Linda Sánchez (D) Yes
• 43. Joe Baca (D) Yes
• 45. Mary Bono Mack (R) Yes
• 47. Loretta Sanchez (D) Yes
• 51. Bob Filner (D) Yes
• 53. Susan Davis (D) Yes

Colorado
(5-2 Democratic)
• 1. Diana DeGette (D) Yes
• 2. Jared Polis (D) Yes
• 4. Betsy Markey (D) Yes
• 7. Ed Perlmutter (D) Yes

Connecticut
(5 Democrats)
• 1. John Larson (D) Yes
• 2. Joe Courtney (D) Yes
• 3. Rosa DeLauro (D) Yes
• 4. Jim Himes (D) Yes
• 5. Chris Murphy (D) Yes

Delaware
(1 Republican)
• At-large. Michael N. Castle (R) Yes

Florida
(15-10 Republican)
• 2. Allen Boyd (D) Yes
• 3. Corrine Brown (D) Yes
• 8. Alan Grayson (D) Yes
• 11. Kathy Castor (D) Yes
• 17. Kendrick Meek (D) Yes
• 19. Robert Wexler (D) Yes
• 20. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D) Yes
• 22. Ron Klein (D) Yes
• 24. Suzanne Kosmas (D) Yes

Georgia
(7-6 Republican)
• 2. Sanford Bishop (D) Yes
• 4. Hank Johnson (D) Yes
• 5. John Lewis (D) Yes
• 13. David Scott (D) Yes

Hawaii
(2 Democrats)
• 1. Neil Abercrombie (D) Yes
• 2. Mazie Hirono (D) Yes

Idaho
(1-1 Split)

Illinois
(12-7 Democratic)
• 1. Bobby Rush (D) Yes
• 2. Jesse Jackson, Jr. (D) Yes
• 3. Dan Lipinski (D) Yes
• 4. Luis Gutierrez (D) Yes
• 5. Michael Quigley (D) Yes
• 7. Danny K. Davis (D) Yes
• 8. Melissa Bean (D) Yes
• 9. Janice D. Schakowsky (D) Yes
• 10. Mark Steven Kirk (R) Yes
• 11. Debbie Halvorson (D) Yes
• 17. Philip Hare (D) Yes

Indiana
(5-4 Democratic)
• 7. André Carson (D) Yes
• 9. Baron Hill (D) Yes

Iowa
(3-2 Democratic)
• 1. Bruce Braley (D) Yes
• 2. David Loebsack (D) Yes
• 3. Leonard Boswell (D) Yes

Kansas
(3-1 Republican)
• 3. Dennis Moore (D) Yes

Kentucky
(4-2 Republican)
• 3. John Yarmuth (D) Yes
• 6. Ben Chandler (D) Yes

Louisiana
(6-1 Republican)

Maine
(2 Democrats)
• 1. Chellie Pingree (D) Yes
• 2. Mike Michaud (D) Yes

Maryland
(7-1 Democratic)
• 1. Frank Kratovil (D) Yes
• 2. Dutch Ruppersberger (D) Yes
• 3. John Sarbanes (D) Yes
• 4. Donna Edwards (D) Yes
• 5. Steny Hoyer (D) Yes
• 7. Elijah Cummings (D) Yes
• 8. Chris Van Hollen (D) Yes

Massachusetts
(10 Democrats)
• 1. John Olver (D) Yes
• 2. Richard Neal (D) Yes
• 3. Jim McGovern (D) Yes
• 4. Barney Frank (D) Yes
• 5. Niki Tsongas (D) Yes
• 6. John Tierney (D) Yes
• 7. Ed Markey (D) Yes
• 8. Mike Capuano (D) Yes
• 9. Stephen Lynch (D) Yes
• 10. Bill Delahunt (D) Yes

Michigan
(8-7 Democratic)
• 1. Bart Stupak (D) Yes
• 5. Dale E. Kildee (D) Yes
• 7. Mark Schauer (D) Yes
• 9. Gary Peters (D) Yes
• 12. Sander Levin (D) Yes
• 13. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick (D) Yes
• 14. John Conyers Jr. (D) Yes
• 15. John Dingell (D) Yes

Minnesota
(5-3 Democratic)
• 1. Tim Walz (D) Yes
• 4. Betty McCollum (D) Yes
• 5. Keith Ellison (D) Yes
• 7. Collin Peterson (D) Yes
• 8. Jim Oberstar (D) Yes

Mississippi
(3-1 Democratic)
• 2. Bennie Thompson (D) Yes

Missouri
(5-4 Republican)
• 1. William Lacy Clay, Jr. (D) Yes
• 3. Russ Carnahan (D) Yes
• 4. Ike Skelton (D) Yes
• 5. Emanuel Cleaver (D) Yes

Montana
(1 Republican)

Nebraska
(3 Republicans)

Nevada
(2-1 Democratic)
• 1. Shelley Berkley (D) Yes
• 3. Dina Titus (D) Yes

New Hampshire
(2 Democrats)
• 1. Carol Shea-Porter (D) Yes
• 2. Paul Hodes (D) Yes

New Jersey
(8-5 Democratic)
• 1. Rob Andrews (D) Yes
• 2. Frank LoBiondo (R) Yes
• 3. John Adler (D) Yes
• 4. Chris Smith (R) Yes
• 6. Frank Pallone (D) Yes
• 7. Leonard Lance (R) Yes
• 8. Bill Pascrell Jr. (D) Yes
• 9. Steve Rothman (D) Yes
• 10. Donald M. Payne (D) Yes
• 12. Rush D. Holt Jr. (D) Yes
• 13. Albio Sires (D) Yes

New Mexico
(3 Democrats)
• 1. Martin Heinrich (D) Yes
• 2. Harry Teague (D) Yes
• 3. Ben R. Luján (D) Yes

New York
(26-3 Democratic)
• 1. Tim Bishop (D) Yes
• 2. Steve Israel (D) Yes
• 4. Carolyn McCarthy (D) Yes
• 5. Gary Ackerman (D) Yes
• 6. Gregory W. Meeks (D) Yes
• 7. Joseph Crowley (D) Yes
• 8. Jerrold Nadler (D) Yes
• 9. Anthony D. Weiner (D) Yes
• 10. Ed Towns (D) Yes
• 11. Yvette D. Clarke (D) Yes
• 12. Nydia Velázquez (D) Yes
• 13. Michael McMahon (D) Yes
• 14. Carolyn B. Maloney (D) Yes
• 15. Charles B. Rangel (D) Yes
• 16. José Serrano (D) Yes
• 17. Eliot L. Engel (D) Yes
• 18. Nita Lowey (D) Yes
• 19. John Hall (D) Yes
• 20. Scott Murphy (D) Yes
• 21. Paul Tonko (D) Yes
• 22. Maurice Hinchey (D) Yes
• 23. John M. McHugh (R) Yes
• 25. Dan Maffei (D) Yes
• 27. Brian Higgins (D) Yes
• 28. Louise McIntosh Slaughter (D) Yes

North Carolina
(8-5 Democratic)
• 1. G. K. Butterfield (D) Yes
• 2. Bob Etheridge (D) Yes
• 4. David Price (D) Yes
• 11. Heath Shuler (D) Yes
• 12. Mel Watt (D) Yes
• 13. Brad Miller (D) Yes

North Dakota
(1 Democrat)

Ohio
(10-8 Democratic)
• 1. Steve Driehaus (D) Yes
• 9. Marcy Kaptur (D) Yes (A very big pig. See here. A rose by any other name is a bribe.)
• 11. Marcia Fudge (D) Yes
• 13. Betty Sutton (D) Yes
• 15. Mary Jo Kilroy (D) Yes
• 16. John Boccieri (D) Yes
• 17. Tim Ryan (D) Yes
• 18. Zack Space (D) Yes

Oklahoma
(4-1 Republican)

Oregon
(4-1 Democratic)
• 1. David Wu (D) Yes
• 3. Earl Blumenauer (D) Yes
• 5. Kurt Schrader (D) Yes

Pennsylvania
(12-7 Democratic)
• 1. Bob Brady (D) Yes
• 2. Chaka Fattah (D) Yes
• 7. Joe Sestak (D) Yes
• 8. Patrick Murphy (D) Yes
• 11. Paul E. Kanjorski (D) Yes
• 12. John Murtha (D) Yes
• 13. Allyson Schwartz (D) Yes
• 14. Michael F. Doyle (D) Yes

Rhode Island
(2 Democrats)
• 1. Patrick J. Kennedy (D) Yes
• 2. James Langevin (D) Yes

South Carolina
(4-2 Republican)
• 5. John Spratt (D) Yes
• 6. Jim Clyburn (D) Yes

South Dakota
(1 Democrat)

Tennessee
(5-4 Democratic)
• 5. Jim Cooper (D) Yes
• 6. Bart Gordon (D) Yes
• 9. Steve Cohen (D) Yes

Texas
(20-12 Republican)
• 9. Al Green (D) Yes
• 15. Rubén Hinojosa (D) Yes
• 16. Silvestre Reyes (D) Yes
• 18. Sheila Jackson-Lee (D) Yes
• 20. Charlie Gonzalez (D) Yes
• 25. Lloyd Doggett (D) Yes
• 28. Henry Cuellar (D) Yes
• 29. Gene Green (D) Yes
• 30. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D) Yes

Utah
(2-1 Republican)

Vermont
(1 Democrat)
• At-large. Peter Welch (D) Yes

Virginia
(6-5 Democratic)
• 3. Robert C. Scott (D) Yes
• 5. Tom Perriello (D) Yes
• 8. Jim Moran (D) Yes
• 9. Rick Boucher (D) Yes
• 11. Gerry Connolly (D) Yes

Washington
(6-3 Democratic)
• 1. Jay Inslee (D) Yes
• 2. Rick Larsen (D) Yes
• 3. Brian Baird (D) Yes
• 6. Norm Dicks (D) Yes
• 7. Jim McDermott (D) Yes
• 8. Dave Reichert (R) Yes
• 9. Adam Smith (D) Yes

West Virginia
(2-1 Democratic)

Wisconsin
(5-3 Democratic)
• 2. Tammy Baldwin (D) Yes
• 3. Ron Kind (D) Yes
• 4. Gwen Moore (D) Yes
• 7. Dave Obey (D) Yes
• 8. Steve Kagen (D) Yes

Wyoming
(1 Republican)

Our Gangster Government

The Terror of Living Under the Bus

Obama was silent.

He said nothing that would support the people of Iran that could be heard around the world. Apparently he tweeted and twittered today to let the people know that he was not wanting them to get hurt. (I can see him doing this on his tiptoes.) Oh, how sweet the tweet.

Why didn't Obama stand for freedom early on? Everyone knows that the Khomenei regime is a vicious theocratic dictatorship fronted by Ahmadinejad. Was it that he wanted to deal with the regime to talk them out of nuclear missiles and that would be his big legacy?

His silence showed me was he would throw an entire nation of innocent people under the bus. For what? Power and adulation. "Screw 'em. I'd rather deal with a dictator anytime." Could there be anything else? Not from what I've seen. Let's see if he can parlay a tweet into world leadership.

His sweet little tweet was his hedge against an ominous future when it looks like his man in Iran is going to show his colors as the true Nazi he is. Anyone that has a hint of a brain knows that whatever deal he might cut with that thug Khomenei, if it should come to that, is worthless. Neville Chamberlain learned that.

So are Obama's plans toast? Doesn't look like he can win. And given his feeble brainpower when it comes to morality, he never could have won.

Don't tell me he wanted to keep the dialogue open. That's a ruse. Bullies like Iran's leadership are always wanting to talk. They are parasites, after all. They have to find blood to live on. Kim Jong-il has done a remarkable job of that. He suckers blood out of us only to up the ante on his threats when he gets hungry.

Where does that leave us? Well, under the bus. Or more aptly, in the back seat of Thelma and Louise's Thunderbird convertible. If we let Obama get away with this, that is where we deserve to be.

Already he has shown that he is a bully at home. He's commandeered business after business in the name of an emergency only to make sure that his supporters are taken care of by stripping bonafide contract holders of their property and their rightful due. He's supported ACORN which is known to be working overtime to stuff the ballot box, by seeing to it that they are well funded. He called them (the pitchforks) out to harrass AIG employees when he wanted to make his point on TV that "regular people" didn't like Wall Street. He's spent the US into oblivion. Now he wants to control industry through cap and trade, or its substitute, EPA regulators. And he plans to tell us what to eat and drink and every other manner of behavior because he will be paying for our healthcare. Throw the doctors under the bus for that. They are mere slaves.

He promised change. I'm choking on it.

Meanwhile he's swatting flies and turning the corridors of the White House into a skateboard park.

thepeoplescube.com

drudgereport.com

This is the Thelma and Louise presidency. The terror is palpable here in the back seat. But, like the people on that fated commandeered flight that ended up in a Pennsylvania field on 9/11, the fear turns to determination once we declare, "This shall be, not that."

And we'd better declare it soon because when we go over the cliff, we will hear his shrill glee. And there will be no freeze-frame ending.

The Revenge of Affirmative Action

Suppose I tell you that you can achieve being a doctor or a lawyer or even a President. Suppose you are a minority. We know you have had a rough time being black, Latino or a woman. How would you like a break? Even though you cannot pass our normal standards for a student at this university, we are going to let you in. We think you, if you study, will do OK and be able to get started. Besides, we will feel better. Maybe you will become a doctor or a lawyer or even a President.

By one standard, the social one, so the argument goes, this sounds good. “It’s a way for our society, for us as a whole, a group, to make up for the past. No matter if none of ‘us’ had slaves or was ever ‘mean’ to a woman or a Latino. It’s just right that we do this. It’s social justice.”

(I’m not going to go into the metaphysical, epistemological and moral fallacies of collectivism in this article. Suffice it to say that people come in the form of individuals, not groups. To claim anything true about human beings as a group in the realms open to their choices is false. It is his conceptual faculty and volition that distinguish him as human being.)

By another standard, the professional one, this is not good. If a person takes the bait of the bounties of affirmative action, he does so knowing that he is not up to par measured by the standards of that profession or the university training him for that profession. There is nothing hidden about this. He may be dazzled by the surface, but he ingests a plug of poison hidden deep beneath the surface if he accepts it.

It is possible that such a person could take the bait in one of three ways. He could think this an authentic opportunity to be what he always wanted to be and measure himself by the standards of the profession of his choice. He would have to be very clear to do this. He would have to work diligently to honestly succeed – by his own ability - to measure up to those standards. He would want to be measured by those standards.

Or, he could be cynical and play it for all it is worth, exploiting the “fruits” of these relaxed standards all the way to the top.

Or, he might not be too smart and try to float.

Six or eight months ago I read an article about individuals, members of a minority, who wanted to be doctors, lawyers and other professionals and failed. They took out large loans for their education. But they accepted the seductive fruit of Affirmative Action. They found themselves behind the bulk of the students, generally hung out with the people in the same situation, and never measured up to the qualifications for their profession. They failed the bar exam or the exams to get into med school. They thought they were OK by what they were told in school, but where the rubber met the road, they failed.

They didn’t like being behind the curve, dropped out and found something else to do. Many of them over a $100,000 in debt couldn’t pay back the loans and ended up caring less because they felt trapped and cheated. They either went bankrupt or tried to get out of their obligation. They found themselves cynical, broke as well as broken, and damn angry.

But there were others who went on with their work where the standards for brain surgery or the rigors of preparing a legal case did not apply. They ended up in the humanities. The humanities have no intellectually rigorous course of preparation. Although they may have had to meet the requirements of their professors, often those were not too tough. Every specialized course of study in those subjects is not objective and thus intellectually bankrupt - from philosophy to sociology to psychology to political “science”, and many others. (Note: Objectivism is the only philosophy I’ve found that is rigorous. And I’m not the only one who has responded to it. People are responding to it in droves, driven by the increasingly apparent consequences of our unworkable society and lack of viable explanations in the humanities.)

So long as any member of a minority accepts the premise of affirmative action, he accepts one thing: I am inferior. He has to embrace being the victim and this seals his fate. He is done; doomed.

Burnishing the stories and wounds of victimhood, he never can achieve his independent, authentic self nor the fruits of such a crucial achievement. Either he is the master of his own fate or the victim of his circumstances. And those states of mind are mutually exclusive. Like the drawing of the vase which transforms into two faces, the mind cannot see nor be present to both at once. It’s one or the other. Choose.

Unless he is able to throw aside that premise and refuse to advance except by his own work and achievement, he is done. And necessarily by accepting the premise of inferiority and victimhood, he is going to end up angry and want revenge. Why wouldn’t he? Anyone who had accepted such a premise would. It can be no other way. He will end up blaming the successful, the capable, those who achieve and if he is to maintain his worldview, he must bring them down.

Culturally, we are reaping the consequences this thinking now - in spades - via the Presidency of Barack Obama. Now everyone is going to get what it is to be a victim as the President seeks to carry out his beliefs to their bitter end. (Notice how he holds the victim up as the reason for all of his actions.) In the populous, the anger is growing. Committed to this course, this will not end well.

Barack Obama knows he has a gift. He’s said so and revels in it. And he thinks he is going to negate the plug of poison he swallowed years ago. How? By forcing everyone to swallow that poison plug so that his inexcusable sin which negated his worth to himself becomes invisible - to him.

Barack knows well how to speak to invoke the moral basis that keeps this idea in place. He is not a force for the lessening of racism nor any form of victimhood. (Note his choice of Sotomeyer, a confirmed “ethnicist” who wants to judge cases, not by the consequences of a man’s actions, but by his irrelevant circumstances.) He is a force for its increase. Instead of advocating standards and ideals which are consistent with man’s necessity to make judgments about reality and produce values, he’s wholesale turning the world upside down.

Because of the wreckage caused by this idea, which is widely accepted in the culture, he is attempting to redistribute wealth based on it. He is attempting to take America down to size so that it be no better, no stronger, no more capable than the least capable countries on the planet. Just as the standards declined and became increasingly worthless at the universities that instituted Affirmative Action, now those low standards are going to be instituted everywhere – BY FORCE.

If you cannot afford a house, Obama will see to it that you get one. If you cannot pay your debts, Obama will see to it that you can get help. If you cannot survive as a business, Obama will keep you afloat. If you cannot decide what to do in your business, call him. Wherever reality intrudes, he will intervene and protect you from the consequences. This is Obama’s professed mission.

His foreign policy and his economic policies here at home are a testament to this idea. If the idea of Affirmative Action is to really work, then the standards must be relaxed. Obama’s method? FORCE them to relax!

This is the method that led to the Fannie and Freddie fiasco. This is the method that sourced the failure of our biggest banks. This is the method that set up GM and Chrysler for ruination. This is the method that has made health care and consequently, health insurance expensive. This is the method that has made our schools a cesspool of non-learning. The list is already long and is growing at a terrifying pace. And it the method, FORCE, that is growing at a terrifying pace.

Except for the force instituted by the government, none of the current financial mess would nor could have happened. Human life, left alone, sorts out the bad ideas and decisions as it must to survive. It’s correct them or die.

The free market never fails. It is always correcting its mistakes. But, soon this will be impossible - by rational, above-board civil means, that is.

Some of us have said that if we get universal healthcare, we will probably go to the post office for brain surgery. That is a laughable exaggeration, but in essence it is true. That is the end of the road for erasing standards.

Barack Obama is a smart man – smart in one sense. He knows how to use rhetoric to manipulate the system to his ends. This is why he has no problem calling businessman to the White House and telling them it is his gift, his capability as a manipulator that protects them from the pitchforks. (Of course they only have to thank him for his powers and succumb to his dictates.) This is why he has no problem bankrolling permanent community organizers and rabble rousers, the pitchforks, which he can call out whenever he wants to bring pressure against his intransigent enemies. This is why he has no problem taking wealth from Chrysler investors and simply giving it to his supporters, the unions.

And it is also why he can combine contradictions in one sentence as if they make sense.

He is so delusional about his powers, that he thinks he can alter the absolute of reality around the globe. He is wrong. But he believes it.

Questioning, thinking people don’t buy it. Peace cannot be obtained by a man who INITIATES force to cause it and Obama has that record here at home. The people who enjoy his rhetoric and don’t ask questions, hope. True to this level of superficiality, they think it is so nice that Michelle planted a garden..

Obama forgets one thing. He is invested 100% in his particular form of flight. Like Icarus who fashioned wings of wax, Obama soars high in the sky. In the thrill of his flight, Icarus forgot his wings were made of wax. Flying too close to the sun, they melted. “Holy damn! REALITY?” He plummeted to his death.

When a man says "I've always been a strong believer in the power of the free market." after he had commandeered AIG, GM, Chrysler, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac rending them un-free to act in the market, anyone who is thinking says “What? How can you say that?” Obama isn’t bothered by this. Affirmative Action showed him the way.

When he decided he was going to become a politician he wanted power. He schooled himself in what it was to have power. Then he decided to run for President. He wanted to really have power, the ultimate power. Now he could FORCE his ideas on society. And by his actions we see his deepest motive - unadulterated hatred of the best mankind has to offer: Creativity, production, authentic values, and a life to live for - and all in the name of a pseudo-virtue, "You shall give to the poor at all costs, including the destruction of the engine of life and wealth."

Cowardice as Foreign Policy

There was a story that circulated some years back about thugs who attacked a woman on the streets of Brooklyn. No one tried to stop the crime in the making; no one said anything nor did anything other than watch or turn away. The story was important as an barometer of the moral stature of our society. Many thought it was an outrage that no one could think of anything to distract the thugs or offer the woman encouragement in her battle. Everyone except for the victim (and she may have been) was a moral coward in this situation.

This is not to say that it was their duty to get into the fray. It wasn't. But there are many things that could be done when a life and death struggle of an innocent person with a thug is happening that would have worked to stop their crime. I guess the onlookers could explain away their passiveness as "I didn't want to meddle." Would anyone accept that explanation?

So I see the moral character of Obama clearly now. He's a coward. He has so many opportunities to stand for freedom, for democracy and give encouragement to the millions of people in Iran and around the globe who want it. But did he. No. Not a drip. His remarks would just as soon support a dictatorship - as if the people would want that which they obviously don't - or a democracy. Sovereignty to Obama means whoever is leading the country regardless of how he got there or how he maintains his control. Obama doesn't choose to display any distinctions in this area. Hmmm. I wonder why?

Hannah Arendt, noted author of The Life of the Mind and The Origins of Totalitarianism, attended the Nazi war trials. She said she was amazed how ordinary and thoughtless these handmaidens to atrocity were. "Not my job." "Not my worry." "I didn't know." No concern about life and what was happening at all.

This is Obama. He doesn't get it and he is thoughtless when it comes to important values. Moral cowardice packaged as seeming "fairness' is our foreign policy. I know this because I have seen it before. He bypassed opportunities to stand for real freedom, rather than give it lip service for the believers back home, in Europe and in South America.

And he doesn't stand for it here either. When dealing with Americans, he becomes the bully. He negates contracts as if they mean nothing for their owners and the rule of law only to give the benefits of the spoils of his winning in November to his supporters. He plans to summarily fire an IG who is investigating fraud and theft in a particular government program that he wants to use to benefit his supporters. He forced banks to take money so he could get control of them when they didn't need it or want it. This list is getting very long. The gays are chafing and the doctors are next in line.

He's not passive at home. He's too directed for that. Ask yourself what he is up to.

Overseas, he is a wuss. At home he is a thug. Always, he is a master manipulator and unless you are good an disentangling what he says, you think it sounds good. My assessment is that it is all a very, very toxic waste.

Anyone who wants to hear his rhetoric like it is the voice of God is free to do so. He always is quick to have the lamb lay down with the lion and the tides smooth out. I expect him to advocate creationism if he thinks it will get him a vote.

A friend got so excited about the demonstrations in Iran because she felt it was because of Obama's Cairo speech. Maybe, but I don't think so. It's not likely that a speech, especially one as tepid and "beautiful" as he delivered, a little over a week before an election could alter it and move millions to march in the streets.

I've never heard that Muslims are committed to getting along or world peace. Have you? I've heard that if you are a non-Mulsim, you have one of three choices: death, slavery or second class status. That's it. Whereas Americans hear Obama in a Christian framework, I don't think Muslims do.

How about this idea? Could two democratic countries flanking Iran have anything to do with it? Whereas before, Iran was one of three dictatorships in that subregion of the Mideast - Iraq, Afghanistan and Iran -now it is the only one. Hmm. Can't consider that one. It's associated with none other than the hated Bush.

Rationality is not a strong suit with many Americans. Unquestioned feelings and finding someone to follow are. This tells me something about them, not something about the truth or rightness of Obama's words.

To get to that, one must think. But most would not know where to start. Opinions: 100; Valid conclusions 0.

The Moral and Economic Arguments Against Government Health Care and For Freedom in Health Care

This is a really great video that gets to the heart of the matter in arguing against Government Health Care. This issue is, I think, the most important issue that must be defeated if we are to retain our private, individual lives in any meaning of the term.

The argument which almost no one will confront is the altruist argument - that you should be concerned about your nameless neighbor's health, that he must be taken care of, and you should feel guilty if you don't. If you can handle that argument emotionally and intellectually, then it will be possible to win this fight.

I suggest you bookmark this link when you get it up on your computer screen. Given our culture, you have to remember the access point to making it and you need to be able to ask the questions which will bring up their false reasons. At that point, you can highlight it and offer the counter argument and benefits of freedom.

If you want to know what this health care is ultimately going to look like, go to your county public health clinic and ask for an appointment. (They especially like treating STDs since they can be a public health problem. If you have arthritis or heart trouble, don't bother.) Contrary to all of the ballyhoo on Government Health Care, the truth is that you will suffer health care rationing and lost time waiting in lines to get it. The plans used in Great Britain and Canada are a disaster.

No one remembers that Progressivism is based largely in eugenics, the science which sought to perfect the human race. Progressivism began in 1890 and ran for 30 to 40 years. And Progressivism is the doctrine to which modern Democrats owe their allegiance. Hillary openly named it. Obama said, "I'm not a socialist; I prefer to be called a Progressive."

When the government controls people's lives it decides who lives and dies. Naturally it will make sense to make those choices based on some criteria and that criteria will be eugenics or political patronage. What you want will be lost along with the free market in health care.

We already see the push toward the Nanny State - where the government tells us what to eat and that we must exercise and on and on. It will pass laws "encouraging" this behavior making it prohibitive to eat what we would prefer and generally enjoy our lives as we see fit. This pernicious government activity is where we are headed and Government Health Care is the big, big access to gaining this control.

And never forget: Hitler's atrocities were based on eugenics.

Some Thoughts

Everything alive grows from the inside out. An acorn sits in a fertile environment, puts out roots and then grows a shoot upward. That sprouts leaf and limb until one day it is a mighty oak fulfilling its purpose in its mature form. The same with a human fetus.

The same principle applies to all living things and products of living things. Even a creation of a living thing such as an invention, a poem or a painting grows from the seed of an idea until it is an expression of the vision gestated within. Anyone who creates knows that something isn't right and is wooden if one attempts to force a form upon it from the outside. It grows from the inside out. Frank Lloyd Wright new this and advocated it his entire life.

This same principle is true of societies. One man puts down roots and makes a life. Another moves nearby and they get to know each other. Pretty soon they trade with each other. This happens one man after another until a community has developed. The Constitution of the United States allowed this and that is why we grew into a might expression of liberty.

The reason I and a growing number of others so object to Obama is because he is trying to form the society from the outside in. This is his meaning of "change." He's seeking to impose his will on the country, and even the world, by force and threat. This violates the principle of life which means he is in violation of life. It is not how life works. Life cannot grow and prosper this way.

Is this why totalitarian societies and dictatorships fail? They turn the life principle inside out and it does not work? They reverse cause and effect?

Notice how politics is always concerned with the appearance of things. It is concerned with the outside, not the inside. Politicians are notorious for saying any damn thing to get elected or keep people approving them all the while pulling one shenanigan after another. And this is why thinking people don't trust most of them. Simple, when you think about it. They aren't concerned with the inside, the underlying truth of their ideas and the structure for implementing them. They just get the gun out and force it, like a square peg in a round hole, and don't respond to the nature of things and how they work.

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I feel sorry for blacks who are beginning to see that Obama is not the man they fell in love with. They pinned hope and happiness on this man.

You can see this in Juan Williams, who often appears on a panel during the last 20 minutes of the Fox Political News program at 6:00 p.m. He so wants Obama to succeed that he twists himself into a pretzel to find an explanation that gives him the benefit of the doubt. Sometimes he has to just own that what Obama is saying or doing doesn't work. He looks pained and it is painful to watch.

It must be like falling in love with someone that you realize isn't good for you. It's hard to let go because the love was so delicious in the beginning that you let him into your heart.

I know what it is to be caught in this kind of bind. It's distinctly human.

Never underestimate the power of superficial qualities.

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I'm so tired of the argument that says Terrorists are the way they are because they are poor or uneducated and therefore we should cut them slack. We should feel empathy for them. This argument has also been made about blacks because of slave ancestors and the poor in general in this country.

This is so lame. The main reason it is so lame is that does not attribute these people as fully human. It doesn't treat them as though they also use their minds, albeit maybe poorly, inconsistently and for irrational values, to achieve the values, rational or not, that they want.

This reasoning doesn't treat people as though they possess choice. You do not have to be educated or rich to understand what work is or honesty is or honoring someone's property is. Those morals are in every society no matter how primitive.

Let's stop the pretense and the arrogance of acting like these people are not people. They are. They know how to build bombs for God's sake! They can learn to operate within the same principles that you and I live by. Treat them so and this will instantly bring them into the community of human beings.

The foreign policy and government programs that are justified for this reason are a disgrace and demoralize human beings everywhere. Get over its already!

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I think America is living through a Reign of Terror. No, not the terror of tanks and machine guns turned on the people. Rather the terror of "change" covered by a velvet mouth.

The terror is the stripping of people of responsibility - breaking the link between cause and effect, between the actions one takes and the consequences that follow - information that is vital to human survival, let alone a country's.

Obama is replacing it with a new criteria: Do you love me? Will you follow my dictates? Don't forget, "I am kind."

NO? OUT!!!

"You shall be relegated to the realm of non-humans."

The first salvo was the meeting with bankers where Obama pulled the old protection racket tactic. "I'm the only thing between you and the pitchforks. Do as I say."

There are so many of these examples that I don't remember them all. One was the court dismissing accountability of the states to clean up their voter registration list and prevent illegal voting. The court negated two attempts and gave a pass, except for a tiny slap on a thug's fingers ("Don't carry your night stick and guard the voting booth through 2012"), to intimidation at the voting booth.

All of this coupled with the growth and discovery of the rampant illegal actions of ACORN and his continued support of ACORN tells me that he is up to destroying the validity of the democratic process.

Then he arbitrarily stripped the holders of primary debt in Chrysler of their rights. He stole their property and gave it to the unions - all for political patronage. In that action, he destroyed the principle of peaceful agreements among men and used his gun to get his way. This is not justice. This is nothing except goddammed thuggery. Pure and simple.

Today O fired an Americorp Inspector General. He does not have that power because the IG is designed to be above politics and inspect according to principle and objective evidence. He fired him anyway.

He urges great speed in passing the laws he wants and fosters these bills not even getting read or put out for public discussion.

Yesterday I read that the strategy for his beloved healthcare plan is to work out the details in secret, print it and then pass it before the public has time to review it. Railroading is his modus operandi. (Congress, including my local representative, John Lewis, is just as culpable in this kind of politics.)

He also has Sotomayer on rails insofar as that is possible.

For these reasons alone, where he is overturning the purpose and means of Finance, Law and Legality, Voting, Industrialization primarily in the Auto Industry, the Medical industry, Education and many other sectors of our society, Obama is a menace.

Ingenuous is not a strong enough word for Obama's character and actions. He hates America and the principle it was founded on.

Many Americans are feeling like they are experiencing the battered wife syndrome. Obama at home bashes Americans and the basics of American life and abroad apologizes for his "wife's" behavior all the while sucking up to every thug out there. All in the name of peace and calling forth a dialogue.

The syndrome goes on because people want to believe him. "Maybe he will be nice next time." "Maybe he will honor me next time." We are learning that he doesn't and he won't.