The Crisis of Our Times

On Immoral Wretches, a Lake of Fire, and other Light Hearted Comedies

2006-01-17T22:53:00.000-05:00

Today a coworker asked me sarcastically if I believe that all of us immoral wretches will burn in hell. It was put snider than what my meek delivery hints at. Of course his statement was followed by some remark about the religious right controlling the Government-presumably a government that he finds fault in. Like an idiot-stumbling over lines of argument and phrases of refute in my mind-all I could spit out was "I guess." I guess...Well I do, though thats a simplified remark, but perhaps a remark appropriate for his level of understanding-I don't know. Whether or not hell is an inferno in grand degree or some other over heated holler, I cannot say--I've never been there and fully pray I shall never be. What I do know is that its a place of great discomfort. I've heard people say that its a disjoining from God, which seems obvious. Unfortunately to many of those who fail to believe, and even some that say they do, that type of hell seems a lot less hostile than the burning inferno that we've come to imagine. Considering that every good that we can enjoy, every good that we know is from God and enjoyed within him, I couldn't imagine a worse sort of hell-even though I can only in part conceive of it, much like trying to conceive being dead. So we, obviously, can only try to describe hell through what we know from our material world and what has been revealed to us. Christ describes hell many times as a horrible place of pain. As a realist, which to be honest I take almost as much from the Greek Academy and from Cicero as I do from Augustine and the Church Fathers, I believe in an ordered world, thus I believe in justice. If the world is just, there must be a hell, but we can only describe it in physical ways, thus the idea of the inferno. Living as we do the greatest pain that we can imagine is our whole body in tremendous pain, such as being set on fire, sustained without the escape of death.
Thus I guess you could say that those immoral wretches will burn in hell. Believing in Justice, I can say I do know that everyone will receive what is due to them, whatsoever that should be.

Though of course, its by God's Grace that we are saved from the reign of Death. By faith in God we follow him, we seek him, so that we may understand him more, and thus so we may love him and follow him more fully. The fruit of faith is just actions. Those of us that do not live morally, in that we live contrary to what is our proper role and order, run the risk of hell, being not given God's Grace.

We are not spiritual beings like angels, nor are we purely animal creatures like dogs. We are harmoniously combined, but we must order ourselves properly. Any proper order starts with the highest to the lowest-the highest should always reign over the lowest. Our highest element is a soul, which practically is our Reason-which we share with the angels and which separates us from beasts.

In order to live correctly we must conform our animal element to Reason through our Will. Cicero and the Academy prescribe this as well. Through Right Reason we break ourselves from the slavery of the physical-lust, sloth, gluttony, pride, etc. We break our wrongful habits, we end our addictions, and we end our search for happiness in material things, because such searches are in vain.

Such is vain as far as all those things are temporal and base, subject to chance and fortune. You wish to find happiness in wealth, but wealth can be lost, you try to find happiness in sex but sex can be denied, or food or anything else that you have no ability to control. We must order ourselves properly so we can think properly. Those that do not are immoral and may be in danger of hell, but even before death grasps them they already obtain it in part. I love ideas and the quest for truth. I love talking to people who are intelligent. I can think of nothing worse than talking to someone who acts as a child, who whines, who cries, and acts unsteady. Those who allow their base appetites and habits to reign above their reason, act as bratty children. To me that's already a small part of Hell, and I pity them.

All right, All right...I can hear some of you already asking, if it is in our ability to make such proper orderings why do we need Jesus or Christianity. Well we have the Reason, but our will is only partially free. Because of original sin we are under the reign of death, and our wills are stained because of it and imperfect, unlike the angels who have perfect will. So no matter how much we will to be perfectly like the angels in obedience there will be times even in the best of us that habit and addiction get the better of us. Thus no matter how much we try we are not worthy of Heaven, eternal communion with God.

We don't have that power, we must ask for the aid of that who does God. We were given this ability, and thus salvation and freedom, because of Christ, the logos.

Christ was born without the stain of sin. He was completely innocent. Upon being betrayed he suffered Death unjustly. Death is the just punishment for sin. Christ was perfect in faith, action, and will. By being punished unjustly he was punished enough to satisfied death for us all. Its a little like a population sentenced justly to a jail term and then a truly innocent man being sentenced unjustly, who then satisfies our sentence for. By his death we were set free, by following Christ we are granted God's Grace and are made worthy of Heaven. By the Cross, we are set free. Grace is only granted to those that seek God, the Truth. To seek for something you must first have faith that it can be found, that should be obvious. In my day-to-day studies I seek Truth, which rightfully is God, because
I believe Truth exists. Newton sought the properties of gravity because he had faith that gravity exists.

Even though there have been people who doubted gravity, though usually under some intoxicant stronger than caffeine, they were still subject to its truth, and its the same for those that don't acknowledge God. Once on our search we start understanding, and we conform our actions appropriately-those who still say by faith alone are we saved and think that actions don't matter are just kidding their selves, if they had faith then they would act accordingly. This is just a breezy summation of it. Augustine in The Free Choice of the Will gives a better description and in the next couple days I'll type it up and put it on here.

So are immoral wretches going to burn, I guess you could say that, but that's not important to me, I hope not to be there with them. Unfortunately you immoral wretches act like children--which is shown by your disregard for marriage, your objectification of other people, your insistent greed and search for material happiness, and in the extreme your disregard for life (abortion, contraception), and of course your genuinely whinny nature and your possible addiction to Reality TV (ohh...the agony)--so I'll have to deal with you here...pity...thank God I have the free will to avoid you.

Cheers.

Handful Of Dust

2006-01-15T21:04:00.000-05:00

Just finished reading a wonderful book by Evelyn Waugh, titled A Handful of Dust. The title is borrowed from a line in T.S. Elliot’s famous poem, The Wasteland. I’ve only breezed through the first few parts of that poem but I hope get a better read of it in the near future. Mr. Waugh’s book is disturbing, hilarious, and reflective of our times--mostly all at once. The central character, Mr. Tony Last, lives a fair life, with an intelligent son (John Andrews) and an attractive wife, Brenda-who those of high society believe to be much above her husbands worth. They reside in a family estate, left to Tony by his father, called Hetton Gardens. Hetton requires a grand amount of Tony’s wealth to keep and is never a very comfortable place-to the irritation of Brenda. Its large, gothic, and uninviting. Mr.Last rarely has guests and when one should appear it is to his annoyance. One day a fellow, John Beaver, who he met a club-Brat’s-comes stopping by for the weekend. John is unanioumously disliked by all who matter, and at the moment of his arrival becomes more than Mr. Last wishes to endure. He avoids him thourghly, leaving Brenda to tend to him. They hit it off, though it seems remarkable considering Mr. Beaver’s "awfulness." From this moment on Mr. Last’s life slowly swirls into the abyss. His wife’s boredom leads her into an affair with John Beaver. She gets a flat in London and finds any excuse to stay away from Hetton, her Husband, and son. Months into the affair an awful tragety occurs. John Andrews, out on his first hunting trip, is a victim of a freak accident, a startled horse knocks him off of his and in flight stikes him on his head with a violent kick. Tony is informed of his son’s death and sends a friend Mr. Jock Grant-Menzies to inform his wife in London. Upon hearing the unfortunate news, Brenda blurts out unconsciously, "thank God." Though she makes her apologies, her actions soon shed light on the remark. Within a few weeks she proclaims her desire for a divorce and wish to marry Mr. Beaver. Mr. Last, though not in favor of it, is naturally forced to go along with it. They make the appropriate arrangements, including how much Brenda will receive in alimony. Under the law the only grounds for divorce is adultery and Tony agrees, inorder to hide Brenda’s affair, to spend the night with a woman so that the hired detectives can get enough evidence for the court. Later on, Tony is informed, through Brenda’s brother, that she wants more-which would force Tony to sell his beloved estate. Tony had enough and refuses any settlement and starts to plan for a trip to hideaway for awhile. Upon making his plans he meets a Dr. Messinger. Dr. Messinger is planning a tripto Brazil to search for an old forgotten city. Tony decides to go along for the adventure. While in Brazil Tony catches a harsh fever. Dr. Messinger attempts to go ahead of the river in search for helpbut drowns on his way leaving a very ill Mr. Last to fend for himself. Tony recovers but finds himself stuck forever in Brazil-and to throw salt on the wound to read Dickens for the rest of his life.

Well that’s a very vague breakdown of the plot and leaves more than enough for any future readers to find interest in--and I hope that you do. I’d recommend it to anyone. It’s just over two-hundred and twenty pages so its not exactly an overwhelming task to read---though it is certainly a rewarding book.

Quite a few things sprung to my mind while I read. It’s in a way an apotalyipic revelation, that in large degree we see in our present time. Marriage, decency, parenthood, any responsibility or duty at all in fact, are considered anchors to personal passions and thus unbearable chains of slavery. Morality itself is an unbearable bore. The characters are stuck in an eternal adolescence, thinking it proper form to follow their base passions without the sting of natural consequence. Certainly we all know the type and and many of you are perhaps just that sort. Central to the problem, and I believe implicit in the book, is that society had Christianity formerly as its rock, its very foundation.

This foundation decayed through neglect has become a skeleton, where old institutions-such asmarriage, church, parenthood-still exist but mean nothing at all. Any shape is bound to lose its form when it loses its center, and so society has decayed to a state of eternal adolecence.
It does sound familiar doesn’t it.

As with Mr. Last, when tragity strikes and disillusion takes its toll, they, or maybe "we" is a better word, search for an unknown place of happiness that’s stamped on their hearts, not in the higher spiritual order of things but in the only place that weak minds can comprehend, the material world. Tony searchs for a mythical paradise in Brazil, but instead finds his search take him into an unescapable hell. Sounds like so many of us who’ve turned away from God and Truth inorder to adopt a man made political religion of mathematical precision, that guarantees Nirvana but instead leads us to totalitarianism, Nazism, Communism, and all the otherhells that men’s minds have cruelly conjectured.
God is the only eternal and by latching on to him we cleave onto eternal truth and wisdom. Everything material was created from dust and back to dust it will go. Grabbing onto it can not bring you truth, purpose, or even a tolerable existence. All such grasps will only clinch a handful of dust. Evelyn Waugh makes that point rather clearly.

A Final Note on Christmas from Peter Brimelow

2006-01-08T18:03:00.000-05:00

Peter Brimelow, in conjunction with www.vdare.com, each year holds a "War Against Christmas Award," which takes a look at how the importance and its explicit recognition of the Christmas Season are in decline around the country. After citing numerous examples, he makes the following point (cited from Steven Rothberg):

Balance it with Christmas. Stay aware of the relative significance of other holidays when compared with Christmas. As most of us know, Christmas is one of the most valued holidays in the Christian calendar—by contrast, Hanukkah is a good deal less significant to the Jewish community. Moreover, Kwanzaa—while of great importance to many African-Americans—is primarily a cultural celebration rather than religious. As such, keep all three holidays in their proper perspective. ‘It can be a serious mistake to elevate Kwanzaa or Hanukkah to the level of Christmas,’ says Steven Rothberg, president of CollegeRecruiter.com. ‘To do so might be really insulting to Christian customers.’
The truth is that there is no “Holiday Season.” There is only Christmas. Everything else is a distraction and a delusion.
American Christians do not hunt around for days dedicated to obscure saints—Lew Rockwell can supply a list on request—and celebrate them loudly in order to step on Ramadan or Yom Kippur. Neither should anyone else step on Christmas.
When people get cards wishing them “UNmerry Christmas”, then they can start getting offended.
And only then.

Goodbye Christmas for now, but hopefully not Forever 1/6/06

2006-01-07T23:00:00.000-05:00

Epiphany has passed and Christmas is officially over. Today, I started to de-decorate my house--taking down the stockings, mistletoe, nutcrackers, holly and unwrapping my favorite Dali prints--that for the season masqueraded on the wall as wrapped gifts. The lights that adorn my house
have just begun to come down. I prefer a more traditional Christmas (as opposed to a Griswold Christmas—there’s nothing worse than a pop culture reference…lol) so it won't require much of my time to pack up those few lights. Last night was the last time they'll shine, but I did notice that my house was the only one in sight with lights on (or even hanging)--most of the block packed them up before the New Year and the remainder did so last week.

Stopping the Celebration of our Lord's Birth prematurely is nothing new of course, though in my Grandfather's time it would have been just enough cause to boycott an un-festive corner store or to send a few shame-on-you-nods toward the culprit across the street--of course today its more typical to get a puzzled look from someone when Epiphany is mentioned. The modern Christmas season starts on Black Friday and ends the day after Christmas--just
in time to celebrate Valentines on the Corporate Calendar that most follow now a days. Its not
that the world has been filled to the brim with atheists or those annoying hippy types. They’re few in number and most of them don’t even put the lights up or apathetically leave them hanging all year long. Christians are criminal in that respect, or at least those that label their selves by that name on occasion. The people who should guard that holiday the most and feel the greatest anger at losing it are just handing it over with out resistance—on occasion they do let them know that their smile is just a forced one. Look at America, a country filled with backwards Medievalists—as Europe seems to believe—and yet here we spend more time buying gifts than in praying and meditating on the greatest gift that has ever been given to humanity. I read in the newspaper, a few weeks before Christmas, about the controversy with Wal-Mart, and other stores, not wishing an explicit Merry Christmas to customers or allowing the Salvation Army in front of their doors. The articles showcased the reactions of the Christmas shoppers and most of them thought of it as some thing between horrible and distasteful. It didn’t stop them from shopping there though. They expressed their scorn and continued buying Polly Playthings and Tiny-Tot Torture Chambers that come with the combustible head G.I. JOE. They expressed that if they actually looked for a store that showed support for the Christian holiday, or at least not explicit scorn or apathy towards it, they’d be hard pressed to find one among the accessible corporate producers and store chains—far more effort than American fortitude could endure. There wouldn’t be anywhere to buy Dad that assault rifle he wanted or little Billy that computer game that looks so awesomely realistic—you know the one where you can see in minute detail the enemy’s brain splat on the Screen when you shoot him with the titanium loaded lazar launcher. I mean if we had to do that—to actually find a large accessible store like that--we couldn’t get anyone any real presents, we’d be left to giving books from the private bookshop or even worse giving to some Charitable Organization in our loved ones name. That sure doesn’t sound like Christmas.

Does it?

Errrrr....Happy New Year! 12/31/05

2006-01-07T22:59:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year! Current mood: content
Happy New Year!Such a simple and casual phrase of goodwill--which surely has at least a small semblance of sincerity in the heart of the well-wisher--but as this millennium has stayed the course laid out from the last it will be a phrase given in vain. These years have seen nonsensical wars, endless hate, and minds filled with dangerous Utopian visions and silly ideologies (idiot-ologies as the respected John Adams labeled it). They have been years filled with people whose ears are taken with deceptions and whose hearts are more prone to be enflamed by word democracy than the name Jesus Christ. The Cultures that fill these fleeting moments of eternity are crumbling away and the demagogues that preside over and awe the masses can only point fingers at each other or blame it all, in full, on the immigrants crossing over the blurring borders. They’re blind to the root cause, despite how obvious it may be, that those occupying the lands of the West, of Christendom, have their eyes and hearts centered upon their selves and not the Truth. They are inspired by little other than the pursuit and occupation of whatever in their immediate disposal that can be of USE to gratify their base inclinations—only to hunger twice as much afterward. How could a climate such as this produce a culture worthy of even a passing remark from the mouths of the Wise, Noble, or even the Semi-Awake? How could such a culture ever wish to produce anything to compare to the Confessions of St. Augustine, Dante’s Divine Comedy, the works of Michelangelo, or the masterpieces of Bach? Instead we get the DaVinci Code, the Motorcycle Diaries, the scribbling of Picasso, and the drooping noise of Korn. It’s a brave new world indeed. These have been years where Darwinism—despite its immanent holes and giant grasps—has been taught as irreproachable fact. In the course of events starting with the communitarian gathering of Greece and the thought from the Academy to today’s events and rather lame attempts of thought—liberalism, nominalism, extremism, etc.—can any proof be acquired to support the new faith—which Darwinism has been called—that places its whole being in the notion of Human progress. As Mencken stated that the evolutionary course from George Washington to Franklin D. Roosevelt is proof enough that no evolutionary progress exists. War, Famine, Plague, and Death, the Four Horseman have been with us for some time but none more brutally present than in the 20th century (a Century that parallels the 14th in cruelty, war, superstition, and death) and these few years that followed it. And it doesn’t appear that the semi-sincere well-wishes, resolutions, or the sounds of pouring champagne will scare them off just yet or discourage their loyal vassals from carrying them out with bright smiles on their faces. So another year gone, and another here to come………and yet again another semi-sincere phrase from the lips of a reluctant well wisher….Happy New Year!

O Holy Night, O Silent Night 12/24/05

2006-01-07T22:57:00.000-05:00

Its the 24th of December, the beautiful Eve of Christmas, and I have of yet not made a post--though many ideas have come to mind. And most of those ideas have came out of my intellectual response to other people's blogs--namely those disparaging religion but at the same time complaining about the decay of culture (a paradox to me and surely for many). And since its the time of the great Holiday, I don't wish to trouble my audience--even if that be only me--with any slanderous remarks or mean spirited name calling, of which I'm prone to do (just joking of course).
Instead I think it would be much more appropriate to contemplate on the miracle that occured, really just a small step in time, those many years ago in a small impoverished manger. That Christmas Day, a baby was born who was not just a man but God himself. As odd as it sounds, that fact just really started to ease into my mind today. Since the time I was a child I knew something or other about Jesus, that he was the son of God, and that--paradox to our mind--he was God himself. Throughout my short life I've went through various stages of belief--at a young age superficially accepting without any care for understanding, through a period of mocking disbelief, to now just a state of awe at what an amazing fact (and its correlating grand concept) that virgin birth of God is. God chose when, how, and where to be born as well as to whom. Nothing is insignificant. The very fact that God made the choice to become a man--a strange decision if any motive other than great love is considered--is stunning. In great part it is this level of love that has been given to us on that most holy day that I've just started to fully appreciate. The God of all things, the highest being of all beings, the Truth and creater becomes the created (in part), he becomes a lower form (in part) because he put himself into a state of suffering, pain, and temptation in a world full of human-made distortion. That's absolutly awesome to me. The concept is so deep that if a man feels no humility in his soul (when that wonderful miracle is ACTUALLY contemplated), then I'd have to deduce that they're of some other sort of creature.
That love is our continuing gift and that wonderous mystery should be the aim of continuious devotion. Its sad to me, in thinking about all this, that on the Day when the greatest gift was given to humanity, we now consecrate to ourselves--marching out in the cold air, fighting trials of traffic and those of a natural sort, fighting with our fellow man to waste away our money on unneccessary items to put under our Pine Tree (which is itself elaborated with luxurious figures of a fat man dressed in red) to gratify our desire (if only in part) of a cornucopia of endless material goods to hoard to ourselves. We give because we want praise, or maybe more often because we feel we have to in order to get more for ourselves. On the day when our eyes should be on God, in thanksgiving for the Son and in celebration of his endless love, we're flattering our own egos with every material indulgence, giving and expecting presents for ourselves. If God cannot satisfy you, What will?
I'm not throwing stones, or for that matter, spears and daggars. The sin is mine as well. I was out there with all you, and I think it was actually you that blooded my nose last night so you could grab the last Polly-Plaything there was at Toys-4UR-Souls. I recognize the need for change and I DEARLY HOPE YOU DO TOO.
All praise to God, but alittle thanks to you to for suffering my rants and tired thoughts.
God Bless and Merry Christmas,
B. Hoffman

On a Right position

2005-02-01T11:34:00.000-05:00

"It is a traditional conservative position to be against huge foreign aid, which has been almost a complete failure for many years now. Talk about huge foreign aid – Turkey is demanding $26 to $32 billion according to most reports. Israel wants $12 to $15 billion additional aid. Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia want additional aid in unspecified amounts. Almost every country that is supporting the U.S. in this war effort wants something in return. The cost of all these requests have not been added in to most of the war cost calculations...

It is a traditional conservative position to be in favor of a strong national defense, not one that turns our soldiers into international social workers, and to believe in a noninterventionist foreign policy rather than in globalism or internationalism...

Conservatives are generally not the types who participate in street demonstrations, especially ones led by people who say mean-spirited things about our President. But I do sincerely believe the true conservative position, the traditional conservative position is against this war."

Rep. John Duncan www.house.gov/duncan

Prof. Fleming on the retiring Douglas Feith

2005-01-27T21:04:00.000-05:00

"Feith, remember, is the man who (with Richard Perle and David Wurmser) wrote a policy memorandum for the Netanyahu government, urging Bibi to ignore the United States and show no mercy to the Palestinians—a memo written by American citizens in the first person, as in “We in Israel . . . ” Although the year was only 1996, the “Americans” called for the overthrow of Saddam Hussein. Feith is also the genius who suggested that the United States was not bound by the Geneva Convention. He also drew up the new rules for interrogation so memorably exploited by those sweet kids with cameras at Abu Ghraib. Feith is also accused of leaking his own memo, linking Saddam Hussein with Al Qaeda, to the Weekly Standard. When Dick Cheney quoted the Standard’s article as proof that the administration had been right along, the circle of disinformation was closed."

-Thomas Fleming

Chris Check's post on chroniclesmagazine.org

2005-01-25T18:50:00.000-05:00

Thirty-seven years ago, a quiet gentlemen from Northern Italy named Giovanni Battista Montini caused a big stir with a little pamphlet. The stir was not because his pamphlet said anything new, but because many people were hoping that it would say something new, and it did not. Instead, it courageously restated what the world had known for—I do not exaggerate—thousands of years. History remembers Giovanni Battista Montini as Pope Paul VI and his pamphlet as Humanae Vitae, the papal encyclical that confirmed what the Catholic Church (and all Protestant churches until 1930) had always taught: Artificial contraception is intrinsically evil.It's not altogether true that Humanae Vitae said nothing new. Expanding on centuries of Church teaching, the document laid bare in a manner that can only be described as prophetic what was in store for a world that embraced contraception: "conjugal infidelity and the general lowering of morality."It's hard to argue with Paul VI. The Pill may not be the only reason that Americans tolerate Oval Office scandals, Viagra and Victoria Secret ads during football games, "reality" shows that make a circus out of marriage, and the reality that one in four high-school students will graduate with a sexually transmitted disease, but, as Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver has written, the sexual revolution, and the consequent cultural "unraveling," would not have been "possible or sustainable without easy access to reliable contraception."Contraception, however, did more than enable the sexual revolution; it inspired it. As Paul VI warned, a man using contraception will "forget the reverence due to a woman, and, disregarding her physical and emotional equilibrium, reduce her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires." If you doubt that this exploitation of women has come to pass, then you must be unaware of the $12 billion American (or $57 billion worldwide) pornography industry and the marriages it has destroyed.Paul VI also warned that contraception would become "a dangerous weapon . . . in the hands of those public authorities who take no heed of moral exigencies." If a husband and wife could sterilize themselves on the grounds that another child would break their limited means, the Pope concluded that governments could apply the same solution to "the problems of the community." Overpopulation. Crime. Feeblemindedness. Take your pick. Americans might find Pope Paul's warnings a little fantastic until they discover that controlling the populations of the Third World is a central element of our own national-security policy.When we contrast the promised benefits of contraception (spontaneity, romance, pleasure) with the realities that Paul VI predicted (divorce, adultery, political tyranny, even disease), we should not be surprised to discover that the proliferation of contraception has done nothing to slow abortion. On the contrary, the former leads to the latter. It's easy enough to see how abortion steps in when contraception all too frequently fails. But the more profound relationship between contraception and abortion is this: Both are a deliberate rejection of human life, the true end of marriage. Marriage begins as an act of love, the total gift of oneself to another. The child is the fruit of this love. Contraception deforms marriage into an arena of self-gratification or lust, to use a word out of fashion. What is the bitter fruit of lust? Abortion.Yesterday, we marked the 32nd anniversary of the Supreme Court's creation, out of whole cloth, of a mother's "right" to kill her baby. If you fear for the soul of a nation that promotes this "right" to the tune of some million-and-a-half innocent babies a year, here is my suggestion: Read Humanae Vitae, toss out your pills and prophylactics, and (if you are married, of course) have another baby. Bringing a child into the world is the most pro-life thing you can do.

Mr. Bush Should Start Listening To Conservatives

2005-01-21T20:29:00.000-05:00

"The danger inherent in reform is that the cure may be worse than the disease. Reform is an operation on the social body; but unlike medical surgeons, reformers are not on guard against unpredictable side effects which may divert the course of reform toward unwanted results. Moreover, quite often the social doctors become part of the disease."

Eric Hoffer

A Few Encouraging Words from Waylon Jennings

2005-01-21T19:57:00.000-05:00

There are still places where people like me can hang out
With nothing at all in this whole world to worry about
They ain't tore 'em all down yet and said every man for himself
or polished them up until nothing worth keeping is left

They ain't got 'em all
If you try here and there you'll still find a few holes in the wall
Their an endangered species but I'm keeping track
I can tell you that they ain't got 'em all

There are still women who can walk up and change your whole world
Who don't even know they're impossibly beautiful girls
Who for some crazy reason will hold you so close in the night
Til nothing else matters and you finally start feeling all right

They ain't got 'em all
They're still there and their wantin' and wonderfully willing to fall
There an endangered species but I'm keeping track
I can tell you that they ain't got 'em all

Waylon Jennings from The Complete MCA Recordings

Isn't it funny...

2005-01-21T18:43:00.000-05:00

Isn't it funny--sadly funny--that those who call their selves conservatives distrust the federal government to spend their tax dollars, distrust it to manage the economy, distrust it to provide universal healthcare, but they welcome in full faith when the federal government tells them of their endeavors to reform the world into a flourishing democracy (a very conservative proposal, I do say).

I'm starting to see Mr. Mill's point.

Tom Piatak's post at chroniclesmagazine.org

2005-01-21T18:22:00.000-05:00

"Over at NRO, Victor Davis Hanson admits that Bush’s inaugural speech represents “the first time that an American president has committed the United States to side with democratic reformers worldwide,” belying any claim that Bush’s speech is in any way conservative. But Hanson still praises Bush’s “idealism” and scoffs at the “moral calculus” of Bush’s critics, even though Hanson feels that, if Bush is serious about his rhetoric, we are heading for confrontation with Iran, China, Russia, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and doubtless much of the rest of the globe."

"Of course, Bush’s critics would have to include the Founding Fathers, none of whom envisioned America’s role in the world as spreading democracy around the globe at gunpoint. They would also include those of us appalled at the pictures out of Tal Afar in Iraq yesterday, where a U.S. patrol opened fire on a car, killing the parents and making orphans out of the five children in the car. Particularly poignant was the picture of a young girl, crying and covered in her parents’ blood. No amount of “idealism” can justify what happened to her, and the responsibility for her situation rests not with the soldiers who fired on her parents’ car—who are only seeking to defend themselves in a hostile and unfamiliar environment—but on those who sent the soldiers there in the first place, beginning with the “idealist” at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Perhaps a good place to begin our moral calculus would be by opposing unnecessary wars that inevitably result in death, mayhem, and images like those out of Tal Afar, and by critically examining the gauzy abstractions used to justify such wars."

Tom Piatak

Radical Conservatism...Unpatriotic?

2005-01-19T23:31:00.000-05:00

"The notion that a radical is one who hates his country is naïve and usually idiotic. He is, more likely, one who likes his country more than the rest of us, and is thus more disturbed than the rest of us when he sees it debauched. He is not a bad citizen turning to crime; he is a good citizen driven to despair."

H. L. Mencken

G.K. Chesterton on the Patriotism of the Empire loving Rudyard Kipling

2005-01-19T18:47:00.000-05:00

"He admires England, but he does not love her; for we admire things with reasons, but love them without reason. He admires England because she is strong, not because she is England."

G. K. Chesterton

The brilliant Chesterton's words help remind us about those among us who have no patriotism for their country, those who can barely muster up enough love for their wife or husband--if that. Just as many of these people--more in my experience--have the tendency to call theirselves "conservatives" as they do "liberal", so these words have little meaning any more. Let us now be divided into the Patriotic (lovers of our Country) and the Unpatriotic (admirers of power and haters of their land).

Reflecting on NeoConservatism

2005-01-18T21:27:00.000-05:00

“I had expected the Neoconservatives to address themselves to the great social difficulties of the U.S. today, especially to the swelling growth of a dismal urban proletariat, and the decay of the moral order. Instead, with some exceptions, their concern has been mainly with the gross national product and with ‘global wealth.’ They offer few alternatives to the alleged benefits of the Welfare State, shrugging their shoulders and the creed of most of them is no better than a latter-day Utilitarianism. I had thought that the Neoconservatives might become the champions of diversity in the world instead, they aspire to bring about a world of uniformity and dull standardization, Americanized, industrialized, democratized, logicalized, boring. They are cultural and economic imperialists, many of them.”

Russell Kirk reflecting on NeoConservatives

...perhaps I too am not a conservative.

2005-01-18T20:44:00.000-05:00

"Another consideration that must be addressed: what does imperialism do to the constitutional design of our country? Murray Rothbard and Robert Higgs were both right to stress a general incompatibility between limited constitutional government and expanding empires. Imperial crusades make it harder to counteract consolidated managerial government. They push forward the cumulative process by which a once self-restrained regime, based on checks and balances, is turned into a unified engine of foreign expansion."

"The American statesman who made this argument best in the twentieth century was Robert Taft. Unlike Goldberg, Taft never described himself as a “conservative.” But if Goldberg and his social democratic globalist companions are “conservatives,” then perhaps I too am not a conservative."

Paul Gottfried in "Jonah, We Hardly Knew Ye!"

Hunt for WMDs over...try again?

2005-01-18T10:38:00.000-05:00

Its old news by now, but the hunt for Iraqi WMD's is now over. It has been reported that "Bush has expressed disappointment that no weapons or weapons programs were found." Don't worry though folks, we'll try again in Iran. And if not there, we'll go to Korea (Third times a charm). Check out The National Review Online for feeble war appologetics (poor magazine hasn't been worth reading since Peter Brimelow and Sobran left). It was recently reported in The Times that the National Review has (in an editorial) had a change of heart and started critizing the War for Iraqi Democracy. I haven't read the article yet, but those ladies and gents out there in hawkland may have to stick with Bill Kristol and the Weekly Standard. They haven't even had a second thought about our cakewalk war, even as more and more conservatives wake from their lapse of reason. Kristol dosen't care "If we [neoconservatives] have to make common cause with the more hawkish liberals and fight the conservatives, that is fine with me." He dosen't care as long as there's a good fight to be fought (and there will be he assures--even if he has to make up reasons).

Stay Tuned. And Remember boys and girls, America is always in Danger as long as there's another country in the world (and there's only one way we can take care of that).

An Endorsement for Global Free Trade

2005-01-15T16:34:00.000-05:00

"The protective system . . . is conservative, while the free trade system is destructive. It breaks up old nationalities and pushes the antagonism of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie to the extreme point ... [T]he free trade system hastens the social revolution. It is in this revolutionary sense alone . . . that I vote in favor of free trade."

Karl Marx 1848

Sir Walter Scott on NeoCon's, poetically speaking

2005-01-11T23:06:00.000-05:00

Canto Sixth
I
Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,Who never to himself hath said,"This is my own, my native land!"Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned,As home his footsteps he hath turned,From wandering on a foreign strand!If such there breathe, go, mark him well;For him no Minstrel raptures swell;High though his titles, proud his name,Boundless his wealth as wish can claim;Despite those titles, power, and pelf,The wretch, concentred all in self,Living, shall forfeit fair renown,And, doubly dying, shall go downTo the vile dust, from whence he sprung,Unwept, unhonoured, and unsung.

On Being a Conservative

2005-01-02T22:14:00.000-05:00

"To be conservative is to prefer the familiar to the unknown, to prefer the tried to the untried, fact to mystery, the actual to the possible, the limited to the unbounded, the near to the distant, the sufficient to the superabundant, the convenient to the perfect, present laughter to utopian bliss."

Michael Oakeshott

2005-01-02T20:21:00.000-05:00

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Does Cholesterol Kill Corporations Too?

2005-01-02T19:52:00.000-05:00

The Following article was submitted to the Wayne Review, Wayne State University's "conservative" publication, and rejected on the basis that most readers would not "get" the tongue and check presentation or "get" the "insider" terms (whatever they may be).

With a plethora of health risks being uncovered by our first-class medical field, many are choosing to cut certain portions out of their diet. No egg yolk. Only skim milk. Non-fat lattes. And don't mention bacon thats been off the table for months, especially after the cuts in AFDC (Aid to Families with Dependent Children) programs. At this rate I suspect America may be off the prominent list of the World's fattest in a few years time. I foresee a skinnier, perhaps healthier, America on the horizon. Then again, I'm no economist.

As you and I get healthier or as you at least do the fat cats in the big business show no concern for the medical warnings. They eat the bacon and, in most cases, the grease too. These corporate moguls know their way around a pork chop buffet and dinners on us. And it's going to cost us $125 billion. Or so is the estimated amount of Corporate Welfare the real pork that these companies will enjoy this year. As Time Magazine has reported, the corporate giants by the name of AT&T, Bechtel, Boeing, and General Electric account for about 40% of all this. And you were complaining about the welfare queen with the Cadillac down the street.

This particular cuisine has more variety than your favorite Italian restaurant your representatives have better imaginations than you think. Subsidies, grants, real estate discounts (or giveaways), low-interest loans, government services, and (our favorite) tax breaks are all on the menu. There's more to pork than meets the eye. And to spice it up just for effect it all comes under a nice name like Economic Development or Public-Private Partnerships. It's a tasty regale for your average corporate tycoon; pretty tempting to an average student also, I must admit. Unfortunately, the average student or for that matter the average American isn't eligible to eat so well at another's expense.

Seems unfair, doesn't it? These powerful and politically influential corporations get government handouts and special deals at the expense of taxpayers and you and I get, well, student loans. Nice, but I'd still rather have the million dollar grants. Outside of my own selfish desires, though, I can see the justification for our low interest loans. They allow us to obtain the degree of our choice, enhancing our possibilities for employment with a higher wage; thus creating payers of a higher income tax, which then will, apparently, go to fund the next acquisition of our corporate employers. True, a cynical analogy of a scheme that I do benefit from, but an analogy that can be backed up by statistics.

The justification for corporate welfare usually revolves around the prospect of creating jobs more importantly the prospect of getting us employed. It's a noble prospect, which I could support, if it worked. The big four AT&T, Bechtel, Boeing, and General Electric who benefited from the 40% of corporate welfare, as reported by Time, also saw overall employment (fall) 38% as more than a third of a million jobs disappeared. This may not be so for all beneficiaries but according to the Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW), a non-profit organization that specialize in this sort of thing, corporate welfare may increase jobs in one State or Municipal but hasn't, in the long term, created more overall jobs in the nation. Corporations, considering relocation, simply wait for the highest bidder creating more jobs in one area only by taking them away from another. There's no overall benefit for anyone except for the pork eaters and the politicos they get into office.

We might as well get use to having lighter pockets from funding a corporatist state. It doesn't appear to concern many politicians. We have seen reforms--which admittedly I blessed--on the old social welfare system, which as CAGW said didn't work, destroyed incentive, perpetuated dependence and distorted the economy. Politicians pushed through these reforms happily. But in regards to corporate welfare benefits,which honestly have the same results, the handouts keep growing and going to the most powerful businesses (I presume poor citizens don't contribute much to campaign funds).

A skinnier and fitter America may never be fully realized. The fat cats prefer their high cholesterol diet. The fact that these hand outs destroy incentive and negatively effect the corporations ability to stand on their own two feet, seems to impress very few. At any rate, I doubt size 48 Armani belts will go out of style any time soon.

A Momentary Lapse of Reason: Conservatives in the War Party

2005-01-02T19:36:00.000-05:00

The Following Article was Published in The Wayne Review, Wayne State University's "conservative" publication, in its September 2004 issue.

The bugle sounds. The charge begins. And on the battlefield our guy, the good guy, always wins. Its also fitting that the good guy is exactly that, by the virtue of his always being right. Combat is always a noble endeavor. And the cause is always clearly just. Or so it was in the romanticized novels I loved as a child when such visions seemed real. Unfortunately, these idealized pictures faded as the child became aware of the actual realities of the twentieth century--the senseless wars, the foreign policy catastrophes, and the lack of respect for the wisdom of the past.

I would like to say that such realities disillusioned me into the conservative I am now, but my evolution was much more subtle though these aspects surely made their mark. To some folks reading this, the idea that my awakening to the realities of war (and world) had an effect on the creation of a greater conservative tendency in my heart, sounds illogical. Maybe it should; especially to those most familiar with the Hannitys, OReillys, and Bushs out there. But conservatism has always had the tendency to rail against war, sometimes with great reaction and still today a large pocket rail against the stupidity of our foreign entanglements.

The fact that the conservative movement spurred out of the ashes of WWII with a suspicious eye on war and those who called for it enlightens few. The names Richard Weaver, George Santayana, and Murray Rothbard, perhaps do less. But the words of Russell Kirk should vibrate through the core of every conservative mind. In The Politics of Prudence, Kirk wrote that a "soundly conservative foreign policy, in the age which is dawning, should be neither interventionist nor isolationist: it should be prudent. Its object should not be to secure the triumph everywhere of Americas name and manners, under the slogan of democratic capitalism, but instead the preservation of the true national interest, and acceptance of the diversity of economic and political institutions throughout the world." It followed that Dr. Kirk steadily and warningly opposed the Persian Gulf War of 1991.

Currently, we are back in the Gulf under the pretense to end terrorism foreverwhat connection the country had to the 9/11 attacks I am ignorant of, though the Weekly Standard tries to inform me. The weapons of mass destruction that we knew were there, arent--at least not until we brought them over and proceeded to destabilize a once semi-stable country. We ended a brutal tyranny, true but it was a secular tyranny with a predictable hunger to remain in control, which feared the fundamentalists who would prefer to overthrow Mr. Hussein in favor of a theocracy. If we wish to fight terrorism, it might be a good idea to not increase the chances of the formation of a terrorist state by destroying a secular country in the hotbed of the Middle East.

Or so is my thought--though the Goldbergs, Bennetts, and DSouzas tell me Im wrong. These conservatives seem partial to the Soviet ideal of a benevolent global hegemony, as long as the U.S. plays big brother. These modern Alexanders ignore the tragic fates that every empire in history procured. They ignore Russell Kirk. They blow off the Vatican. They disgrace the Constitution. They close their eyes to every conservative institution and tendency in the West.
Edmund Burke calls to these men, why engage in wars halfway around the world, at incalculable expense in men and money? They answer back to end tyranny around the world through Pax Americana. There is no question about how undesirable such a thing would be, nor do the consequences look positive from my perspective. The only question I have is how conservatives can be persuaded by an idea thats so hostile to conservatism. Id like to believe it is on account of a momentary lapse of reason. And I hope that conservatives and America recover from this lapse of reason, even just momentarily.