Wednesday, September 25, 2002
I have a great deal of respect for Walter Williams. He taught me Microeconomics.
He's a brilliant economist, but this op-ed, "America:
A Sissified Nation?" makes some hasty assumptions.
No matter how much of our liberty Washington takes away in the name of security,
there are no guarantees that there won't be another terrorist attack. Instead
of attacking American liberties, the government ought to go after terrorists in
their countries of origin
Only a handful of masochists approved of Operation TIPS, and civil liberties must
not be salvaged in the name of a "war;" but Dr. Williams is "[going] after terrorists
in their countries of origin," the only option? His statement suggests not only
is there a liberty and security trade-off, but the US government can efficiently
maintain security. Gene Callahan contests that assumption in the essay "Security
the Hayekian Way."
No doubt, a free market security structure will have deadly failures at times.
It is pointless to compare what that free market result might be with a world
of "perfect security." Such a world cannot exist. What markets provide is not
a perfect allocation of resources but a rational one... That isn't to say that
various interventions in the market can't increase the satisfaction of some people,
at least in the short run. Government agents are very good at using our resources
to protect themselves. I, too, would feel safer if I had my own trained security
detail assigned to me, flew on private jets all of the time at someone else's
expense, had special "no-fly" zones put in over my house and office, and was whisked
off to a secured bunker at the first sign of trouble.
Secondly, Dr. Williams surmises intervention will protect liberties and suppress
further acts of terrorism, but rationale suggests otherwise. Wartime means a frenzied-government
passing any badly-written, pasted-together legislation that expands its size.
What is needed is diplomacy, not reactionary political strategies. "If the United
States could contain the threat from a rival superpower during the Cold War, it
can certainly contain three small, poor countries." writes
Ivan Eland, director of Defense Policy at the Cato Institute, going on to
note that, "in addition, a seemingly unprovoked war against another Moslem nation
-- either Iran, Iraq or both -- could act as a recruiting poster for terrorists
for years to come in the fundamentalist Islamic community. Thus, an expanded U.S.
war on terrorism could generate more terrorism."
Concerning Iraq,
Eland writes, "The administration has failed to show why Iraq is any worse than
other repressive states with WMD. Even less has the administration proven that
Iraq is a threat to the United States. Administration hardliners should not use
the Sept. 11 tragedy to settle old scores with Saddam Hussein." But who needs
evidence when you've got Super Hornets raring to go? Diplomacy doesn't sell magazines
and newspapers. The US Government wants to use its might because the American
people want to see some buildings blown up on TV. US defense policy is like Candace
Bushnell at a Barney's truck sale. The government is in an "
arms race with itself." Eland with David Isenberg, in a Policy
Analysis writes, "merely throwing money at a bureaucracy whose efficiency
even Secretary Rumsfeld compares to Soviet central planning effectively kills
any chance of transforming the way the Pentagon will fight future wars."
But politics is only a game of strategy. Take Al Gore's recent "opposition" on
war in Iraq, he's making a very calculated play for the 2004 election, as
Ram on Post Politics notes. What appears "radical" in today's headlines, will
be decidedly populist in two years. Come election time -- when we are no safer
from acts of terrorism than before September11th, and much more cynical about
the war -- Gore can tell us he was a naysayer from the beginning. Also consider,
as Justin
Raimondo points out, Gore "disagrees with the methods but not the goals of
the would-be world- conquerors in Washington." He is hardly a dove. The man wants
to fight the war his own way, in 2004.
Dr. Williams ends his essay, "I'm not a member of America's sissified generation."
I suppose that's the difference. My "generation" did not experience the false
pretense of "security" under the Reagan administration. Some old-timers can't
shake their faith in the Defense Department's capabilities, no matter how irrational
it is to trust a government body.
Wednesday, September 25, 2002
As for word from the back-corridor, some guy named "Dumbass" believes all I need to know about Israel can be found here.
The Palestinians are getting away with this so far largely because they know the Jews are much better human beings than they are... absolute simple survival will snatch away from the Israelis the moral luxury of sparing the innocent. They will at some point have to say, "Yes, I will kill your whole family if necessary to stop you from killing mine." Better even for the Palestenians that this be done now, while it is on some manageable scale.
I'm also informed someone in North Carolina is trying to cut US Aid to Israel under provisions in the Foreign Aid Act. It's an idea Noam Chompsky's suggested before:
September 13, 2002, DATELINE ASHEVILLE< NC USA. The federal lawsuit
to deny Israel U.S. federal funding, due to violations in Title 22 of
the Foreign Aid Act (prohibiting aid to countries that kill
civilians)
is winding its way through the justice system, and briefs are due
within the next month or so to argue the case whether or not 1) "We
the People" can successfully get a hearing, and 2) whether or not the
President can ignore laws passed by congress.
The Foreign Aid Act also forbides states engaging in clandestine nuclear weapons development.
Wednesday, September 25, 2002
Sometimes my sitemeter lets me see what website people went to next. Goodness, those bias-ites are intellectual heavy-weights!
Relying on software will not deflect the current onslaught. We must go to the source. If you want a cleaner inbox, there's only one thing to do: Send a daily spam of your own to your senator, and he or she is bound to get the message.
Except for a letter from a Nigerian banker last week, my yahoo account never receives spam -- and I am very public with it. There's no problem if you come up with a creative screenname, and make sure you've requested that your mail server leave you off advertizers lists.
Tuesday, September 24, 2002
One might assume most of the debate on A Cut from the Bias is taking place in the back corridor. Nope. Since Sunday I've received only one email, coming from someone all too informed.
Here is my problem with the current anti-war movement. It is in
reality an
anti-American movement that is disguised as being pro-peace. The
entire
Israeli-Palestine conflict is a good example. Both sides seems to have
the
leader the other deserves. Arafat is a terrorist who has consistently
rejected any serious peace treaty with his actions especially at the
Davos
summit. Someone could make the argument that only Arafat's English
speeches
should count and his speeches in Arabic are only for public
consumption.
That is a view I don't share: it reeks of Entrocenticism. In response
to
Palestine electing Arafat; Israel elected Sharon (a man with a record
nearly
like that of Arafat). Sorry, they have some disturbing parallels.
What is
needed in the region are two new leaders that are willing to actually
discuss peace and not merely pantomime.
The ant-war movement seems to dwell almost exclusively with Israeli
actions
and not those of Palestine. Those actions are so intertwined that they
can
not be separated. The presence of 'observer's to witness Israeli
crimes are
a complete joke and have by their actions turned themselves into
another
propaganda arm of the PLO. The so called 'peace shields' that are
going to
Iraq are likewise. There is room to debate the wisdom of invading Iraq
but
so far the anti-war crowd has effectively marginalized themselves from
the
debate with positions so far from the mainstream that they are being
taken seriously. Sorry, a debate would have to look at both American and Iraqi actions in a neutral light which is something that is hard to do when every other line about the possibility of war includes oil in it. (Actually sounds like a stump speech).
Both sides could be wrong? What a dangerously unique concept! This is a statement I completely agree with; Palestinians lie, Israelis lie. Palestinians kill, Israelis kill. But I'm not discrediting the rhetoric of "activists" today (it is a grave error to mistake everyone antiwar as pro-Palestinian.) My intention was to embarress and silence Susanna Cornett, and it was met. I have discredited Susanna Cornett. Her silence is deafening.
Addendum: The emperor still has no clothes. Susanna and her Biased have provided me with another example of their incapacity for debate extending beyond ad hominem attacks. "Insultblogging," as Eugene Volokh notes, "reflect badly not just on the author, but to others whom readers associate with the author."
Tuesday, September 24, 2002 This site will change the world
Tuesday, September 24, 2002 Index has recently updated its site, well worth browsing. Be sure to read the profiles of receipients of their 2002 Awards
Tuesday, September 24, 2002
Not a week after I declined "blog-roll" membership from two big-players to make my site more personal, I found myself tangled up in this mess on the inappropriatly named A Cut from the Bias. However, it's what I've been telling people all too many times. This "blog" trend is dangerous. It provides an immediate celebrity to those willing to sit on their asses several hours a day, parroting what others want to hear.
I finnished Jeremy Rifkin's Age of Access the other day. Despite it's wowie-zowie technology enthusiasm (it was published in 2000,)Rifkin makes a salient point, describing the internet as a reality parallel, rather than a suppliment. The internet is not "space," but "access." Your average blogger is nobody, once he's shut off his laptop
If blogging were only an InstaPundit form of providing quick links to interesting stuff, I'd be all for it. But instead, it's become this weird playground-world for people bored at work. You need to trust the omniscience of the blogosphere, or else you're the kid who sits alone at lunch.
I would like to be proven wrong. Reader of my blog can attest I will quickly abandon a position once I have been persued in the right direction. If someone can please enlighten me to any misunderstandings I may have, please drop a line. I'd like to know.
My sense of well-being doesn't jump when my hit-counter gets above 30/daily -- rather, it makes me feel uncomfortable. So why do I "publish?" I've had an online journal for the past three years, and it has always existed as a notebook that can never be lost or deleted. I don't work for the government or a non-profit, I'm not applying to grad schools any time soon, and for those reasons I am free to make my views public. Also because, sometimes, some random person out there will fall upon my ideas via Boolean phase "pledge across america" + bush + fool. I question the integrity of anyone motivated otherwise
