David T. Beito
Huckabee couldn't have said it better. Here is Romney's answer to a survey on video games. Note Obama's comparatively evasive response. Ron Paul apparently was not asked.
I want to restore values so children are protected from a societal cesspool of filth, pornography, violence, sex, and perversion. I've proposed that we enforce our obscenity laws again and that we get serious against those retailers that sell adult video games that are filled with violence and that we go after those retailers.
Sunday, December 23, 2007 - 01:14
Comments
Mark Brady
Who said this?
"Though the people support the government, the government should not support the people."
"Though the people support the government, the government should not support the people."
Sunday, December 23, 2007 - 03:16
Sheldon Richman
I just finished watching. I'm afraid I had my usual reaction. I felt let down, like something was missing. For one thing, Ron Paul talks too much about the Constitution and too little about liberty and justice. War in Korea would okay if Congress wanted it? When was the last time Congress voted for a declaration of war without the president asking for it?
He also sounded unprepared. If he is going to call for ending the income tax (why that one and not the others?) and for bringing all the troops home, he should know the numbers. He looks like he's winging it. No excuse for that.
The immigration answer was a disaster. He persists in speaking of an invasion. How offensive! He's lucky Russert wasn't better prepared. How does Ron Paul know we'd have fewer immigrants if the welfare state were abolished? I think we'd have more, considering how attractive the economic environment would be. But would he open the borders then? I'm not convinced he would. I am more and more suspicious of this welfare-state rationalization for immigration control. It has worn so thin there is virtually nothing left of whatever credibility it had.
I think I'll stop watching news of the campaign. I'm tired of being disappointed.
Cross-posted at Free Association.
He also sounded unprepared. If he is going to call for ending the income tax (why that one and not the others?) and for bringing all the troops home, he should know the numbers. He looks like he's winging it. No excuse for that.
The immigration answer was a disaster. He persists in speaking of an invasion. How offensive! He's lucky Russert wasn't better prepared. How does Ron Paul know we'd have fewer immigrants if the welfare state were abolished? I think we'd have more, considering how attractive the economic environment would be. But would he open the borders then? I'm not convinced he would. I am more and more suspicious of this welfare-state rationalization for immigration control. It has worn so thin there is virtually nothing left of whatever credibility it had.
I think I'll stop watching news of the campaign. I'm tired of being disappointed.
Cross-posted at Free Association.
Sunday, December 23, 2007 - 12:45
Mark Brady
Sunday, December 23, 2007 - 21:30
Roderick T. Long
[cross-posted at Austro-Athenian Empire]
Okay, readers of my blog know I have some serious disagreements with Ron Paul too. But, um, lordy. This is a bit psychotic.
And doesn’t this mean that the Randians are giving Paul the same treatment that Whittaker Chambers gave Rand? All this story needs is the line “to a gas chamber – go!” to complete the irony.
Saturday, December 22, 2007 - 02:52
Aeon J. Skoble
Roderick, Amy, I'm expecting you to try to outgeek me here.
 | I received 92 credits on The Sci Fi Sounds Quiz How much of a Sci-Fi geek are you? |
| Guess the Sci-Fi Movie Sounds hereCanon powershot | |
Saturday, December 22, 2007 - 11:28
Mark Brady
Who wrote these words?
"The world will always be governed by self-interest. We should not try to stop this, we should try to make the self-interest of cads a little more coincident with that of decent people."
"The world will always be governed by self-interest. We should not try to stop this, we should try to make the self-interest of cads a little more coincident with that of decent people."
Saturday, December 22, 2007 - 23:47
Mark Brady
Who wrote that a judge is a law student who marks his own papers?
Friday, December 21, 2007 - 15:47
Amy H. Sturgis
During December 17th-22nd and beyond, the Lakota Freedom Delegation to Washington, D.C. is taking historic action to reclaim freedom under natural, international, and U.S. law, while developing diplomatic relations with the Family of Nations.
Visit the Lakota Freedom website.
Read press coverage:
* "Descendants of Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse Break Away from U.S."
* "Lakota Group Pushes for New Nation"
* "Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago"
Visit the Lakota Freedom website.
Read press coverage:
* "Descendants of Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse Break Away from U.S."
* "Lakota Group Pushes for New Nation"
* "Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago"
Thursday, December 20, 2007 - 13:18
Mark Brady
Who wrote these words?
"Like many businessmen of genius he learned that free competition was wasteful, monopoly efficient."
"Like many businessmen of genius he learned that free competition was wasteful, monopoly efficient."
Thursday, December 20, 2007 - 15:10
Gus diZerega
Jamie Leigh Jones’s unbelieveable ordeal should give many libertarians long pause. She was drugged, raped, beaten, and later imprisoned by KBR in Baghdad. KBR argues she has no legal recourse because she signed a binding arbitration agreement when she became an employee. http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/12/19/162652/29/685/424439
(More discussion on my blog www.dizerega.com)
Jones testified:
“There has been no prosecution after two and a half years. The arbitration laws are so abusive that Halliburton is trying to force this into a secret proceeding, which will do nothing to prevent continued abuse of this nature. What is there to stop these companies from victimizing women in the future? The United States has to provide people with their day in court when they have been raped and assaulted by other American citizens. Otherwise, we are not only deprived of our justice in the criminal courts, but the civil courts as well. The laws have left us nowhere to turn.”
(More discussion on my blog www.dizerega.com)
Jones testified:
“There has been no prosecution after two and a half years. The arbitration laws are so abusive that Halliburton is trying to force this into a secret proceeding, which will do nothing to prevent continued abuse of this nature. What is there to stop these companies from victimizing women in the future? The United States has to provide people with their day in court when they have been raped and assaulted by other American citizens. Otherwise, we are not only deprived of our justice in the criminal courts, but the civil courts as well. The laws have left us nowhere to turn.”
When people work for “private contractors” they apparently give up all their legal rights. Raped, beaten, severely injured, imprisoned – and because she signed a binding arbitration agreement with corporate goons, she likely has no recourse with a government that never met a corporation it didn’t want to help, or a citizen it didn’t want to screw. When she went to a company supplied psychiatrist, the first question she was asked was whether she planned to sue.
Evidence of the absolute moral depravity of the American right wing in all its guises? Yes. But she also would have no recourse in many versions of a pure “libertarian” society, either.
Libertarianism needs a theory of power able to confront concrete realities and not just the abstract equality of contracts considered without attention to context. The concept of arbitration among genuine equals has great merit. When applied to formal equals who in reality are anything but equal. It leads to atrocities such as what happened to Jamie Leigh Jones.
(There was an edit change due to my confusion of last names... the"duh" in diZerega)
Thursday, December 20, 2007 - 16:56
Mark Brady
Who said this? And here's a hint: The author is not thought of as an economist, but more as a man of letters.
"The protectionists are fond of flashing to the public eye the glittering delusion of great money-results from manufacturing, mines, artificial exports...But the really important point of all is, into whose pockets does this plunder really go?"
"The protectionists are fond of flashing to the public eye the glittering delusion of great money-results from manufacturing, mines, artificial exports...But the really important point of all is, into whose pockets does this plunder really go?"
Wednesday, December 19, 2007 - 01:16
Mark Brady
Even if neocons and neoliberals won't listen to radical critiques of the Fed, it looks as if one person who regularly posts at Counterpunch is listening.
Mike Whitney looks into the abyss and sees The coming collapse of the modern day banking system.
"The economist Ludwig von Mises is more succinct in his analysis:
"There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought on by credit expansion. The question is only whether the crisis should come sooner as a result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved."
Then having quoted Mises in support, Whitney cites Milton Friedman on (price) inflation:
"This admission proves Greenspan's culpability. If he knew that stock prices had doubled their value in just 3 years, then he also knew that equities had not risen due to increases in productivity or demand (market forces). The only reasonable explanation for the asset inflation, therefore, was monetary policy. As his own mentor, Milton Friedman famously stated, 'Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon'. Any capable economist would have known that the explosion in housing and equities prices was a sign of uneven inflation. Now that the bubble has popped, inflation is spreading like mad through the entire economy."
Mike Whitney looks into the abyss and sees The coming collapse of the modern day banking system.
"The economist Ludwig von Mises is more succinct in his analysis:
"There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought on by credit expansion. The question is only whether the crisis should come sooner as a result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved."
Then having quoted Mises in support, Whitney cites Milton Friedman on (price) inflation:
"This admission proves Greenspan's culpability. If he knew that stock prices had doubled their value in just 3 years, then he also knew that equities had not risen due to increases in productivity or demand (market forces). The only reasonable explanation for the asset inflation, therefore, was monetary policy. As his own mentor, Milton Friedman famously stated, 'Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon'. Any capable economist would have known that the explosion in housing and equities prices was a sign of uneven inflation. Now that the bubble has popped, inflation is spreading like mad through the entire economy."
Wednesday, December 19, 2007 - 02:29
David T. Beito
Wednesday, December 19, 2007 - 23:00
Mark Brady
Who wrote these words?
"Free trade, one of the greatest blessings which a government can confer on a people, is in almost every country unpopular."
"Free trade, one of the greatest blessings which a government can confer on a people, is in almost every country unpopular."
Tuesday, December 18, 2007 - 01:03
David T. Beito
I was, and am, skeptical of the blimp idea but this is awesome.
Tuesday, December 18, 2007 - 17:19
Aeon J. Skoble
Papers are all graded; waiting for final exams to roll in, so, surfing around. What do I find? Great News: Peter Jackson and New Line have resolved their differences, and have agreed to make a film of The Hobbit. Also -- Not Necessarily Great News: The 2-movie deal includes The Hobbit and something descibed ominously as"a sequel." Meaning what, something Tolkien didn't write concerning the years between The Hobbit and LOTR? Do not want. UPDATE: According to AICN,"The second project is believed to be a bridge between THE HOBBIT and THE LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy - culled from the titanic amount of periphery/ancillary/notated material found in Tolkien's works." So, maybe it'll be ok. I'll keep an open mind; PJ's credibility with me is good.
(Can't believe I scooped Roderick on this.)
Tuesday, December 18, 2007 - 23:07
Mark Brady
Whose words are these?
"It is not a question of Mahometanism simply, but of Mahometanism compounded with the peculiar character of a race…They were, upon the whole, from the black day when they first entered Europe, the one great anti-human specimen of humanity. Where ever they went, a broad line of blood marked the track behind them; and, as far as their dominion reached, civilisation disappeared from view. They represented everywhere government by force, as opposed to government by law."
"It is not a question of Mahometanism simply, but of Mahometanism compounded with the peculiar character of a race…They were, upon the whole, from the black day when they first entered Europe, the one great anti-human specimen of humanity. Where ever they went, a broad line of blood marked the track behind them; and, as far as their dominion reached, civilisation disappeared from view. They represented everywhere government by force, as opposed to government by law."
Monday, December 17, 2007 - 01:56
Mark Brady
Which famous nineteenth-century public intellectual was godfather to the philosopher Bertrand Russell?
Post your answers as Comments below.
Sunday, December 16, 2007 - 15:15
Amy H. Sturgis
Have the worlds of science fiction and presidential politics ever been more closely aligned than they were in 2007?
Read"Planetary Politics" by Dave Itzkoff from The New York Times.
Read"Planetary Politics" by Dave Itzkoff from The New York Times.
Sunday, December 16, 2007 - 19:06
