Party Political Dynamics Made Simple

     I’ve been involved in politics, one way or another, for three decades. Over that period, nothing of consequence has changed. The country has continued to slide toward totalitarianism, albeit of a uniquely American sort. The spokesmen of the major parties continue to posture and orate, and now and then a “law” gets passed or a Supreme Court decision is announced, but in the main power is exercised largely by unelected bureaucrats.

     Effort exerted without positive consequences is effort wasted. (Don’t quibble. Muscle building is a positive consequence.) That recognition, conscious or not, has moved many persons to absent themselves from the whole mess. They don’t listen to the news; they don’t read the papers; they don’t contribute to any political organization; and they don’t vote.

     It’s that last bit that’s on my mind this morning.

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     The non-voter is often castigated as “lazy” or “uncaring.” That might be true of some. For many, it’s the product of a rational calculation: nothing changes, so why vote? Yet now and again, a non-voter is stirred off his sofa by the appearance of a candidate, or a party platform, that alters that calculation and gives him hope. More often than not, the stimulus is the non-voter’s discovery of a minor party that differs substantially from the major ones.

     There have been many minor parties. For a sample, we have the Populists, the Socialists, the Communists, the Conservatives, the Right-To-Lifers, the Constitutionalists – I borrowed them for a novel -- the Consumers, and of course the Libertarians. None of these get a lot of votes per election, but they do get some – and oftentimes their tally is larger than the margin of victory.

     That can make a major party candidate very angry...especially if the Republican lost the election, and the Libertarian candidate pulled enough votes to make the difference.

     Republican Party candidates have often complained bitterly about such results. They seem to think the GOP candidate has a right to those votes; they act as if the votes that went to the Libertarian were “stolen” from them. They seldom ponder the possibility that he might have to earn them. They seldom pause to wonder whether the only reason those votes were cast at all is that the voters deemed the LP candidate worth the trip to the polling place -- that those voters might have stayed home were he not on the ballot.

     In truth, the LP candidate has done exactly what a minor party exists to do: he’s animated voters most of whom would have stayed home if he weren’t on the ballot, and most of the rest of whom are disgusted with the performances of Republicans raised to office. In effect, his candidacy tells the GOP, “These are the votes you could have had if you were a trustworthy defender of freedom.” He is a linchpin of the political dynamic – a reason for the major parties to sit up, take notice, and contemplate their inadequacies.

     But no one likes to dwell on his failings. Political strategists and aspirants to office like it less than most.

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     The political dynamic arises from the nature of a political party: a mechanism for amassing political power. While it is natural that there are only two major parties, the minor ones are important nevertheless. The dynamic functions properly only under conditions of competition – and the more competitive, the better. The minor party candidates function to represent the sentiments of Americans the major parties displease. They offer the major parties a reason to reconsider their platforms, their selection of candidates, and their behavior in office.

     But they who seek power are unhappy with such entreaties. they’d rather not hear them at all. Indeed, they’d rather that no one hear them. So they do what they can, through law and extralegal alliances, to silence them.

     When the major parties succeed in locking the minor ones out of the battle, as they have often tried to do (and have occasionally succeeded), the dynamic becomes perverse: the major parties tend toward convergence. The differences between their de facto postures diminishes. Far more attention goes toward securing earmarks, feeding, servicing, or otherwise mollifying constituents at home, wooing important contributors and supra-political power brokers in the media and industry, and of course, staying in power. It takes a rare event, such as the Democrats’ nomination of William Jennings Bryan in 1896, to cause a major shift in arrangements or allegiances.

     If they could see to it, the major parties would render the minor ones illegal. It would guarantee their grip on power in perpetuity. The major parties would preserve the fiction of independent identities, but in fact they would become a single, silently coordinated “Incumbent Party,” whose inner workings would be visible only to a well-guarded elite. Elections would become even more of a sham than they already are. It is due partly to enormous efforts and partly to good fortune that despite considerable major-party effort to that effect, the minor ones continue to appeal to those Americans who see no difference worth mentioning between the Democrats and the Republicans.

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     The only thing that can defeat an entrenched dynamic is a counter-dynamic of equal or greater magnitude. Accordingly, Americans who want something other than the political status quo should seriously consider a minor party -- any minor party – rather than resigning themselves to supporting “the lesser of two evils” at a time when the difference between those evils is shrinking toward invisibility.

     Were the minor parties, in aggregate, to rise to a status at which they command 10% of the vote, the major parties would undergo a convulsive upheaval. A 10% margin in any election is “landslide” territory. It commands respect. It represents “a mandate to lead.” What power-seeker wouldn’t lick his chops at the possibility of winning over that disaffected 10%?

     Note that I don’t advocate supporting a particular minor party. There are differences among them, of course. Some are more focused on one issue than all others. Some are stylistically more to Smith’s taste than to Jones’s. And some such as the wonderfully irreverent Rhino Party, are just for fun.

     What’s important about the minor parties is that all of them are “outside the fences.” If you want the major parties to stop behaving as if they own this country in fee simple and needn’t bother their heads about what you think, selecting and supporting one might be the most constructive means toward that end.

Sticklers.

You know what I find so hilarious...

Nevada Democrat Party ignored the Bernie delegates that gave Bernie the lead in Nevada...

These delegates were ignored because... get this.... Those delegates did not have PROPER ID!!!

So, I guess Democrats really DON'T have a problem with Voter ID and Voter Disenfranchisement... As long as they suit their agenda....

Hypocrite, thy name is Democrat Party...

Comment on "Bernie Sanders can’t afford to stay silent any longer." Editorial, Sacramento Bee, 5/17/16.

Clinton's climate of violence.

This would not have happened but for Clinton's public celebration of violence:

Wendell Pierce, best known for his role on The Wire, was arrested for allegedly attacking a Bernie Sanders supporter on Saturday. According to reports, Pierce grabbed a woman’s hair and hit her in the head for supporting Sanders. Pierce was reportedly talking to the woman and her boyfriend at the Loews Hotel in Atlanta around 3:30 a.m. before the attack took place. He was arrested for battery and was later released on $1,000 bail. Pierce has been very supportive of Hillary Clinton’s campaign, and has been outspoken about his dislike for Bernie Sanders.

"Bernie Sanders can’t afford to stay silent any longer." Editorial, Sacramento Bee, 5/17/16.

Quickies: Some GOOD News!

     Now and then, truth and justice do triumph:

     When given the choice of standing alongside a decorated military hero or a bunch of militant LGBT activists – choose wisely.

     The leadership of Hampden-Sydney College learned that lesson the hard way.

     On May 19 I reported to you that the Virginia all-male college had chosen not to renew retired Lt. Gen. Jerry Boykin’s contract – ending his stellar, nine-year career teaching leadership and ethics.

     Less than six hours later, the college reversed its decision and offered the retired general a one-year contract....

     The LGBT activists had wanted Hampden-Sydney to fire Boykin over a joke he made to a gathering of conservatives. They accused him of advocating for violence against gays and transgender people.

     “The first man who goes into the restroom with my daughter will not have to worry about surgery,” Boykin told the crowd.

     Remember always, Gentle Readers: Leftists and their mascot groups have no sense of humor. Then gauge how much of a risk you’re willing to take for the sake of a wisecrack, or the transient pleasure of a little plain speaking.

A Friday Assortment

     As my friend Adrienne has said, some day’s it’s just not worth chewing through the restraints. So have a few blips, slips, and quips instead of a “real” essay.

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1. Prospects For An American Collapse.

     The brilliant (and far more beautiful than she thinks) Sarah Hoyt is tired of the doom-and-gloom talk:

     Okay, I’m sick and tired of hearing in every group I belong to that “Doom, gloom, the end is coming soon.”

     Now, I join with you in thinking that we’re on a difficult path and with the pool of two joker-Americans to pick from for the presidency, it might be a mighty step for joker-Americans, but the rest of us are going to suffer a worse economy, diminished prospects and likely, in either case, because hyenas smell blood, war at home and abroad....

     I mean, let’s be real, okay? I’m more than sick and tired of people envisioning a plunge down into the middle ages, or the stone age. I’m more than sick and tired of people imagining that tomorrow we’ll be Venezuela.

     Well, no, we won’t be Venezuela. For one thing, our version of Spanish is a fair distance from theirs and includes words for a lot of drugs the Venezuelans don’t consume. But there are reasons to “hope for the best” but “prepare for the worst:”

     There is, I’m trying to tell you, an inertia to good things as well as bad.

     When he spoke at the Californial LP Convention in 1987, Milton Friedman offered the opinion that the U.S. has been coasting on momentum from the Nineteenth and early Twentieth Centuries. However, except in the total absence of frictional effects, inertia diminishes logarithmically with time. We could be nearer to the bottom of the tank than anyone realizes. Indeed, the past fifteen years have provided significant bits of evidence to that effect.

     As hard as it is to change society for the better, it’s also difficult to change it for worse.

     I must disagree. It’s a lot easier to destroy than it is to create. Ask the “Palestinians.”

     Barring a cataclysm of epic proportions, computer programmers won’t become farmers.

     And how grateful I am for that!

     Yes, I know, you’re going to say “what happens when the welfare checks fail?”

     As bad as that would be, the cataclysm that would follow the total cessation of Social Security payments could be a lot worse. Many among the poor are able-bodied – Herbert Spencer called them “sturdy beggars” – who could sustain their lives by manual labor.

     People tend to imagine welfare recipients becoming destitute and descending on other neighborhoods.... they mostly sit in place and lament and try to use their victimhood to get stuff.

     If we were concerned only with the “purely” destitute, this would probably be the outcome of a collapse of the welfare system. However, our “poor” are the most entitled poor in history. Moreover, they’ve been heavily leavened with notions of racial and ethnic maltreatment that inclines a significant fraction of them toward “acting out:” violence.

     Don’t quit your job and become a goat herder.

     Good God, no! I want to be a lumberjack! Leaping from tree to tree!...

     Your first priority should be to maximize your income or your wealth.

     It’s equally important to secure it against seizure – a significant feature of collapses in countries inclined toward socialism.

     Your second priority is to make sure your home is safe...

     This tends to be better done as a community effort.

     Your third priority is making sure you’re safe....being situationally aware.

     Nothing can compensate for good situational awareness, especially when one is in transit. However, those who must frequently leave their fortresses to move through populated zones have a particular problem with this. He who can minimize such travel has an advantage.

     Be not afraid. And don’t give up.

     Be a little afraid. Fear can be a useful servant, as long as it falls short of the magnitude that paralyzes you.

     Please read all of Sarah’s column. If nothing else, it’s a divergent and useful perspective.

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2. Trends In Censorship.

     Via Stuart Schneiderman comes this bit of news from the north:

     Citing the need to make transgender people “feel safe and secure in who they are,” Canada’s Minister of Justice Jody Wilson-Raybould introduced legislation Tuesday that would prohibit discrimination on the basis of “gender identity” or “gender expression” and make anti-transgender “hate propaganda” punishable by up to two years in prison. The proposed legislation — which was unveiled on the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia — would amend the Canadian Criminal Code to expand existing “hate speech” prohibitions to include any public speech or communication that “promotes hatred” on the basis of “gender identity” or “gender expression.”

     Don’t preen yourselves, fellow Americans, on your “First Amendment freedom of speech.” Left-liberals and activists in our hallowed land are demanding exactly such legislation...and should Obama be followed in the White House by either Democrat candidate, we’re very likely to get it.

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3. “Deniers.”

     Time was, denier meant something akin to thread count in women’s stockings and pantyhose. Today it’s used in a much different fashion. The esteemed Jonah Goldberg comments on the various ironies and inanities:

     Put aside the fact that there is no such thing as settled science. Scientists are constantly questioning their understanding of things; that is what science does. All the great scientists of history are justly famous for overturning the assumptions of their fields. The real problem is that in politics, invocations of science are very often marketing techniques masquerading as appeals to irrefutable authority. In an increasingly secular society, having science on your side is better than having God on your side — at least in an argument.

     I’m not saying that you can’t have science in your corner, or that lawmakers shouldn’t look to science when making policy. (Legislation that rejects the existence of gravity makes for very silly laws indeed.) But the real intent behind so many claims to “settled science” is to avoid having to make your case. It’s an undemocratic technique for delegitimizing opposing views and saying “shut up” to dissenters....

     For starters, why are liberalism’s pet issues the lodestars of what constitutes scientific fact? Medical science informs us fetuses are human beings. The liberal response? “Who cares?” Genetically modified foods are safe, sayeth the scientists. “Shut up,” reply the liberal activists. IQ is partly heritable, the neuroscientists tell us. “Shut up, bigot,” the liberals shriek.

     (Cue my favorite Andrew Klavan video.) But wait: there’s more!

     In New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio is pushing to fine businesses that do not address customers by their “preferred name, pronoun and title (e.g., Ms./Mrs.) regardless of the individual’s sex assigned at birth, anatomy, gender, medical history, appearance, or the sex indicated on the individual’s identification.” The NYC Commission on Human Rights can penalize offenders up to $250,000.

     See segment #2 above, and shudder.

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     That’s all for today, Gentle Reader. Time for some decaf and fiction. And maybe later, a little yard work. Or not. See you tomorrow.

For Your Listening Pleasure

     The recent death of Prince has elicited a great deal of commentary about him and the many styles of music he went through over the breadth of his career. There’s no question he was comfortable with an unusually wide variety of musical families...but the following short video of a pre-concert preparation session really brings home how multitalented and versatile he was:

     I’ve heard “Summertime” done in many different styles, but the above is the first time I’ve heard it done as a tune-up exercise. And even so, it’s mesmerizing.

     R.I.P Prince Rogers Nelson.

Congress's aversion to its duty.

Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) and other legislators have filed amendments to the 2017 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) in an effort to force a broad congressional debate, especially related to the war against the Islamic State (ISIS). It’s not simply that Congress hasn’t debated the use of force in the war against ISIS. It’s that as a body they actively resist such debate.^[1]

The Republican Congress, that is.

Notes
^[1] "Congress Is Ignoring Its Most Important Constitutional Duty." By Daniel L. Davis, The National Interest, 5/17/16.

Quickies: Two Governors And Lots Of Sniping

     Third parties don’t appeal to many voters, who are concerned that they’ll “waste” their votes on candidates who “can’t win.” Similarly, politicians who’ve attained high offices as candidates of a major party aren’t often interested in realigning themselves with a third party.

     That’s what makes this significant:

     Seizing new fuel for his appeal to Donald Trump's critics, former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson has joined forces with another former Republican governor to strengthen his Libertarian presidential bid.

     William Weld, who served two terms as the Republican governor of Massachusetts in the 1990s, will announce plans Thursday to seek the Libertarian Party's vice presidential nomination, Johnson confirmed in a Wednesday interview with the Associated Press. The pair met privately in Las Vegas over the weekend when Weld agreed to run as Johnson's running mate in the party's upcoming nominating convention and into the general election.

     "We got together and shook hands on it," Johnson told the AP in an interview in Salt Lake City, where his underdog presidential campaign is based. "It brings an enormous amount of credibility to what it is I'm doing. I'm unbelievably flattered by this and humbled."

     Johnson is casting himself as the best — and perhaps only — alternative to Trump, as the New York billionaire's Republican critics struggle to identify another third-party candidate.

     The LP presidential ticket has little chance of scoring even one electoral vote; the one and only time that happened was in 1972, when elector Roger McBride, who would later be an LP luminary himself, cast his nominally GOP electoral vote for the LP ticket of John Hospers and Toni Nathan. However, the two-governor ticket lends increased respectability and seriousness to the LP. From the comments to that article and this one, that has some Republican diehards worried:

     Add 2% to the est 2% head start they get at the starting line in the form of all Dem votes voter fraud, and the 4% total gets Hillary elected. This is a serious election, perhaps the most serious ever. Gary and Weld are not serious men, they should be done with it and join the Dem Party.

     This is good news for: Clinton supporters, And deluded Libertarian voters... who can't admit that their pride and spite will only help Clinton, and hurt America.

     Why don't these douchebags just rips off the mask and endorse Bernie? What utter stooges.

     The underlying assumption is that the Republican ticket “should get” the votes that go to the LP ticket. In other words, the GOP “owns” those votes, and the LP candidates will be “stealing” them. The same claim was made when U.S. Senator for Minnesota Norm Coleman lost to Al Franken in 2008, except with even more venom.

     Among displays of political vanity, that attitude is hard to beat. It also suggests an unwillingness to grapple with why hundreds of thousands of Americans quadrennially cast their votes for presidential candidates “who can’t possibly win” – and of course, an equal unwillingness to work for those votes.

     Hubris is a precursor to Nemesis, Republican partisans. You might want to keep that in mind.

The Not So Hidden Persuaders

     You’ve heard about the Facebook “trending” scandal. You remember the attempt to silence Ezra Levant. You’ve heard about the “lawfare” campaign Michael Mann has mounted against Mark Steyn. And of course, you know about the “safe spaces” rage on American university campuses. The arrows point, generally, in the same direction: a set of blunt-force attempts to suppress news and opinions that displease the Left.

     They’re all bad, noxious, intolerable. Yet they’re not the most dangerous of recent strokes against freedom of expression. There are some that, by virtue of their greater subtlety and ability to couple with our desires and preconceptions, are far worse. Likely they’re attempting to operate on you even as you read this.

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     Consider the recent spate of stories about long security lines at America’s airports. I don’t fly any more, so this is of no personal consequence to me...but this revelation most certainly is:

     As travelers suffer through long airport security lines, the Transportation Security Administration is spending millions on advertising, public relations, new uniforms, and office furniture.

     The agency has blamed budget constraints for the nightmarish lines, which have caused 4,000 Americans to miss their flights and 100 travelers to sleep on cots overnight at Chicago’s O’Hare airport.

     However, an analysis of recent government contracts reveals that over the past month the TSA has spent more than $2 million on various services unrelated to increasing manpower or improving security.

     The agency awarded a public relations contract worth $53,234 for news clippings and media monitoring from a company that worked with President Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection campaign....

     The TSA is also spending heavily on advertising. This month the agency rehired a communications firm that in the past was in charge of the TSA’s “brand strategy.”

     The $1.7 million contract is for “continued marketing services and additional advertising support.” Sage Communications, LLC will provide Google text ads, online ads on travel related websites, video ads, Facebook and Twitter ads, as well as develop a “media plan and social media strategic communications plan.”

     Sage Communications will also monitor and report on the results of its social media and advertising campaigns.

     Once you’ve gotten past the insoluble mystery of why the TSA needs to advertise at all, perhaps you’ll ponder the clash between TSA’s ad spending and its “budget constraints.” The TSA claims to have no money for its core function, yet it has plenty to spend on promoting itself! Intriguing, eh what?

     That’s one.

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     The Hillary Clinton email scandal has grown prodigious “legs,” such that no amount of airy dismissals by the candidate can neutralize it. So what’s to be done? Why, this, obviously:

     In the last few days, two articles have appeared defending Hillary Clinton's use of a private server for her classified communications. One, from the famously objective PolitiFact, continued their amazingly uninformed series of "fact checks" with a check of Colorado Senate candidate Jack Graham's statement that "it's clear that [Clinton] violated security laws." The other article was written by Paul Waldman at the Washington Post Plum Line blog.

     Please read the whole thing. Author Charlie Martin knows his stuff – and I can say that with assurance because, having worked in defense engineering for 25 years and having held high security clearances the entire time, I know the security laws and regulations quite well. He demonstrates that the articles at PolitiFact, the Washington Post, and The American Prospect, are erroneous in a fashion that is both consistent and deliberate: conscious attempts by their authors to paper over Mrs. Clinton’s several felonies and thus soothe those who doubt her trustworthiness.

     That’s two.

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     Finally for this morning, there’s this adroit bit of indirect slander:

     All over the country, employers say they see a disturbing downside of tighter labor markets as they try to rebuild from the worst recession since the Depression: They are struggling to find workers who can pass a pre-employment drug test.

     That hurdle partly stems from the growing ubiquity of drug testing, at corporations with big human resources departments, in industries like trucking where testing is mandated by federal law for safety reasons, and increasingly at smaller companies.

     But data suggest employers’ difficulties also reflect an increase in the use of drugs, especially marijuana — employers’ main gripe — and also heroin and other opioid drugs much in the news.

     What are we to make of this? Here’s one reaction, from a usually more skeptical observer:

     I'm willing to bet that the Venn Diagram showing "People in poverty" and "People who use drugs" is almost a perfect circle, with just a few slivers on either side.

     Really? Should a sufficiently large number of readers form that conclusion, what elements of our political and media classes are most likely to benefit? Would that strike you as a conclusion the New York Times might want you to reach?

     That’s three.

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     When all the errors are in the bank’s favor, you can be forgiven for thinking there’s more at work than sloppy arithmetic. – Me.

     “A mechanical process can reverse a bit at random, but motivation acts like a field — the elements won’t change unless the field does.” — James Tiptree, “Faithful To Thee, Terra, In Our Fashion”

     Persuasion is a much studied field these days. There’s so much money to be made – and not just in selling the public on a new cell phone or a body spray guaranteed to get you “all the way home.”

     The Left has suffered a number of failures in its blunter attempts to bludgeon the American people into buying its nostrums. The reactions against such phenomena as Occupy and Black Lives Matter have been so dramatically negative that the message cannot be missed. While this wasn’t exactly predictable, it was certainly “in the cards,” given the longtime American resistance to such techniques. Accordingly, the strategists and tacticians of the Left have reverted to their earlier tools: gradualism and soothing syrup.

     Gradualism gave us a state of affairs in which it’s possible for a city government to seize a whole community under eminent domain and turn it over to a private developer; for unelected bureaucrats to harass a voter-fidelity activist with the full power of the federal government; for other unelected bureaucrats to fine a couple $16 million for putting a pond on their own property; and for an activist district attorney to indict a Congressman for completely legal fundraising practices and a state governor for a legitimate exercise of his ex officio authority. Gradualism has removed all the Constitutional fetters from political authority. This has been the Left’s design for decades. Now it only needs to put into office men who will use that unbounded power to totalitarianize the country once and for all.

     If there’s a little problem with massive popular resistance, the Left will use its allies in the media to soothe those who dislike what they’ve seen and heard. The media have been good friends to the Left over the decades. Education and journalism have been its bastions since before World War II.

     The process is one of minimization and, when possible, the exploitation of the audience’s existing mindset. Don’t rant and rave denials; merely soften and redirect. Couple the message to what the listener would prefer to believe. Trust us, the TSA says: we’re doing the best we can with the meager resources those skinflints in Congress have allowed us. Hillary Clinton didn’t send or receive information that was marked classified. And all those jobless folks? Well, if they weren’t all on drugs...

     Get the idea?

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     Making use of what people already believe, or what they’d prefer to believe if given a reason, is a far more powerful persuasive technique than bullhorning your contrary stance directly into their faces. The master persuaders have known this for a long time.

     Some years ago, there was a faddish set of notions about “subliminal seduction:” the use of persuasive elements below the threshold of conscious perception in broadcast advertising. It turned out that, while those techniques had been tried, they’d proved ineffective. Appealing to the conscious mind provides a more reliable return on investment.

     Review the instances cited above. Think about the other news items and opinion columns you’ve read recently. Ponder your own convictions and preferences, and how you automatically seek out those whose views tend to accord with them. It feels good to encounter a like minded, intelligent man who’ll tell you that yes, you’re the reasonable one, it’s the others who are off base.

     Works, doesn’t it?

Unnatural Selection

Back when I was a young teenager (way before the web), I regularly read Popular Science, Popular Mechanics, and Hot Rod magazine.  They had a way of igniting the imagination of a thirteen-year-old about what he might drive upon reaching that arbitrary age of sixteen.  In the meantime, go-karts, mini-bikes, and bicycles would have to satisfy that innate yearning for autonomy and speed.

 
One of the solutions that always seemed attainable to a cash-strapped kid was the kit-car.  They appeared in ads near the back of those same magazines.  Cool pictures of a Shelby Cobra GT, a British MG TD, even exotics like the Lamborghini and Ferrari.  The Dune Buggy was the only model that seemed real – or at least not an imitation of a real model.  
  

The prices for those cool bodies always seemed relatively reasonable – as low as $399.  Of course, that did not include the underlying chassis, power plant, and busted knuckles required to make the pipe dream a reality.  It would be on you to find your own Volkswagen Beetle to complete the project.

There is something somewhat similar to the kit-car going on in the South China Sea.  There, the Red Chinese are busy building artificial islands on nature’s VW chassis.  By taking natural reefs and dredging sediment from the seafloor, they’re creating artificial islands.  Some are growing by as much as eight acres a day.

The NY Times reports, “China appears to be pushing ahead with its building spree in the disputed waters.  On Tuesday, Chinese state news media announced that construction had begun on two new lighthouses in the Spratly Islands, adding to the growing number of structures that satellite images indicate China is building, including airstrips.”   The Obama administration argues that China can't use artificially constructed islands to expand its sovereignty, mineral and fishing rights or to impede the international right to freedom of navigation.  
 

Let’s just hope that the invisible-ink pen that Obama’s been using to draw red lines around the globe isn’t water-soluble too.

  Now consider what is going on in America today.  The Obama administration, in a letter to every public school district in the country, has decreed that kids must be able to choose what facilities they’ll use based on their self-declared “gender”.  The declaration goes well beyond bathrooms – it includes privacy rights, education records, and sex-segregated athletics.  Although the letter does not carry the weight of law, it does threaten that failure to comply could result in lawsuits or revocation of federal aid.

It should come as no surprise that Obama wants locker and bathroom use decided by one’s self-professed “gender-identity” over what’s on a birth certificate.

If we do not permit school-age kids to vote, smoke, or drink, why in the world would we let them choose their “gender”?  What kind of a parent gives in to a kid’s every whim or desire – especially on a matter of that magnitude.  Even worse is an administration that would promote this aberrant behavior as acceptable – while demanding the rest of America accepts it too.  

Thinking that a kit-car is the same as the real thing would be wacky.  Acknowledging the artificial islands as legitimate sovereign territory would be disastrous.  Believing gender is a function of the mind or the result of medical modifications is madness.  

Even so, we should have great sympathy for a kit-car that thinks it’s the real thing – no matter how well the bodywork, it’s just a replica.  If girls are suffering from body image issues now with our sex-obsessed culture, just wait until the “girl” that was a “boy” feels the pressure.  What could possibly go wrong?

When questioned about divorce by the Pharisees Jesus reminded them about Moses’ teaching in Genesis:  “But at the beginning of creation God made them male and female.”  Jesus had a stern warning for those that want to let kids decide if they’re “male” or “female” -- “Things that cause people to stumble are bound to come, but woe to anyone through whom they come.   It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.”

In some perverted way, this is reminiscent of the Obama administration’s foolish “cash for clunkers” program.  The last thing the government should be doing is ensuring the destruction of VWs in order to promote the creation of mere imitations. 

So what is the Obama administration’s response to the contention that when it comes to China and bathrooms they cannot have it both ways? 

 “Yes we can!” 

Quickies: Antipope Francis?

     For some time now, Ann Barnhardt has denounced Jorge Cardinal Bergoglio, a.k.a. “Pope Francis,” as a villain and an enemy of the Church. I’ve tried to reserve judgment on the matter, being: 1) a lay Catholic of somewhat off-center convictions, and 2) not half as certain of my opinions on doctrinal and ecclesiastical matters as Ann Barnhardt. Also, it doesn’t conduce to certainty about a man to be half a world away from him and entirely unacquainted with him personally.

     But with this most recent papal effusion, I’ve moved a whole lot closer to Ann’s opinion of the cardinal from Argentina:

     In an interview on Tuesday with the French magazine La Croix, Francis minimized the difference between Islam and Christianity, arguing that the religions share a concept of subjugation.

     Today, I don't think that there is a fear of Islam as such but of ISIS and its war of conquest, which is partly drawn from Islam. It is true that the idea of conquest is inherent in the soul of Islam. However, it is also possible to interpret the objective in Matthew's Gospel, where Jesus sends his disciples to all nations, in terms of the same idea of conquest.

     This connection is so asinine, it can only be explained as a deduction from the liberal tenet that all religions are morally equivalent.

     Let’s make the most generous possible assumptions about what Bergoglio said:

• That he was misquoted;
• That he spoke casually and in haste;
• That he was mistranslated, perhaps deliberately;
• That he was under pressure to satisfy the interviewer’s agenda;
• That he simply failed to find the right words to express his intended meaning.

     Even if all the above were provably true, the quoted statement is as massively unwise and anti-canonical as any statement recorded as having been made by a pontiff. Worse, those five generous assumptions cannot simultaneously be true.

     The most benevolent possible evaluation I can make of Bergoglio, given all his other massively unwise (and frequently ignorant) forays into spheres a sensible cleric would instinctively avoid, is that he’s a fool: a well-meaning fool, perhaps, but that kind can do even more damage than a malicious one.

     Did the College of Cardinals have an agenda of some sort when it elevated this man to the Throne of Saint Peter? If so, what could it have been? Nothing in accord with the interests of the Church or Christianity in general, I’d say. Perhaps they sought to “back away slowly” from some of the more conservative stances of Pope Benedict XVI. If so, they got a whole lot more than they bargained for.

     Popes don’t last forever. At some point Bergoglio will depart from the papacy. What sort of man will the College choose to succeed him – and what will their selection tell us about the vector of the Church, the oldest continuously functioning institution in the world and the one most reviled by “those who have not joy,” who would see Christianity extinguished forever?

America: Banana republic.

The United States has begun to fit the social and political profile of a Latin-American banana republic. We have a multicultural society now, fierce racial antagonisms, a weak sense of national identity, a class of superrich who live mostly apart from the rest of the people, a ruling oligarchy, imperial presidents who possess dictatorial powers, a corrupt congress bought and paid for by corporate wealth, a police-ridden surveillance state, and a vainglorious military that, despite its long record of lost wars, remains the only institution in society that commands respect.

William T. Vollmann, in his 2009 book Imperial, writes that Americans have believed too literally and uncritically in their national myths of abundance (unlimited space and resources), money (bringing happiness, success, and national cohesion), progress (everything is getting better) and meliorism (every problem can be solved), and innocence. There are also the conflicting immigration myths of assimilation and mosaic. The first assures us that Mexicans will become like us, and the second that Mexicans will enrich us because they are different. Yet America’s overly generous and undiscriminating immigration policy is driven also by ethnic resentments and politico-economic calculations. As Americans have turned against the policy, naked power has stepped forward to tell them that the policy will remain the same, whether they like it or not. And this is another way that we have become like Mexico: We have awakened to realize that our government is not our own, that we are ruled, essentially, by our enemies.^[1]

Not sure I agree with the "vainglorious military" point but I do with the rest of it. Obama got his fundamental transformation alright but he built on a foundation laid by decades of work by leftist fanatics and liars. America has been gutted racially, legally, morally, and politically.

10,000 miles away our troops fight people who are either not our enemies or who can do us little harm all while our own homeland is being invaded by third-world parasites and enemies. No American soldier mans the southern ramparts. Not one.

When the invaders get here, we ply them with public benefits and destroy our legal system's ability to deal with their pathologies and enmity. They shoulder aside Americans in the job market to the cheers of our leftist enemies. We wet our pants in excitement at granting these invaders U.S. citizenship. Shriners on parade floats are more discriminating when they toss Tootsie Rolls to bystanders.

One out of two dynastic contenders for the presidency was eliminated in this year's primaries and the one left standing is a corrupt, foul-mouthed, bloodthirsty, lying Alinskyite who is the darling of the leftist establishment and whose closest companion, Huma Abedin, is described, in part, by Discover the Networks thus:

Longtime former employee of the Institute of Muslim Minority Affairs, which shares the Muslim Brotherhood's goal of establishing Islamic supremacy and Sharia Law worldwide.^[2]

If there's any coherence or rationality to how we approach politics and culture in the U.S. I'm not seeing it.

Notes
^[1] "The Mexicanization of North America." By H.A. Scott Trask, Chronicles, 5/5/16 (emphasis added).
^[2] Discover the Networks.

Do You Own Yourself?

     Those of us concerned with individual rights and their roots in the nature of Man have searched long and hard for a foundation for our convictions: a set of premises about which everyone could agree, from which the rights we champion can be smoothly derived. The stops along the way have included religious convictions, the assertion that rights are “self-evident,” and a variety of arguments from symmetry. None of these have proved completely satisfactory.

     In recent years, the most promising possibility has been the notion of self-ownership: the premise that one owns oneself in a fashion comparable to other kinds of property. Several notable theorists, including David Friedman and Walter Block, have traced a logical path from that premise to the individual rights to life, liberty, and honestly acquired property that are at the heart of the libertarian idea. Indeed, the premise even lends support to the important proposition that the rights of a minor child are held in trust by his parents until the child can “homestead himself” into a recognizably functioning adult.

     However, successfully founding our rights on an axiom of self-ownership requires two things: The first, and more obvious, is that some accept the assertion...but some do not:

     The humans are always putting up claims to ownership which sound equally funny in Heaven and in Hell, and we must keep them doing so. Much of the modern resistance to chastity comes from men’s belief that they ‘own’ their bodies — those vast and perilous estates, pulsating with the energy that made the worlds, in which they find themselves without their consent and from which they are ejected at the pleasure of Another! It is as if a royal child whom his father has placed, for love’s sake, in titular command of some great province, under the real rule of wise counselors, should come to fancy that he really owns the cities, the forests, and the corn, in the same way as he owns the bricks on the nursery floor. [C. S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters]

     (Indeed, Lewis’s observations above might help us to resolve the ultimate problems with a premise of self-ownership...but that’s for later.)

     The second requirement is that the implications of self-ownership not appear absurd. Here, the difficulties arise from aspects of the property relation that are clear and well supported by practice when applied to other sorts of property. The most troublesome one is the notion of transferability.

     We abhor slavery. All civilized nations have outlawed the practice; those nations in which it persists must deny it for public-relations purposes. Yet slavery is merely the property relation as applied to a human being. If Smith owns himself in the same way as he owns his house, car, and pets, what prohibits him from agreeing to become Jones’s slave? More troubling still, what would prevent Jones from seeking a decree of involuntary indenture against Smith, if Smith has incurred a debt to Jones that he can satisfy in no other way?

     No decent person would want to see that come about. We outlawed debtor’s prisons and established a legal path toward debt relief through bankruptcy to avert it. Yet to regard Smith as Smith’s property carries the implication that that property relation is transferable, as are all other property relations recognized in civilized societies. If self-ownership is to become the foundation of our argument for individual rights, this is a problem that must be solved.

---

     It’s not enough to dismiss the matter as unworthy of consideration. The implications, both philosophical and social, are serious enough to fatally undermine the edifice of individual rights. It is impermissible to invoke religious arguments; not everyone accepts the same assumptions about such things. Indeed, at least one major religion, Islam, accepts slavery as fully justified. Nor can the problem be solved with legislation, Constitutional or otherwise, as the very purpose of the assertion of rights is to circumscribe legislation. We must either find a refutation of self-transferability that nevertheless preserves the essence of self-ownership, or accept that it justifies slavery, with all the consequences thereof.

     Various persons, some very bright, have grappled with the matter without reaching a satisfactory conclusion. The late Robert Nozick, in his masterwork Anarchy, State, and Utopia, concluded that slavery was a permissible consequence of the axiom. His conclusion disturbed many persons who were otherwise thrilled with the excellence of his reasoning.

     The answer might lie in one of the insufficiently discussed and understood aspects of the property relation. It’s been important to the adjudication of matters concerning both real and movable property, and has special application to weapons law.

---

     In an essay that originally appeared at Eternity Road and which is reposted here, I wrote:

     The concept of ownership -- that status that confers rights over the thing owned -- has a small number of prerequisites:

1. The thing owned must have been acquired either by:
   • homesteading: That is, it was previously owned by no one, and the owner gathered it in by his own action or the action of a contracted agent;
   • trade: That is, it was previously legitimately owned by another, who parted with it voluntarily in exchange for some other consideration, or none.
2. The thing owned must be held apart from the common: That is, the owner must sustain his claim of ownership by assertion, use, and the maintenance of the thing in an "improved" state.
3. The thing owned must be within one's adequate control: That is, one must be able to make reasonable guarantees that neither its possession nor its use will infringe upon the rights of any innocent party.

     Failure of any of the above conditions nullifies a property claim. For example, having acquired a plot of land, Smith might permit it to deteriorate to the point that it can no longer be distinguished from an unowned field. That would nullify Smith's claims through the agency of neglect. Alternatively, he might pollute it in such a fashion as to pollute his neighbors' lands as well. That would nullify his claims through the agency of inadequate control. Either of these would warrant a fresh homesteading of the field, or seizing the field from him on the grounds of a clear and present danger.

     If the language sounds familiar, that's because it's well embedded in Anglo-American legal practice for about three centuries now.

     Adequate control is also the logic behind assessing a claim of damage against an owner for what his property did without his knowledge. For example, if Smith were to buy gasoline -- an ordinary sort of transaction -- and store it in his garage, he would become liable for any damage that gasoline might inflict on others. If he were to park his car on a hill, and the car's parking brake were to fail and send it careening into a crowd, he would be liable for the deaths, injuries, and property damage that ensued. And if he were to acquire radioactives, which then poisoned his neighbors or made their homes uninhabitable, he would be liable for those crimes as well.

     By acquiring an item, the owner assumes responsibility for whatever that item might inflict upon unconsenting others. Alfred Bester's classic short story "Fondly Fahrenheit" is a neat dramatization of this principle.

     The subject of that essay was the hoary old “private nuclear weapon” exception to the right to keep and bear arms. The subject of that essay was the hoary old “private nuclear weapon” exception to the right to keep and bear arms. Private parties cannot exercise adequate control over weapons of mass destruction; indeed, it’s become questionable whether even governments can do so. If you cannot control it, you cannot claim ownership of it.

     The critical step here is the all-important distinction between control and coercion. A human being can only be controlled by himself. (Let’s pass in silence over the many cases of persons who fail to exercise that control.) Slaves are not controlled by their owners; they are coerced with the threat of punishment. In consequence, the slave does only what he must to avert such punishment. Moreover, when the agency of punishment absents itself, or is induced to “look elsewhere,” the fiction of control becomes a mockery as the slave undertakes whatever course suits him best: a course very likely to be at the expense of his owner.

     I submit that coercion does not constitute adequate control under Anglo-American notions of property, and that therefore no man can legitimately claim another as his property. If this conclusion is defensible – and I must admit that I’ve never before used this chain of reasoning in the context of self-transferability or slavery – it solves the problems inherent in the axiom of self-ownership, freeing us to use it as the fundamental premise for arguments about individuals’ rights.

---

     The many passionate advocates for individuals’ classically understood rights have fought long and hard to have their case accepted by others. Too often those others will reply with one or another of the never-ending “Yes, buts:” “Yes, but what about the army?” “Yes, but what about the poor?” “Yes, but what about my dairy subsidies?” These are not philosophically sound rejoinders; they can all be dealt with. The intellectual case for our rights has often been snorted aside as hanging weightless in mid-air, a set of assertions as arbitrary as any infant’s claim that “I want it, therefore it’s mine.” And of course, there will always be carpers who dismiss the entire subject as “antiquated,” “impractical,” or most galling of all, “simplistic.”

     If self-ownership can be made to serve as a foundation for our argument, we might at last succeed in planting a firm foothold on philosophical territory. Yet as I’ve discussed above, it’s vital that we succeed in coping with the implications of our premises. Given the intensity of the sentiments aroused by any discussion of slavery, the one addressed here may be the most important of all.

Unraveling the mystery of hostility to Putin and Trump.

The elites of the world conspire together in a globalist club.

But ironically, Putin put a damper on this by restoring some degree of nationalist themes to Russia. And Donald Trump is threatening to do the same for the US. This is why globalist elites hate them so much.

Comment by Dominique Francon Society on "America Goes Away: Fred Left Behind in Mexico." By Fred Reed, The Unz Review, 5/12/16.

The Mark Of The Villain

     If there’s any ability more critical to one’s safety and happiness than the ability to distinguish the evil man from the good, I can’t imagine what it might be.

     I’m treading on theologically uncertain ground in this. It’s Christian doctrine that no individual is irredeemably evil. I subscribe to that doctrine. Nevertheless, there are those who consciously embrace evil during part or all of their lifetimes. The greatest of these are long remembered; their crimes remain prominent in the histories for decades, even centuries. Of course there are preferable paths to greatness, yet great evil has a peculiar glamor of its own.

     But most of us don’t come into direct contact with the great monsters of history. For one thing, there aren’t enough of them. For another, it isn’t guaranteed that they’ll be recognizable as villains during their lifetimes. A great deal of seeming good has been done by thoroughly evil men, and much destruction has been wrought by well-intentioned men who thought they were doing good.

     The prerequisite for recognizing the villain is the ability to recognize evil.

---

     The beginning of the journey starts with the recognition that there is such a thing as truth: statements that accord with objective reality. Truth is fundamental to human understanding, and therefore to all questions of morals and ethics. The following comes from an essay I posted at the late, much lamented Eternity Road on September 20, 2010:

     For reasons that would require a large history to delineate, Americans have been led away from the understanding of absolute truth. We've been treated to elaborate, amphigorical explanations of why "the cat sat on the mat" should not be taken as a statement of unchallengeable fact, even if we can see Kitty sitting on the damned thing with our own eyes. Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, and the rest of their tribe literally made careers out of the campaign to destroy even the possibility that language, our vehicle for thought and for interaction with one another, can express truth. But without a trustworthy, serviceable conception of truth, there can be no knowledge, including knowledge of Man's nature. Since the understanding of Man's nature is the key to reasoning about right and wrong, without truth we can make no approach to moral and ethical standards.

     Without truth, evil becomes not merely undefined, but undefinable.

     It should follow that a conscious attempt to persuade others to accept an untruth – a falsehood or a dangerously inaccurate statement – is evil. It’s possible to harm others in other ways, of course, but as I said above, much harm is done by the well-meaning. Also, the infliction of harm is sometimes necessary to effect justice. However, with the exception of games in which no one’s rights are at stake, conscious deception, whether crude or artful, is always evil.

     Consider, if you will, the oft-repeated lie that many thousands of Iraqi civilians – the fictions given have varied between 100,000 and 300,000 – were killed by American forces during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Some of those – the already deceived – purvey this lie unknowingly. But others do so knowing perfectly well that it’s false. In the usual case, those liars proceed thence to lies about the theft of Iraq’s oil by American corporations. Their purpose is evil: to paint the American liberation of Iraq from the Ba’athist regime of Saddam Hussein as itself evil.

     Other large-scale lies of recent vintage include claims that the federal government distributes heroin and cocaine in black communities; that AIDS was invented in a government lab as a weapon of war; and that a third of American children routinely and involuntarily “go hungry.” Those who promulgate such falsehoods have an agenda. They believe getting others to accept their deceits will serve that agenda. The truth – that heroin and cocaine, the “recreational drugs” of choice for an unfortunate number of persons, are mostly produced and sold by private criminal organizations; that the source of the AIDS virus was most probably West African chimpanzees; that food is so available in the U.S. that the most common health problem the poorest Americans face is obesity – doesn’t serve that agenda.

     These lies, in other words, are tools villains use to twist the minds of the ignorant and insufficiently skeptical. Their purveyors seek to make you into a tool: to use you for their own ends.

     The conscious intention to use others for one’s own ends and against their interests is the defining characteristic of the villain.

---

     A healthful skepticism about bombastic claims is a survival necessity in our time. Not all hyper-dramatic claims are strokes in support of an evil enterprise, of course, but even those are worth a cocked eyebrow and some desultory fact-checking. No one’s email has ever been chosen to win a vast sum of money in some European lottery. There are no African heiresses looking to share their good fortune with you, if only you’ll oblige by sending them your bank account number and routing information by return mail. And sorry, lonely gents, beautiful Russian ladies aren’t gaspingly eager to meet and mate with you.

     No, he who asks you to accept such claims isn’t necessarily a villain...but if I were you, in my future interactions with him I’d keep one hand on my wallet and the other on my gun. Be prepared with the sharpest of sharp questions: “Who? By when? How do you know? Who else have you serviced? Can you provide references?” Count evasive answers against them.

     But soft! What email through yonder server breaks? Well, looky here! Intergalactic Representations Ltd. has read this blog and is certain they can make me a world-famous author! All I have to do is send them a copy of my most recent story and a check for $2500, and they’ll be on it faster than you can say “Eschew Rebarbative Anfractuosities And Obfuscatory Vermiculations!” Now where did I leave my checkbook...

     (Recommended: M. Scott Peck’s The People Of The Lie)

“Representation:” A Quickie Tirade

     I’m thoroughly sick of social justice warriors. I know, I know: I should tell you something you didn’t already know. All the same, that’s my current irritant. Lately, when it comes to entertainment of any sort, the merest dab of SJWism will make me explode in fury. My cardiologist, of course, disapproves.

     I happen to enjoy movies quite a lot. I own over 400 of them. And I don’t give a rat’s ass about anything but how diverting they are: how imaginative, exciting, and well made. But then, I’m not an SJW. I don’t see everything through the lens of “justice for historically oppressed peoples,” “cultural appropriation,” “minority representation,” or any of the rest of their rot. And may I say it once frankly at least:

Most “historically oppressed peoples” deserved exactly what they got.
Some deserved even worse.

     (By the way, have you noticed how little concern SJWs have for the very worst oppressed of all oppressed peoples – the Jews? There’s a moral in there, somewhere.)

     Anyway, read this for the latest episode in this unending horror feature.

     Ghost In The Shell is the absolute pinnacle of its art form. There’s nothing else in the anime oeuvre to compare with it, especially as regards graceful writing and philosophical depth. Masamune Shirow will be remembered for centuries for the story. The makers of the anime can be justly proud of the finished work. That Hollywood should choose to make a live-action version is merely additional praise of the original.

     So what is this SJW concerned about? That central character Motoko Kusanagi, a round-eyed, big-bosomed cyborg, will be played by round-eyed, big-bosomed Scarlett Johansson, one of the foremost female action stars of today. “Whitewashing!” “Racial exclusion!” “Cultural appropriation!” “Insert your preferred SJWism here!”

     These...persons deserve nothing but contempt. They’re the true bigots and squanderers of cultural treasures – all cultural treasures. That a brilliant piece of anime, known mainly to devotees of the art form, should be picked up by a major Hollywood studio and cast with a terrific, somatically perfect leading lady is an act of high praise...but no! “The character has a Japanese name!” Therefore, by SJW rules, she must be played by a Japanese actress. Failing that, at least one with an epicanthic fold.

     Anyone who grants these cretins the smallest sliver of time or shred of respect is doing a disservice to the entire human race. Yet they seem to be everywhere. Whatever fuels them seems to be inexhaustible. They’re determined to politicize, and thus spoil, every form of entertainment we enjoy. Can we at least deny them any of our time or energy?

     Or have I somehow stumbled into their web by even noticing their existence?

     I hope there’s some Maalox^® left.

Quickies: An Unusual Connectedness Problem

     I’ve often used the phrase connectedness problem to describe a situation where two instances of pernicious government activity reinforce one another’s rationales. Both should end, yet their backers, many of whom can understand how one generates the “need” – i.e., the rationale – for the other, will nevertheless defend both. The irony is that the usual defense is that “we can’t end X as long as Y continues.”

     Just today, courtesy of Ace of Spades, I’ve been considering a new application for the phrase:

     By the way, if you're under the impression there's some hope for this in the Libertarian Party, well, I wouldn't count on it:

     The moderator, John Stossel, then asked whether Jews should have to bake a Nazi wedding cake and Johnson replied, “That’s my contention, yes.” He then went on to cite the silliest slippery slope argument I have ever heard—and I’ve heard some silly ones. He actually said that a private utility company might decide to shut off someone’s electricity for religious reasons.

     Is this really a problem? No really; has this ever happened in the history of the universe? Where do they get these ridiculous scenarios?

     Stossel waved this off with a generic "you know, libertarians disagree on stuff" observation, and studiously ignored the obvious: that Johnson's stated policy preference was not merely some minor difference in libertarian philosophy, but rather a wholesale abandonment of pretty much everything libertarians claim to stand for.

     Fortunately, there were other libertarians in the debate who aren't raging statists on this issue like Johnson. But even so, you'd think the Libertarian Party would be up front and center, loudly and insistently defending Christian florists and bakers against the most blatant violations of the 13th Amendment in recent history. But they've collectively been AWOL since the beginning. It's no wonder we're losing so badly on this issue: all we have are lukewarm supporters and uncertain trumpets. And "libertarians" like Gary Johnson who have, in effect, sided with the enemy.

     The connection here is between an unwarranted exertion of State power and a prevalent attitude among self-nominated libertarians. The exertion of State power is the imposition of the “public accommodation” conception on privately owned businesses. The attitude – and this is not unanimous, though it does seem to be the majority view – is that religious belief is a source of division and prejudice that must be fought.

     A significant number of libertarians are uneasy about the right to discriminate. A larger number are overtly hostile to religious belief. The combination renders them ready to endorse antidiscrimination laws that make a mockery of the notion of private property. Yet they’d rather defend those laws than say a good word about faith, absolute freedom of association in all spheres, or both.

     The damnedest things can stop people’s minds cold. I’m no paragon of crystal-perfect logical consistency; there’s probably something that stops mine. I wonder what it is.

The Sins Of Authority: A Sunday Tirade

     It seems my news reading is insufficiently broad, as yesterday evening I missed a story of considerable importance:

     The Marianist order has suspended a former longtime president of Chaminade High School from functioning as a priest after allegations of sexual abuse involving a former student were found to be “credible,” the order said.

     The Rev. James Williams, who resigned in 2011 after 12 years as president of the prestigious all-boys Catholic institution in Mineola, has “completely denied” the allegations, but a “vigorous, thorough and comprehensive investigation” conducted by the order “deemed them to be credible,” the group said in a statement posted Friday on Chaminade’s website.

     The Marianists said they have contacted the Nassau County district attorney’s office and the Diocese of Rockville Centre about the allegations.

     Every case of this sort fills me with both fury and fear. The allegations might not be true; Reverend Williams has denied them, and at this point no rigorous proceeding to determine their validity has yet taken place. However, that an investigation by Reverend Williams’s own order finds them “credible” suffices to evoke many terrible thoughts, of several terrible consequences.

---

     Nearly every other kind of evil pales in comparison to the abuse of a child. Yet the abuse of a child by one in a position of moral and practical authority over him plumbs still deeper into the depths of villainy. The authority finds it all too easy to convince the child that the sin and the guilt belong to the victim rather than the offender. It’s an offense capable of warping all but the strongest souls...and very few minors are spiritually strong enough to withstand its effects.

     The scandal over the sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests has harmed the Church even more than did the Renaissance popes and their orgiastic indulgences. Never mind that the frequency of such abuses is just as high among Protestant ministers and lay teachers. Catholic priests are a special breed: men sworn to complete celibacy in the service of Christ. Those who’ve been entrusted with the care of the souls of the youngest and most impressionable of their flock have a responsibility weightier than any other:

     “Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoso shall receive one such little child in my name receiveth me. But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.” [Matthew 18:3-6]

     Yet when the Most Reverend William Francis Murphy, the presiding bishop of the Diocese of Rockville Center, called a convocation of the priests of the diocese to hear presentations about this terrible evil, the featured speaker, a bishop from another diocese, styled such offenses “inappropriate behavior.” A steady procession of the clerical listeners thanked him for that speech.

     “Inappropriate behavior!” As Father Edward Kealty has said, that’s a phrase to describe “picking up the wrong fork at dinner.” Father Ed got into a lot of trouble with the diocese for saying that to the convocation. It might be the reason he was forced into retirement against his will and the pleas of his parishioners.

     But this, too, is characteristic of sinful authorities.

---

     Authorities of many kinds are prone to taking credit for good developments and foisting the blame for bad ones onto others’ shoulders. They’re also the life form most susceptible to mincing words, especially when they’re confronted with failures and crimes of their own. It’s one of the reasons for the overall decline of mutual trust in recent years. It’s also one of the reasons for what Samuel Johnson called “the general degradation of human testimony:”

     “To doubt whether a man of eminence has told the truth about his own birth is, in appearance, to be very deficient in candour; yet nobody can live long without knowing that falsehoods of convenience or vanity, falsehoods from which no evil immediately visible ensues, except the general degradation of human testimony, are very lightly uttered, and once uttered are sullenly supported.”

     I submit that recategorizing the rape of a minor as “inappropriate behavior” is far worse than a “falsehood of convenience or vanity.” When a person in authority does it, the blot covers more than his individual escutcheon. It taints the credibility and probity of all those of his stature who by their silence concur with his statement.

     Priests, ministers, and rabbis lack coercive authority. Theirs is of a much higher plane: that on which the most critical distinctions of all, those between right and wrong, are found. If these be found unworthy of trust, where do we stand? To what station do we apply for judgment of our own morals and ethics?

     Time was, it was only the moral authority of the Church that bounded the actions of nobles and kings. The nobility of Christendom didn’t need to fear an army of priests with crucifixes and censers. The flock enraged to action was a far different matter – and such flocks, though armed with nothing but the tools of their various trades, removed the crowns and scepters from the heads and hands of many who regarded themselves as above judgment.

     They who think a restoration of justice must begin with changes to the State and its policies may have been looking in the wrong direction all this time.

---

     Today is the great Feast of Pentecost, which commemorates the day the Holy Spirit descended upon Christ’s eleven chief disciples. The Paraclete opened their minds to complete understanding of His teachings and equipped them with the gift of tongues, that they might be understood by all who heard them. Thus enlightened and amplified, they went out to do as He had commanded:

     “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.” [Matthew 28:19-20]

     Teaching is possible only under commonality of language. When the student understands the teacher’s words, it becomes possible for the teacher to impart new information and understanding to the student. This is why teachers enlarge their students’ vocabularies incrementally, and couch their other lessons in language their students are able to grasp. But when authorities tear words from their public meanings, such that language itself becomes a maze of Humpty-Dumpty eccentricities that forbids anyone to be certain of the speaker’s meaning, teaching – indeed, communication of any sort – becomes impossible.

     Deception – the cloaking of crimes of every magnitude behind dense curtains of words no longer penetrable by the light of common understanding – is all that remains.

     Confucius told us that “What is necessary [is] to rectify names.” What’s happening to communication in our day is the exact reverse – and it’s authorities of every sort, lay and clerical, determined to conceal their villainy from the common folk, who are the perpetrators.

     May God have mercy on their souls, for I doubt that we lesser ones will stay our hands for much longer.

Quickies: Could It Happen Here?

     Because it’s certainly happened elsewhere:

     I hope this makes it to theaters on Long Island.

Demo-Balkanization And Effective Power

     Some years ago, I read an article in Reason magazine that made mention of a trend in the formation of unelected bodies that advise executives and legislatures. It was a trend I’d known nothing about, but which has proved exceptionally important these past three decades. It usually goes by the name of stakeholder representation.

     A “stakeholder” is a group that agitates for changes in public policy that focus on some relatively narrow interest. For example, the Sierra Club is considered a stakeholder in environmental concerns. The Urban League is a stakeholder focused on the desiderata of cities. The National Organization of Women is considered a stakeholder as regards “women’s issues.” There are as many others as there are significant concerns, however parochial, around which groups have formed for political action.

     The members of an unelected advisory body are usually chosen by elected officials, most often someone with executive authority. Here’s where the “stakeholder” concept begins to have an effect. If the mayor of a city is populating a commission to advise him on some issue, he’s likely to feel that certain groups must be represented on that commission. For example, imagine a commission on quality-of-life issues in a reasonably large city. If there’s a branch of the Sierra Club operating in his city, it’s more likely to have a member on the commission than not. Another example would be economic development. If there’s a branch of NOW operating in that city, it’s almost certain to have a representative on the commission. The theory is that such groups act as concentrators for the principal interests of a large number of individuals.

     However, the principal interest of any organization is...a little suspense music please, Maestro...the well-being of the organization. Therefore, a representative of group X will have as his foremost priority preserving, and if possible increasing, the importance of group X. He will lean away from postures that would undermine group X’s stature: the size of its membership and revenues and its effective influence on public policy. This sometimes yields seemingly paradoxical results. Imagine, for example, a Sierra Club commission member declining to lend his support to an open-space-preservation initiative. He might do so were he persuaded that the success of the initiative would reduce overall interest in the efforts of the Sierra Club.

     Committee behavior often produces results of that sort. But there’s a larger and more important dynamic behind it.

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     Grouping has a positive-feedback effect. The emergence of groups on certain issues elicits the formation of groups on others. In part, it’s a response to perceived success – people will naturally emulate the successful – and in part it’s to gain the status of stakeholders. Stakeholder groups have disproportionate influence on public affairs, including the distribution of funds and the attention of the media.

     Perceptive political strategists are aware of this. It’s why they work to identify and seduce voting blocs: groups of voters that vote in a consistent fashion. But the effect doesn’t stop there. Since an organized group has the potential to be seen as a stakeholder on some issue in the public discourse, there’s political value in the proliferation of groups, apart from the number of their members. Thus, political strategists have an incentive to encourage the formation of ever more special-interest groups. A political party – in other words, a power-seeking group that makes use of democratic and quasi-democratic mechanisms – will seek to have as many groups as possible within its embrace, in the hope of maximizing the stakeholder representation effect. Sometimes that can even counter an opposition party with a majority of voters.

     There is, of course, a limiting counterforce: the number of distinct issues that can “fit into” popular consciousness and the public discourse at any given time. However, that number has recently been larger than in previous eras, in part because so many Americans have become “single-issue voters.” The paradox is only apparent.

     And believe it or not, we’re not done yet.

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     It’s common to view an unelected body with no official powers as merely advisory. It has influence but not authority. Its recommendations aren’t binding. Executives and legislatures need not move in the direction the commission advocates. As usual, it’s important to look deeper.

     When a politician or a group of politicians shares an incentive with an advisor, that advisor’s recommendations are likely to serve the shared incentive along with any other priorities the advisor holds. It’s every advisor’s desire to be influential, and to be viewed as influential, which sharpens this particular dynamic. And it’s every politician’s desire to be more powerful and influential in the operations of the government. Thus, typical advisory bodies tend to recommend expansions of government, and increases in its de facto power over the citizenry, rather than the reverse.

     The dynamic permeates the whole process. Groups form in a quest for stakeholder status. They’re solicited for representatives to advise executives and legislators. The group will naturally prefer to submit the name of a member inclined toward intervention on its behalf. The member, once empaneled, will see his own fortunes as better served by consistent interventionism and expansion of State power, and the politicians that listen to such commissions will be more inclined to take their advice when it leans in the direction of government expansion. Everybody wins...except you and me.

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     I used the term demo-balkanization in the title of this piece, knowing it would ring strangely in the ears of many readers. Perhaps its meaning is now clear:

Stakeholder groups have disproportionate influence.
Politicians all seek more and wider powers.
Intervention-oriented groups and politicians are natural allies.

     This is one of the chief fuels for the democratic Balkanization of the electorate and the concomitant acceleration of government. And in a political order such as ours, there appears to be nothing anyone can do about it.

     Retief stood up. "I'm taking a few weeks off...if you have no objections, Mr. Ambassador. My pal Whonk wants to show me an island down south where the fishing is good."
     "But there are some extremely important matters coming up," Magnan said. "We're planning to sponsor Senior Citizen Groups."
     "Count me out. Groups give me an itch."
     "Why, what an astonishing remark, Retief. After all, we diplomats are ourselves a group."
     "Uh-huh," Retief said. "That's what I mean."
     Magnan sat quietly, his mouth open, and watched as Retief stepped into the hall and closed the door gently behind him.

[Keith Laumer, “Aide Memoire”]

     Have you joined any groups lately, Gentle Reader?