I like what I see here:
Over the weekend I read The Communist Manifesto for the first time. I expected some sort of almost magical power to draw me into embracing the evil. I was surprised, disappointed, and finally I had a sinking feeling of emptiness as I thought about it more.
The book was like a synopsis of a poorly written alternate history novel. Assumptions critical to the reasoning which followed were unsupported and, at least to my present day perspective, either blatantly wrong or highly suspect. Even conceding the authors their assumptions without contest the conclusions reached with such confidence were as unstable as any house of cards.
And this is the book that convinced millions of people to murder hundreds of millions of others? Is this all that it takes to remove the thin veneer off of civilized behavior and enable the most evil empires human history has ever known? Self-described intellectuals accept this book as a valid political philosophy? These “intellectuals” regard themselves as my betters? Wow!
The typical two year old child or even the family dog wouldn’t accept the conclusions unless they were forced into compliance. It’s no wonder the authors state, “The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims. They openly declare that their ends can only be attained by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.”
But in talking to Ry about the book I got a new perspective. He said that he first read it when he was about 12 years old and it was like the scales had been removed from his eyes and he saw everything clearly for the first time. Furthermore he said it is no wonder Communists killed off older people with any education or even if they wore glasses. It’s no wonder they attack capitalist societies through the school system. We were and are in a war most people don’t even realize exists (see also The Handbook of 5GW). Ry went on to claim that the book was aimed at the young and “the people with guns, the muscle” who would do the “heavy lifting” of “forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.” These would be people without the intellectual rigor to challenge the assumptions, reasoning, or conclusions.
Okay… I can buy into that hypothesis for now.
The obvious question then becomes why do the people who claim to be the intellectuals of our society so much more likely to advocate for Communism?
I know a professor who admits he is a Marxist. He once insisted our family should not be allowed to own the home we do because we “don’t need such a big house.” The “government should let someone with a bigger family use that house.” This professor told me the previous dozens or hundreds failed attempts at implementing a Communist utopia failed because, “The right people weren’t in charge. We just need to have the right people.” I explained that concentrated power of that sort attracts the “wrong” people who would always succeed in the acquisition and control of that power. He insisted that “we just need to get the right people in power.” I then sent him a copy of The Road to Serfdom. I don’t know if he even read it but I do know his attitude has not changed. He believes he is an intellectual superior in our society. He is a professor. He knows what is best for our society. Of course you know he voted for Obama. But I could have given you 20 chances and you would not have guessed that he is a professor in a school of business.
So one answer to the obvious question is we are at war and most people don’t even know it.
Another possible answer is something Sarah once asked me, “Have you ever noticed that liberals are not very bright?” I was a bit shocked. Someone else noticed? I am a bit sensitive about challenging the intellectual capacity of others because I know there are many things that I don’t know and seem to be beyond my capacity to understand (such as the mass appeal of The Communist Manifesto). But here was someone else, without an engineer’s mind, who noticed it too. As I pondered the book and Ry’s observations I realized that was another plausible answer to the obvious question.
The Communist Manifesto tells its readers that supporters of Communism are the intelligent people. They deserve, are destined to, and the good of all human kind depends on them, being in charge. That they “understand” the benefits of Communism to the bafflement of others is probably proof to them that they are the intellectual superiors of those that think Communism is, at best, prone to abuse.
In other words the second plausible answer to the obvious question is that those that advocate Communism are not very bright people who want to believe they are the brightest of all people. And that The Communist Manifesto tells them they are the brightest enables them to then claim themselves as intellectuals.
Regardless of the plausible answers I have no choice but to view Communism as a cancer which has metastasized beyond the point which surgery or chemotherapy can do little more than delay the death of the host. And it can all be traced back to one little book. I’ve written thousands of blog posts on freedom related topics and thousands of others far smarter than me have written hundreds of times more than me with hundreds of examples of Communism evil and failure. Yet we are losing to a couple of guys who have been dead for 120 years who wrote something that was little more than a synopsis of a poorly written alternate history novel.
Man, that sure does suck.
I point out, to those who are befuddled by the Chinese criticizing America’s human rights record, that we are talking about one communist government criticizing another.
See? It makes perfect sense.
“Human rights” you see, means the right to be controlled by an all-knowing and all-powerful government.
Better now?
A child says, “It’s my toy.” That’s property law. A child says, “You promised me.” That’s contract law. A child says, “He hit me first.” That’s criminal law. A child says, “Daddy said I could.” That’s constitutional law.
Harold Berman
[Via email from Rolf.
I have often thought of the property law angle. Animals even have a sense of what belongs to them. This has the potential to be used as an argument against Communism (as if more arguments were necessary).
But the extension to the others is enlightening and makes one ponder. Are these concepts universal? Or is there a strong environmental component that is injected by the time the child is able to speak? If these are universal then are there psychological or socials costs “paid” when the government (or even individuals in positions of parent/teacher/neighborhood-thug power) violates these universal laws? If they are not universal but are products of Western cultural then how do other cultures stack up in terms of happiness, longevity, productivity, and wealth?
Interesting stuff.—Joe]
Shockingly high rates of gun ownership and shockingly low rates of summary executions by totalitarian regimes.
Tasso Rampante
May 29, 2012
Comment to How do you say “Come and take them” in Mandarin?
[This was in regard to the Chinese complaining that the U.S. has “rampant gun ownership”.
As Robb said, “This is a feature, my oriental friends, not a bug.” But from the point of view of the Chinese government it would be a severe “bug” if summary executions (with the family being charged for the cartridge used) became more “challenging”. After all, they have an obligation to “protect the people” by killing those that disrupt the collective and interrupt the narrative. But they are making progress: “The switch from gunshots to injections is a sign that China ‘promotes human rights now.'”
To be fair it’s not just the Chinese government. There are people in our country who advocate the harming of dissidents as well.—Joe]
Prosecutors and police have an authority, not a right, to hold evidence. Citizens have rights. State agents have “authority” or delegated powers, based on the decisions of the citizenry. When the police and prosecutors overstep their authority, they are infringing on rights, not exercising them.
Mikee
May 26, 2012
Comment to Three years
[Mikee is absolutely correct. But that is not anywhere close to the way our opponents talk about our political system. They talk in terms of terms of people being allowed to have rights.
But what I find most interesting at the highest level at least some of them know the truth. From the Brady Center Legal Action Newsletter Spring 2012 (emphasis added):
The people of Colorado should have the right to protect their communities from the dangers of loaded guns on their streets and parks. The gun lobby wants to force guns onto the streets of Denver, and they don’t care how many lives it costs. Their position is so extreme that Colorado’s Attorney General, who has an A- rating from the NRA, is arguing side-by-side in court with us against the NRA and other members of the gun lobby.”
Jonathan Lowy, the Director of the Brady Center’s Legal Action Project who argued the case in court, stated, “States and cities have the authority to keep guns off the streets.”
When talking to the public they speak of the collective people and governments having rights. When speaking to the courts where words have more carefully defined meanings and the opposition is going to point out their errors they correctly speak of government having authority.
They are not merely ignorant or careless with the truth. This is concrete evidence they are deliberately deceptive.—Joe]
It’s happened several times before. Good alternator, good battery, dead battery. Over the last two or three days, I noticed my good starter getting slower and slower. Since vehicles these days, inexplicably, have only a voltage meter, I couldn’t tell from my instrumentation whether I had extra drain, a dead battery, or dirty terminals. You do get a slight clue though, if you watch the voltage closely immediately after start-up. If everything is working normally, you’ll see the voltage start out a bit lower, then creep up to normal running voltage in a few seconds. My meter was rock solid. With a current meter, such as was the norm in the 1960s, you’ll see the charge or discharge current. Much more useful in my opinion. Best would be to have both volts and amps.
The pickup barely started this morning, and at work it didn’t start at all. Like a jerk, only then did I clean the battery terminals. Still no go, so I got a boost from Dan. The terminals get corroded and that can sometimes allow current to flow one direction, but not the other (that’s a diode, see). In this case the batt would discharge just fine, but it couldn’t get any charge current (hence the full voltage immediately after starting– the voltage wasn’t being pulled down by any charge current). Eventually you’re a walkin’, yo.
I went and bought a new battery anyway, because I’ll have a use for it either way. By the time I got back from across town, the old battery was fully charged and snappy as ever, so now I have a new one I can use either in my son’s van or my old beat-up T-Bird. Fun fun fun. Plus I got a decent charger for the garage, just in case. If the battery had had only a few less electrons to give up this morning, I’d have been knocking on doors for a boost. No more. I have used my ham radio 12V supply to charge a car battery, but it doesn’ like that. The huge current load tends to blow some fairly important components.
Yeah so; if your starter slows down, just a little, clean your terminals before it gets worse. You may just have solved the whole problem, right there. You do keep a terminal brush and some tools in your vehicle, right?
I haven’t read the book, but now I’m interested. Maybe I’ll get it for my daughter so she can bring it into her history classes.
One thing I want to call to your attention is that the later printings of the book contain an “explanation” in the forward by a Marxist professor, telling us not to take it seriously. What was that Michelle Obama said about the left’s need to change our history and our traditions?
…she should be suckling an adult if it’s supposed to depict The Obama Way. Well, children, adults– everyone. Maybe there should be a long line behind the kid, all carrying signs and complaining/competing over who gets to suckle next.
Atlas Shrugged Part 2 is being filmed and you could be an extra if you help out with their social media efforts:
So, what do you need to do to get on set? You need to get busy…
- Follow us on Twitter and retweet any of our tweets.
- Like us on facebook and share any of our posts.
The more you tweet and share, the more chance you have to be cast so, tweet and share early and often.
We’ll be selecting an extra this Friday afternoon and flying the selectee and a guest to LA this coming Monday, May 14th – all expenses paid. Or, most expenses anyway – flight and hotel for two nights.
I’m going to be busy with other things on Monday and I don’t really pay much attention to Facebook anyway. I just want to know where I can find Gault’s Gulch.
(My computer stinks This was posted days ago but never showed up. I try again)
As a practical matter, I don’t see how you can wage war on anything but nouns. Just sayin’. Americans fought a war or two against “Britain” which is a noun, thoughbeit a proper noun. Japanese “imperialism” is a noun, etc. “Socialism” is a noun too, as is “jihad”.
This war-on-nouns stuff started, I figure, with the “War On An Emotion”. That of course being “terror”. I agree that it is pretty silly to initiate a military war against an emotion like terror, among other things, because war itself can be pretty terrifying. Now if you wanted to wage war against happiness I suppose that would be a little easier. You may be able to bomb people out of their happiness.
So it comes down to the particular nouns that might be legitimate enemies against which we might legitimately wage war. More importantly, it comes down to those things that are worth protecting, even with deadly force when necessary. Those too are nouns. Life is a noun. Liberty is a noun. Property is a noun. It is far easier to be against something (Critical Theory) than to be for something. When we consider fighting wars, we need to keep that in mind. For what are we fighting?
For those who will say “Who is Dennis Prager?” I say that he is the one who said, “I prefer clarity to agreement”.
So let’s be clear. Only once that is accomplished can we decide on whether or not we agree.
I’ve heard that we can’t legitimately declare war against jihad (or rather, for liberty – the opposite of jihad)) because jihad isn’t a country. That makes waging war against it a logical impossibility, I guess is what we’re being told. OK. So they’re saying we can only wage war for or against real estate? An enemy can only take the form of real estate? See; I can play stupid word games too, and my stupid word games don’t help either.
Hint; liberty isn’t a country any more than jihad is a country. It’s a concept, and hopefully liberty is a movement. Jihad is a concept and certainly it is a movement, for caliphate (another concept). We fight and die for concepts. Life too, but the concept of liberty is an extension of the protection of life.
Via Say Uncle we get this annoying news:
The FBI is asking Internet companies not to oppose a controversial proposal that would require firms, including Microsoft, Facebook, Yahoo, and Google, to build in backdoors for government surveillance.
In meetings with industry representatives, the White House, and U.S. senators, senior FBI officials argue the dramatic shift in communication from the telephone system to the Internet has made it far more difficult for agents to wiretap Americans suspected of illegal activities, CNET has learned.
The FBI general counsel’s office has drafted a proposed law that the bureau claims is the best solution: requiring that social-networking Web sites and providers of VoIP, instant messaging, and Web e-mail alter their code to ensure their products are wiretap-friendly.
“If you create a service, product, or app that allows a user to communicate, you get the privilege of adding that extra coding,” an industry representative who has reviewed the FBI’s draft legislation told CNET. The requirements apply only if a threshold of a certain number of users is exceeded, according to a second industry representative briefed on it.
This is so crap for brains stupid I am surprised the author of the article and the industry representatives didn’t fall over laughing at the FBI. Since the “requirements apply only if a threshold of a certain number of users is exceeded” as long as the number is greater than two they can’t enforce such a requirement against small groups of people. And that assumes the criminals were to use service providers in the U.S. that are easy to track down. With overseas and even open Wi-Fi access points so easy to access even finding a group of a criminals who utilized an illegal communication system would be tough.
This is nothing but A Security Theater that invades the privacy of those that pose no threat to the general population and can be used as a tool by unscrupulous politicians and government thugs to embarrass or blackmail their opponents.
Several years ago when the news of the exploding debt and crashing financial markets was making the headlines son James ask what this would mean. I told him I didn’t really know because I had never seen anything like it before and to a large extent we don’t have any real history of this sort of thing before. In the depression of the 1930’s the government debt wasn’t huge to start out with and there was a completely different situation with the banks and lack of insured deposits. This is different.
The one thing I suggested might eventually happen is that governments would have to start laying off people and that many laws and regulations would essentially be ignored because there would not be enough people to enforce them. His response was something along the lines of, “So this is a good thing then.” Of course it isn’t and wasn’t that simple. There can be a lot of bad to go with the good. For example there may not be enough people to enforce the morass of all the millions of regulations but there probably will always be enough thugs to enforce the confiscatory tax rates, nationalization of health care, communications, food, and energy production and distribution.
The worst of the possibilities have not happened yet but a glimmer of the good has started to shine through:
In April the household survey showed that that there were 442,000 fewer people working in government than in March. The household survey has a much smaller sample size than the establishment survey, and so is prone to volatility, but the magnitude of the drop is striking: It marks the largest decline on both an absolute and a percentage basis on record going back to 1948. Moreover, the household survey has consistently showed bigger drops in government employment than the establishment survey has.
But of course it’s but a drop in the bucket. According to the article there are about 20.3 million people in the U.S. engaged in government work. I would be happier if there were 19 million fewer than that with most of those being in the military.
There. Fixed it.
(and no – it doesn’t become legal if you give it a new name)
About that Marine who was “less than honerably” discharged.
First, I had to check four major news sources before I could find what the Marine actually said. The UK news, MSNBC and the WSJ all just quoted his “Screw Obama” bit (Yahoo News came through). But what counts is the bit about the Oath;
But U.S. District Judge Marilyn Huff refused to intervene, saying the military had the discretion to discipline Stein after he stated he would not follow all the orders of the president.
…
She said that message read: “As an active-duty Marine, I have sworn to defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic. Obama is the economic enemy, the religious enemy, the domestic enemy.”Stein has served nearly nine years…
I can see the judge’s position. He said he would not follow “some” orders, so she kicked it back to the military.
Anyway, it puts you in a sort of pickle when you take that Oath, doesn’t it? So all you who’ve taken it have a question to ask yourselves every single day. Do you follow all orders, no matter what, OR do you defend and protect the constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic?
With a communist in the Whitehouse, what are your options? The Devil (so to speak) has you by the neck. You’re damned if you do, damned of you don’t. I don’t think we want a coup on our hands, but we don’t want a communist giving orders either. Stein’s problem was that he posted about his obvious conundrum on Facebook. Best to get out, maybe? But then you’ll only be replaced with someone who doesn’t have a problem following order from a communist, and that’s not good at all (how long before the Oath is changed to one that gives alliagence only to the commander in chief?). As I say; Pickle.
A radio news report this morning said there have been three accidental shootings in Latah County recently. One of them happened when a guy was “cleaning a loaded pistol”. Yeah, right.
We know about these accidents, why? Because when the injured went to the hospital for their minor wounds, the people at the hospital call the cops.
I once shot myself right through the weak hand thumb. I went to the hospital to get the projectile extracted from my thumb. It was sticking out both ends of the wound. The thought of calling the cops, I am certain, never entered anyone’s mind at the hospital that day.
OK, class. This is a test. WHY did no one at the hospital think of calling the cops in my case, but they automatically called the cops in those other cases? Hint; why aren’t the cops typically called in on a lawnmower accident, a ladder accident, any time you cut your finger while chopping vegetables, cut your head running into a door, etc?
Answer; Because those accidents do not involve guns. We’ve all been conditioned. If it involves a firearm, call the cops. No thinking required. If it doesn’t involve a firearm, well take care of the patient, stupid. This is a hospital. If that’s not bigotry, it sure does look like it.
(I shot myself with an arrow, you see. Flawed wooden arrows can fracture upon launch, and since your hand is right there on the bow, the fractured arrow can be thrust right through your hand)
“Oh, but those gunshots could have been part of a crime” you say. And that’s my point– even you are programmed. If a gun is involved, well, crime. Sure, and someone could have shot me with an arrow while I was threatening them, or that cut you got chopping food could have been done on purpose by your raging spouse, and that contusion on your kid’s head from the bicycle crash might have been caused by you hitting him with a blunt object on purpose, etc., etc., etc., etc., etc. Get the irrational programming (the mindset; gun = crime) ironed out.
Understanding such forces is crucial in attacking issues such as gun control, which are completely out of control. Even though the vast majority of both NRA and non-NRA gun owners are for tighter gun control laws, fear and shame are still the primary factors driving gun ownership to record highs. But fear and shame cannot be approached directly, for one is generally too ashamed to admit one is ashamed!
If shame is indeed one of the most powerful unconscious forces behind so many of our failed attempts to curb our most pressing social problems, and if it is difficult to approach directly, then how can we confront and combat shame itself?
There are at least four different ways, none of which are sufficient by themself. The first is obviously books such as Gilligan’s, which point out the complex factors and overall patterns responsible for shame. Sadly, because they confront shame too directly and are largely cognitive in nature, they reach only a very small percentage of the population, mainly highly educated liberals, who are already less prone to shame. Nonetheless, they are necessary even if they are not sufficient. Without understanding the factors responsible for shame, it is extremely difficult, if not virtually impossible, to fashion truly effective ways of combating it.
The second way is of course individual therapy. Again, this only reaches a very small percentage of the population, mainly highly educated liberals. And, it does not treat a whole society therapeutically that is suffering from shame.
The third of course is ongoing, sustained programs and efforts in education. The earlier and the younger we intervene with children the better. But imagine the howls of protests from conservatives who are already paranoid about “government stealing the minds of children.”
The fourth is the most effective. It consists of carefully orchestrated public service campaigns that feature prominent, charismatic figures from all walks of life (business, entertainment, sports, politics, etc.) that have successfully faced and overcome shame. Powerful personal stories are the main ingredient. And, of course, celebrities are the story.
Ian I. Mitroff
Adjunct Professor, UC Berkeley
April 25, 2012
Confronting Shame-Based Politics: The Biggest Challenge of All
[I would take issue with his unsubstantiated assertion that gun owners are for tighter gun control laws and that shame is an issue in gun ownership. But I won’t out of fear he would put me on a list such that I would end up in a death camp instead of a reeducation camp or psych hospital should he and his kind ever achieve the power they desire.—Joe]
The local newspaper story is here. You only see part of it unless you subscribe. Basically, the robber was distracted with pulling money out of the cash drawer, which was placed on the counter and the clerk took the initiative, snatching the robber’s gun. The gun was dropped. The robber then fled, leaving the cash and the gun behind. Oops. He later came back and turned himself in– probably not a bad idea, given the circumstances.
One of the radio reports has the cops telling us, after this incident, not to fight back– to do whatever the criminals tell us to do. Uh, hey Skippy: isn’t that exactly the sort of advice that enabled the 9/11 attacks?
You can’t really plan ahead for what you’ll do, and you certainly cannot second guess the actions of the clerk. What happened this time, and what happens time and time again, is that someone recognizes an opportunity to stop a crime, and then takes that opportunity while the taking is good. That’s all.
I wouldn’t call it an act of will so much as a reflexive reaction based on a split second certainty, founded in basic principles. My son once recounted an incident at school wherein he had a habitual bully pinned to the floor, crying, before Son even really knew what had happened. No; you don’t plan this stuff, but you don’t want to be hamstrung by stupid advice from cops and other wannabe authorities either.
Good for that clerk for having the presence of mind plus the wherewithal to act. He used his bare hands against an armed robber, no one was hurt, and the robber is in custody.
Hat tip; Billy Beck This can’t get enough exposure;
Some of the people close to me are in effect communists. No; they don’t attend Party rallies and most of them don’t send money to The Party (though some do through their union dues and they may not even know it) but their underlying assumptions are the same. That’s all it takes. You don’t need to be a Firm Believer in the teachings of Brother Marx, carrying around the little red book, or even understand where your beliefs came from. You only need those underlying assumptions you acquired by default sometime in childhood, and just a little bit of envy, or resentment, or frustration, or anger, and plenty of reinforcement from those with whom you’ve chosen to surround yourself. The Party and it’s allies will then be free to do the rest, because you won’t notice until it’s too late. It all sounds fairly reasonable, even good, along the way, because “we all know that something has to be done”. Right? And that something is, as always, more government (less freedom).
Suckers. I can forgive the kids (most haven’t received a proper education) but what about you adults? Seriously.
It’s interesting. I was listening this weekend to a man who barely escaped with his life from Cuba. He said his parents supported Castro. All Castro wanted was justice after all (there was clearly a lack of justice in Cuba, pre revolution) and to serve the collective good of The People. His parents supported Castro wholeheartedly. That is, until the newly empowered communists came and took everything they had– everything his parents had worked for all their lives. I heard the same basic story directly from a famous musician who had escaped from Cuba by skipping out on his handlers while on tour in the U.S. You risk your life doing that. If the catch you, they kill you, or take you back to make an example out of you. The man I was listening to this weekend was in tears, trying to warn us that the same thing is happening here in the U.S., in this land of his Last Great Hope. They’re using same promises and the same rationale, using the same underlying assumptions, with the same goals right here and right now. If it succeeds it will have the same outcome. It always does. Only this time it’s global.
It has been said that being right is ok (sometimes) but being right too soon makes you a radical extremist.
What about being right too late? What does that make you? I ask you Progressives. You’ve grown up with the warning signs all around you, and now the warning signs have reached ear-splitting decibel levels. What does it make you if you’re right too late? Or does your anger or fear, or hatred, or disgust with the human race, prevent you from caring about the consequences? I know there are those who believe there are too many people on the planet already. Some people know what we’re headed for and they secretly long for it. For other Progressives– those who just want to live a good life and want what’s “best” for everyone; What does it make you when you’re right too late?
We must fear a government monopoly on firearms. It is a path awash in the blood of millions and anyone who calls for bans on civilian firearms is on the side of evil.
Braden Lynch
April 21, 2012
Comment to Quote of the day—Ronald Reagan
[It may be the advocates have the best of intentions but as is well know, the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.—Joe]