Beyond The Laws

     First, let’s have a little Kipling:

Whatsoever, for any cause,
     Seeketh to take or give
Power above or beyond the Laws,
     Suffer it not to live!
Holy State or Holy King--
     Or Holy People's Will--
Have no truck with the senseless thing.
     Order the guns and kill!

[“Macdonough’s Song”]

     Now, let’s have a citation that may surprise my Gentle Readers:

Machiavelli tells us that all republics require a leader to step outside of the law from time to time and restore order when the nation inevitably degrades over time

And the founders, no matter how it enrages the “classical liberals” were reading Machiavelli https://t.co/9B34i720Oe

— Auron MacIntyre (@AuronMacintyre) September 22, 2026

     Which stance is your preference?

* * *

     Probably the most toxic term of all, in a political context, is necessity. I wrote about this in a work of fiction:

     “Sir...I know Earth had States, and I know they hated our ancestors, but weren’t there any decent people left?”
     The professor looked at him in silence for a long time.
     “This is truly a hard job, Mr. Morelon. The answer to your question is: No, there weren’t. Not after the Spoonerites left. I know you don’t want to believe it. But the people of Earth had all accepted force and terror as legitimate means to an end. They had accepted the State, and the State had swallowed them whole. There were no free men anywhere. There were only rulers and subjects. As a result, there was no peace and no security anywhere. Have you ever read about war, Mr. Morelon?” Stromberg looked around the room. “Have any of you?”
     There was no answer.
     “It was the greatest of the obscenities of the States.” Stromberg’s voice dropped to a murmur. “Now and again, for any reasons or none, they would hurl their populations at one another. Millions of men would clash in combat, striking and being struck, killing and being killed in numbers beyond imagination. Why? So that one State could enforce its will upon another.
     “The economy of a warring State would be channeled to warlike priorities. No longer did the skills of producers determine what would be made and who would make it. No longer did the desires of consumers determine how much of it would be purchased and at what price. The State ruled all. The engines of production became merely another weapon in its hands, to be wielded against its enemy as it saw fit. To disobey the State in peacetime would cost you your liberty or your property. To deviate from the State’s decrees in wartime was called treason, and would cost you your life.”
     The old lecturer straightened, for a moment looking very like Armand’s grandfather. His eyes had become piercing beacons of anger.
     “And I am charged with teaching you about this. I, who have no more direct knowledge of it than you. Every year I spend hundreds of hours reading histories of old Earth. I steep myself in them until I can smell the greed of the States on the air and feel the chill sweat of their subjects’ fear on my own skin. But why? We’ve left the State behind forever, haven’t we? Would any of you care to guess why I put myself through that torture year after year, and why I’ve put you through this briefer one today?”
     A student raised a tentative hand. “Because it’s necessary, sir?”
     Stromberg shook his head slowly. “Necessary to whom, Mr. Untermeyer? Necessary by whose judgment?” He grinned ruefully. “Necessity is the creed of tyrants. A great man named William Pitt said that. He proved it by going on to become a great tyrant. A man of Hope determines his own necessities. He doesn’t have them determined for him by others.”
     Klaus Untermeyer stood, and the class turned toward him. “But if it isn’t necessary, what other reason could there be?”
     Stromberg pursed his lips and looked down at his lectern. “I noticed that you carry a needlegun, Mr. Untermeyer. May I ask why?”
     The student shrugged. “I’ve always carried one.”
     “Are you good with it?”
     The young man’s eyes narrowed. “Fair.”
     “Have you ever used it to defend yourself?”
     “Uh, no.”
     “But I’d wager a year’s salary that you never leave your room without it. Why?”
     Untermeyer shrugged. “My parents taught me to keep it with me. You never know what might turn up.”
     The sociologist nodded. “Indeed you don’t. Not now, and not in the future. If there’s a soul among you who doesn’t go armed whenever he’s beyond the walls of his home, he’s a benighted fool. Because you don’t know what might turn up. And after twelve hundred years of peace and freedom, neither do we of Hope.”

     Oh, here’s the original quote from William Pitt:

     Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.

     Having said that, I’ll allow that quite a number of thinkers – genuine and self-nominated – have cited “necessity” as the rationale for going outside the law. Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, and others of considerable repute have argued thus. And I have no doubt that any politician worth his bribes would immediately cite all of them and a few others were he to be caught taking “Power above or beyond the Laws.” For politicians, each and every one of them, deem themselves to be “leaders.” And “leaders” are impatient with constraint.

     But not quite as impatient as free men are with “leaders” who dare to step outside the law and claim “necessity.” Especially those men who are fully aware that they would be held to account for their actions. They will want blood… and they get it with surprising regularity.

* * *

     “It’s necessary.” Necessary for what? Necessary for whom? Those are the questions that lurk behind every claim of “necessity.” Robert A. Heinlein brushed up against them in To Sail Beyond The Sunset:

     ‘Thou shalt not steal. I couldn't improve that one, Father.'
     ‘Would you steal to feed a baby?'
     ‘Uh, yes.'
     ‘Think about other exceptions; we'll discuss it in a year or two. But it is a good general rule.’

     Calling thou shalt not steal “a good general rule” is like saying but sometimes you can get away with it. Get away with it how? Why, by pleading “necessity,” of course! But then those noxious questions about “for what” and “for whom” come around on the carousel. Remember Les Miserables? Jean Valjean was servicing his own “necessity.” But it is often the case that in serving one’s own “necessity” he infringes on the “necessity” of another.

     That is why we have courts and jury trials. But prosecutors seldom file cases against the mighty of the land. A jury of private citizens is all too likely to say “No, that wasn’t necessary” and send the offender off to prison. Even if it’s a much gentler prison than the one Jean Valjean suffered, a prosecutor is reluctant to send a Mover or Shaker to one. Prison terms are often cut short retroactively, and Movers and Shakers have long memories.

* * *

     I could go on about this for another twenty pages. But I’ve already done so in what I’ve been told is my best novel, which I cited above.

     My point is simple: I want you to growl menacingly any and every time some “leader” claims “necessity” as his rationale for grabbing “power above or beyond the laws.” I want the bastards who think themselves smarter and more moral than you and me to live in fear: fear of us. Only fear has a Chinaman’s chance of keeping them in line.

     Apologies, Gentle Reader. I let my temper slip its leash for a little while there. We now return you to your previously scheduled programming. Do have a nice day.

Miracles Still Happen

     They’re not always showy events that dazzle the onlookers.

     We needn’t discuss Lourdes, nor the Miracle of the Sun at Fatima in 1917, nor any other of the visually or audibly impressive occurrences the Church has investigated. There are grounds on which even events such as those, witnessed by thousands, can be “explained away.” That those explanations are themselves disputable – they certainly aren’t irrefutable – is also beside the point. Were God’s hand provably the reason for a proposed miracle, faith would not be necessary.

     But faith is necessary. Everyone has one. No one can go through life without adopting a creed of some sort. The hardest of hard-core atheists holds to propositions that are both unverifiable and unfalsifiable.

     Few who choose to believe in God would claim that He is not purposive. While there are conceptions of higher beings and higher planes that incorporate that premise, it has few adherents. Thus, the believer not only looks to miracles as demonstrations of Divine power; he also seeks to know the reason for them.

     Consider the following, recent event.

     The celebrant, a Catholic priest, said afterward that he was overwhelmed by his sudden sense of the weight of God’s power and of human sin. Has it happened to others? Yes. Therefore it wasn’t a unique event. But does that mean that it could not have been a miracle? Emphatically no!

     There’s no imaginable reason why an interior experience can’t be of miraculous origin. Many have had such experiences and have wondered why afterward. They’re seldom explainable by reference to a particular train of thought or an environmental influence. They happen, and we are moved by them; nothing more definitive can be said about them.

     Emotion itself, with its many benefits and perils, is something of a miracle. Scientists have labored to explain the emotions by referring to aspects of brain chemistry and the complexity of the central nervous system, but their hypotheses are as unverifiable and unfalsifiable as any religious doctrine. What we colloquially call “the heart” remains a mystery. So does the phenomenon of the man unable to feel certain common emotions, including love.

     As a writer of fiction, I hold to a common premise about narratives and their relevance to their consumers: You can’t get more out of it than you put into it. That applies quite as strongly to narratives about real-world events as it does to fiction. Believers, who start from the premise of a purposive God, can draw meaning, power, and reinforcement for their beliefs from an event such as the one depicted above. Nonbelievers have less chance of doing so.

     That should come as no surprise. Men are highly variable. Faith is a choice. No two persons share absolutely identical beliefs about anything. We manage to form societies because, thanks to some subconscious awareness of the need, we tolerate differences of vital premises and important convictions among us without allowing them to propel us to violence.

     And that may well be the greatest miracle we know.

     May God bless and keep you all.

Steak, Sizzle, Or Self?

     Happy Autumnal Equinox, Gentle Reader! Today we enter the fall season, which is a favorite here at the Fortress. Soon the colors will be changing, the weather will cool, the fleece garments will come out of storage, and I’ll be sweeping up leaves and patching leaks in the roof… oh, strike that. This should be a happy occasion! It’s Monday, so… well, maybe you should strike that too.

     Anyway, a question has arisen that should interest all writers and anyone else who sells anything. That includes you, doesn’t it? You do – or did – sell either your products or your labor, right? So give this one a hard think:

What are you selling?

     It’s non-trivial, I assure you.

     Consider this pole of the discussion:

Some writers sell themselves.
A few sell a trendy comfort.
Others sell a product.
I simply tell my stories.

I’m not a product, and neither are my books.
The only thing that matters is that you read the stories.
Readers don’t need anything else.

— Delenda Carthago (@DelendaStories) September 20, 2026

     In the strictest imaginable sense, Delenda is correct. After all, the purchaser pays for the book and nothing else. He’s not buying any part of the author, or a guarantee that the author will do any particular thing in the future. What he gets is the book, no more.

     But the book, like any product, conveys other impressions. The purchaser will read the book and draw some conclusions from it:

• Is the story good?
• Is it well told?
• Does it convey specific ideas?
• Do I find those ideas attractive?
• Should I form any expectations of this writer?

     All those things help to mold the purchaser’s future decisions and actions. What do they sell?

     The purchaser’s impressions of the man behind the book matter quite as much as the book itself. Most of us who read have favorites – genres; authors; themes and associated ideas – that we seek to satisfy in our reading. Writers who are consistent about those things will develop followings. Consistency over time reveals the man behind the product.

     I contend that we’re buying into the author quite as much as his books.

     Obviously, this isn’t the same as sitting behind a table at a book-signing event. No one gets to shake the author’s hand or engage him in conversation. But the cumulative impression of a writer that develops over a number of books matters greatly. If he’s to develop a following, he must sell himself as much as his writings. He must consistently evince what I’ve called a sensibility: a set of convictions and attitudes that express a worldview that doesn’t drift or amble about aimlessly.

     The writer cannot “be all things to all men.” He must stake out a specific place in the universe of fiction providers and hold fast to it. That doesn’t mean his convictions can never change. It does mean that his Weltanschauung must be grounded in a particular vision of “how the world works.”

     I was drawn to the late Robret A. Heinlein for that reason, among others. Yes, his writing was unusually graceful for science fiction of the years in which he wrote. I did appreciate that. But more important by far was his remorselessly factual, logical approach to “how the world works,” especially the human part. That might have been because our personalities were compatible; I cannot know, as I never had the privilege of meeting him.

     Most other writers I’ve admired have presented more variable personas. I’ve enjoyed some of their output, but not all. I haven’t pursued their latest works as avidly as I might have. Their divergences sometimes displeased me; they suggested that the man behind the story wasn’t what I’d taken him to be.

     Sensibility, in my view, partakes of craftsmanship, but equally of the writer’s worldview and his willingness to let it show. If that isn’t part of the sale, how likely is the purchaser of your book to want to drink more from your well? And what are you selling, from that perspective? It isn’t just the book, is it?

Morality

     I’ll make this as brief as possible. Morality is a large subject. And yes, it’s one whose discussion tends to make a lot of people uncomfortable. Part of that arises from the desire to believe oneself to be of sound character. Another part arises when the discussion addresses the moral gulfs between various identifiable groups. The latter aspect has come to matter to Americans a great deal more than it did a century ago.

     When the people of our nation were overwhelmingly Christian, peppered here and there by a few Jews and the occasional Oriental or agnostic, an American could proceed through his affairs in the assumption that his moral code was that of everyone around him. It was expressed in the Ten Commandments and the Golden Rule. C.S. Lewis called them, in sum, the Law of General Benevolence. Because we were united on that code, we felt safe among strangers. I’ve talked about this before, most notably in this piece.

     It’s not the case any longer. We’ve imported a great many people to whom the Law of General Benevolence is irrelevant, if not an actual impediment to the satisfaction of their wants. Some of them are scoping you as a potential victim right BLEEP!ing now.

     You can name a few such groups. There are probably a few whose names are unknown to you. But they know you, you trusting Euro-American fool.

     This is the best argument for the reversal of the tides of immigration that have polluted our nation. To be viable, a republic such as ours demands a high-trust society. We are too many to be kept peaceable and sane by policing us. America would need so many police, and so ubiquitous, that the worst totalitarianisms known to history would pale in comparison – and even that many would leave some of us unwatched and unguarded.

     Back from sheer necessity, review Clay Christensen’s striking observation:

     The issue is particularly acute with regard to Indians and Muslims. Members of those demographics are highly unlikely to share Christian moral standards. Therefore, you must not trust them. If you do so, you put yourself in peril.

     Six years ago, I posted briefly about something I’d encountered in a humorous book, a “politically correct” dictionary of sorts. Though my focus this morning isn’t the same as it was then, the observation is nevertheless pertinent. I’ll repeat it here, with emphasis:

“Morally different”
Is a synonym
For EVIL.

     You may not be a practicing Christian, but if you’re of European descent, you’re likely to abide by the Christian moral code. Don’t assume that those of other heritages share that code with you. It could be worth your life.

     I have spoken.

The Latest Threats

     Avast, ye deck rats! The landlubbers be expectin’ a column, even an’ it be Talk Like A Pirate Day! Arr! Well, shiver me timbers, I’ll just have a peek into the “Future Columns” chest for some grub to serve up with yer rum. Now let’s see… ah, here we have it:

1984 playbook everywhere.🇨🇳

Last year 188,760 court records mentioned exit bans.

In 2016 that number was 89.

And now there’s a new law that says if the state thinks you might “endanger” tech or industrial security, they can stop you from leaving the country.

This applies to… pic.twitter.com/ViF0YXU3eG

— Haretina (@HaretinaK) September 17, 2026

     We hear a fair amount about “threats to national security,” these days. “National security” has been used to justify quite a lot of intrusions on Americans’ rights. But as I’ve said before, no one is willing to define it, nor to specify what might threaten it.

     Undefined rationales for suspending or dismissing individuals’ rights bother me a bit. What about you, Gentle Reader? I know, I know: don’t flog a dead horse. But it gets so much more interesting when governments do such things on the basis of one’s trade.

     Haretina Kukuri has brought her usual penetration to this latest outcropping of “threats to our security:”

     1984 playbook everywhere.
     Last year 188,760 court records mentioned exit bans.
     In 2016 that number was 89.
     And now there’s a new law that says if the state thinks you might “endanger” tech or industrial security, they can stop you from leaving the country.
     This applies to everyone by the way… engineers, researchers, and anyone with useful knowledge.
     Soft power stopped working so citizens were packing up and leaving.
     But the system did what systems do when they are authoritarian … it locked the doors.
     Your skills don’t belong to you first.
     They belong to the Party.
     Want to leave?
     Prove you’re not a risk.
     When a government starts treating talent like a national security asset you know what you are dealing with…
     But there is a problem…
     We’re watching the same logic show up in Europe…
     First they normalize tracking everything and sell it to you as security…
     Then movement stops being a right and starts becoming a privilege you have to keep earning!!
     China went straight to the hard version and said if the state thinks your knowledge or skills might be useful elsewhere, they can just stop you leaving.
     But China is ruled by a communist party, so why is Europe trying to promote similar rules?
     For me the direction of travel is obvious.
     More digital IDs.
     More real-time monitoring.
     More rules about who can board a plane when the system flags you.
     More politicians talking about “managing” mobility instead of protecting it.
     The pattern is always the same.
     It starts with a reasonable-sounding reason and it ends with the state deciding your ability to leave is conditional.
     People keep acting surprised when free movement gets treated like a temporary privilege.
     But it shouldn’t be because once a government gets used to controlling information and behavior at scale, controlling physical exit is the next logical step.

     In summary: “The needs of the State come first, comrade.” Today we hear it in every language spoken in the First World. The dirty stew of surveillance, unhallowed investigations, warrantless searches, and now exit bans, all of them founded on threats to undefined conditions, has reached its boiling point.

     Don’t kid yourself, matey. Haretina’s main concern is for Europe, but there’s no reason it couldn’t happen in America. Why shouldn’t “national security” include the forcible retention of “vital” skills and talents? The defense industry, in particular, hungers for them. And what would America be without its trillion-dollar defense industry?

     I shan’t dwell on this at length. Let it suffice to say that it’s vile, the most anti-freedom development since World War II. But let’s take a moment to ponder the second-order effects.

     If Country X makes emigration conditional upon government permission, what effect will that have on persons who might be contemplating moving to X? If X has become, in a charming recent phrase, an open-air prison, will the talented of other nations consider X a desirable place to tote their skills? Doesn’t it seem like Communist East Germany’s border guards might be in prospect? You know, the guys who were ordered to shoot persons attempting to escape as “an act of mercy?”

     Now consider persons already immured in Country X. When they see that freedom of movement has been abolished for certain skill categories, will they seek to acquire those skills? Won’t their interest in them take a hit? As for X’s employers who need those skills, what will happen to their businesses? Wouldn’t you expect applications for employment to decrease?

     Given the above, the next step would be for X’s government to legislate about salaries and working conditions for persons in those categories. Such legislation seldom favors the individuals’ interests.

     Ubiquitous surveillance technology could compound the damage still further. Schoolchildren detected to possess aptitudes that bear on those valuable skills might be “preselected” for involuntary training for the desired occupations. Don’t laugh it aside: it happened in the Soviet Union.

     In view of all that, is it really such a burden to spend just one day of the year talking like a pirate? Yes, yes: I know it’s not related. But think about it, ye scurvy knaves!

Ugly Day Ahead

     Things being as they are – and when aren’t they? – I won’t have time or energy for a fresh piece today, so I’d like to invite my Gentle Readers’ attention to three older pieces:

• What Are National Defense and National Security?
• What’s The Exchange Rate?
• A Failure To Understand, Or An Outright Deceit?

     …plus the snippet below, from Garet Garrett’s essay “Rise of Empire:”

---

     To outsmart the Constitution and to circumvent its restraints became a popular exercise of the art of government in the Roosevelt regime. In defense of his attempt to pack the Supreme Court with social-minded judges after several of his New Deal laws had been declared unconstitutional, President Roosevelt wrote:

     "The reactionary members of the Court had apparently determined to remain on the bench for as long as life continued—for the sole purpose of blocking any program of reform."

     Among the millions who at the time applauded that statement of contempt there were very few, if there was indeed one, who would not have been frightened by a revelation of the logical sequel. They believed, as everyone else did, that there was one thing a President could never do. There was one sentence of the Constitution that could not fall, so long as the Republic lived.

     The Constitution says: "The Congress shall have power to declare war."

     That, therefore, was the one thing no President could do. By his own will he could not declare war. Only Congress could declare war, and Congress could be trusted never to do it but by will of the people. And that was the innermost safeguard of the republic. The decision whether or not to go to war was in the hands of the people—or so they believed. No man could make it for them.

     It is true that President Roosevelt got the country into World War II. That is not the same thing. For a declaration of war he went to Congress—after the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor. He wanted it, he had planned it, and yet the Constitution forbade him to declare war and he durst not do it.

     Nine years later a much weaker President did.

---

     See you tomorrow, I hope.

Wisdom Is Where You Find It

     And who would know better than history’s most celebrated villains?

     And they dreamed big.