Wednesday, December 25, 2013
Friday, December 20, 2013
Fort Sumter liberals and the culture wars
With culture war issues popping up in the news - as a lap dog media does what it can to deflect from Obamacare's disastrous rollout - people should remember that it is not conservatives that start these fights. Rather, it is liberals who seek to change our culture and demonize those who would preserve our values.
The Democrats fired the first shot in the civil war at Fort Sumter. They do so again in cultural issues from abortion, religion in te public square and redefining marriage. Let us just hope Republicans have the stomach and foresight to handle these battles as the first GOP president did.
Wednesday, December 18, 2013
Getting books signed
I'm lucky to have a tolerant girlfriend. She went with me to Mysterious Galaxy - amazing indie bookstore in San Diego - to get books signed by James Rollins and Rebecca Cantrell. She puts up with a lot!
A&E Hypocrisy on Phil Robertson
I' m not a huge Duck Dynasty fan. Reality TV in general doesn't do much for me. But my girlfriend loves it, so I've seen some episodes.
All in all, it seems like a decent family and group of folks. Ending the episode with a family dinner and prayer says it all.
So it's amusing to see the media, or at least some folks in the media, acting like it's a scandal that Phil Robertson thinks homosexuality and adultery are sinful and that it's a bad thing.
But it's appalling to see A&E suspending him for his comments.
First of all, the comments are not offensive, unless your profession is being offended at the fact that for the last few thousand years, Judeo-Christian society has not viewed homosexuality as a positive thing,
Secondly, the show has had tremendous success because its stars are unabashedly traditional Americans. They have values that our elites mock, even as they sometimes court our votes or viewership. Audiences respond to this.
For A&E to ride the Robertson family for the success their values have brought the network, only to suspend Mr. Robertson is rank hypocrisy. Either the executives believe in what they've done or they have simply caved to a pressure group.
Which is worse?
All in all, it seems like a decent family and group of folks. Ending the episode with a family dinner and prayer says it all.
So it's amusing to see the media, or at least some folks in the media, acting like it's a scandal that Phil Robertson thinks homosexuality and adultery are sinful and that it's a bad thing.
But it's appalling to see A&E suspending him for his comments.
First of all, the comments are not offensive, unless your profession is being offended at the fact that for the last few thousand years, Judeo-Christian society has not viewed homosexuality as a positive thing,
Secondly, the show has had tremendous success because its stars are unabashedly traditional Americans. They have values that our elites mock, even as they sometimes court our votes or viewership. Audiences respond to this.
For A&E to ride the Robertson family for the success their values have brought the network, only to suspend Mr. Robertson is rank hypocrisy. Either the executives believe in what they've done or they have simply caved to a pressure group.
Which is worse?
UPDATE: Apparently the Robertson family is threatening to walk if A&E goes through with suspending Phil. The network needs them a lot more than the Robertsons need it. Get the popcorn and watch the battle between the bottom line and politically correct pieties begin.
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
2nd Amendment victory in Colorado
Take our guns, we take your jobs. Seems fair.
Oh and given that folks like Mayor Bloomberg vastly outspent pro freedom groups, can we quit the gnashing of teeth about money in politics?
Oh and given that folks like Mayor Bloomberg vastly outspent pro freedom groups, can we quit the gnashing of teeth about money in politics?
Syria's curveball
So the person claiming that the rebel groups John McCain and his Boy Wonder Lindsay Graham wants to arm aren't al Qaeda is a liar. Oh and she also belongs to a group lobbying for arms to rebels. No conflict of interest there.
When coupled with McCain's support for Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood government, it's a wonder how such brilliant foreign policy judgment lost to Obama.
When coupled with McCain's support for Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood government, it's a wonder how such brilliant foreign policy judgment lost to Obama.
September 11
My heart goes out to all the families touched by this day, in 2011 or 2012 and those protecting our freedoms.
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
Conservatives and Culture
Let's face it. Conservatives are losing, if not having already lost, the culture wars.
The reason is simple: the liberals run our culture. And unfortunately, ignoring the problem will not solve it, as Peter Lawler notes. After all, this is what voters watch. It forms perceptions. Might the election have come out differently if the rich white guy did not equal bad guys in most movies? The general portrayal of those with conservative values is what allows liberals to demonize us as monsters.
The answer? Fight back. Make good quality content with conservative values. Don't be preachy. Just don't be cliche.
Distribution networks like Amazon, YouTube, ITunes and others offer us the opportunity to do well by doing good.
Let's get to work folks.
The reason is simple: the liberals run our culture. And unfortunately, ignoring the problem will not solve it, as Peter Lawler notes. After all, this is what voters watch. It forms perceptions. Might the election have come out differently if the rich white guy did not equal bad guys in most movies? The general portrayal of those with conservative values is what allows liberals to demonize us as monsters.
The answer? Fight back. Make good quality content with conservative values. Don't be preachy. Just don't be cliche.
Distribution networks like Amazon, YouTube, ITunes and others offer us the opportunity to do well by doing good.
Let's get to work folks.
Friday, January 25, 2013
President Obama, Constituional Scholar
One of President Obama's selling points was his keen mind, as demonstrated by his lecturing on the Constitution at the University of Chicago.
So it takes a unanimous Court of Appeals to tell him that the Senate has to be in recess for a recess appointment?
I'd love to see what some of the finals he gave in his classes looked like.
So it takes a unanimous Court of Appeals to tell him that the Senate has to be in recess for a recess appointment?
I'd love to see what some of the finals he gave in his classes looked like.
Thursday, January 24, 2013
War With Women
I preface this post with the fact that I have not served and have the greatest respect for the men and women who serve in our military.
That said, I think that the administration's decision to allow women into combat units may be a huge mistake.
First of all, it says something about us as a society and I'm not all that sure that it's a good thing. While the liberall media pats the administration on the back, they do not even discuss the fact that for millennia, societies kept their women as far from the battle line as possible. It was considered a mark of civilization.
It's pretty damned arrogant to think that we've "progressed" so far from our benighted ancestors.
After all, they recognized a simple truth. Men and women are different. Women are more important than men when it comes to reproducing. That's a simple biological fact. We're not in any sort of cataclysmic population threat - although the West's population replacement numbers don't bring comfort - but still, placing women on the front lines is of a kind with our society's wasting of all its seed corn, from the financial to the social to the literal seed corn we burn for fairy tale alternative fuels.
It's not the sign of a healthy civilization.
Moreover, it ignores the basic function of the military: to break things and kill people until our opponents surrender. The paramount question that facing our policy makers should be whether it furthers this mission.
The men who enter our military service, in my experience, tend to be throwbacks to a time before the age of insanity our nation plunged into during the Sixties. They say "ma'am." They open a lady's door. Do we honestly think that they will not react differently seeing a woman wounded and endangered on the battlefield than they would a man.
Will we be a better society if we force basic training to indoctrinate chivalry out of them?
Moreover, we are looking at combat operations in the Mideast and against the jihadis. What treatment can we expect for women POWs captured by these enemies? What impact will the mistreatment of female prisoners have on their male compatriots?
And, as noted by KFI AM640 military expert Brian Suits, most of war is boring and that is where the biggest threat to unit cohesion will last. What will we do if a highly trained combat soldier gets pregnant? Do we evacuate her? How does that impact morale? Is the American public ready to see pregnant women killed on the battlefield if we don't evacuate?
The military is not a place for social experimentation and we should not try to fix that which is not broken.
That said, I think that the administration's decision to allow women into combat units may be a huge mistake.
First of all, it says something about us as a society and I'm not all that sure that it's a good thing. While the liberall media pats the administration on the back, they do not even discuss the fact that for millennia, societies kept their women as far from the battle line as possible. It was considered a mark of civilization.
It's pretty damned arrogant to think that we've "progressed" so far from our benighted ancestors.
After all, they recognized a simple truth. Men and women are different. Women are more important than men when it comes to reproducing. That's a simple biological fact. We're not in any sort of cataclysmic population threat - although the West's population replacement numbers don't bring comfort - but still, placing women on the front lines is of a kind with our society's wasting of all its seed corn, from the financial to the social to the literal seed corn we burn for fairy tale alternative fuels.
It's not the sign of a healthy civilization.
Moreover, it ignores the basic function of the military: to break things and kill people until our opponents surrender. The paramount question that facing our policy makers should be whether it furthers this mission.
The men who enter our military service, in my experience, tend to be throwbacks to a time before the age of insanity our nation plunged into during the Sixties. They say "ma'am." They open a lady's door. Do we honestly think that they will not react differently seeing a woman wounded and endangered on the battlefield than they would a man.
Will we be a better society if we force basic training to indoctrinate chivalry out of them?
Moreover, we are looking at combat operations in the Mideast and against the jihadis. What treatment can we expect for women POWs captured by these enemies? What impact will the mistreatment of female prisoners have on their male compatriots?
And, as noted by KFI AM640 military expert Brian Suits, most of war is boring and that is where the biggest threat to unit cohesion will last. What will we do if a highly trained combat soldier gets pregnant? Do we evacuate her? How does that impact morale? Is the American public ready to see pregnant women killed on the battlefield if we don't evacuate?
The military is not a place for social experimentation and we should not try to fix that which is not broken.
Thursday, January 17, 2013
The Circle of (Statist) Life
In watching the debates relating to healthcare, taxes, guns and well, just about everything, I am struck by something.
There seems to be a pattern in all of the policy debates before us.
Statists identify a problem. They then, naturally, offer a solution which decreases individual freedom and increases central power.
Said solution invariably fails to take into account human nature. Thus the solution fails.
And from these failures come call for a new solution which takes more freedom and concentrates more power.
Break apart the nuclear family through welfare policy and social libertinism and we see horrible social mutations from declining birth rates to rampant fatherlessness. The outcome is violence, declining educational achievement and over reliance on government services.
So for these new problems, new answers? Alas, no.
The solution for violence is restraining freedom, attacking gun ownership and the Second Amendment or Hollywood and the First Amendment. The answer is more centralization, a vast new federal program for security in your local school.
The solution for a defunct educational system? Squeeze more out of the taxpayer and launder it trough the state capital or Washington. Or maybe both, to make sure all the right hands get greased.
And the entitlement programs, which were the last generations' centralized solution to their problems? More taxes. Trap the young in the Ponzi schemes.
And thus we will have more failure and ratchet the constraints on freedom ever tighter.
A more cynical man might think it's a convenient cycle. But it doesn't have to be a conspiracy to be true.
The only answer is refusing to yield to knee-jerk reactions and to scream stop as the elites look to put out the fires they started by drowning our freedom.
There seems to be a pattern in all of the policy debates before us.
Statists identify a problem. They then, naturally, offer a solution which decreases individual freedom and increases central power.
Said solution invariably fails to take into account human nature. Thus the solution fails.
And from these failures come call for a new solution which takes more freedom and concentrates more power.
Break apart the nuclear family through welfare policy and social libertinism and we see horrible social mutations from declining birth rates to rampant fatherlessness. The outcome is violence, declining educational achievement and over reliance on government services.
So for these new problems, new answers? Alas, no.
The solution for violence is restraining freedom, attacking gun ownership and the Second Amendment or Hollywood and the First Amendment. The answer is more centralization, a vast new federal program for security in your local school.
The solution for a defunct educational system? Squeeze more out of the taxpayer and launder it trough the state capital or Washington. Or maybe both, to make sure all the right hands get greased.
And the entitlement programs, which were the last generations' centralized solution to their problems? More taxes. Trap the young in the Ponzi schemes.
And thus we will have more failure and ratchet the constraints on freedom ever tighter.
A more cynical man might think it's a convenient cycle. But it doesn't have to be a conspiracy to be true.
The only answer is refusing to yield to knee-jerk reactions and to scream stop as the elites look to put out the fires they started by drowning our freedom.
Tuesday, January 15, 2013
New York's New Gun Law
So a bipartisan hysterical reaction passed today and we're supposed to cheer. Because legislators did something. In a bipartisan fashion
That's supposed to be a good thing, right?
As yourself that question every time you strip at the TSA and throw away your sealed bottle of water. When politicians are proud of themselves for breaking land speed records in limiting the rights of law abiding citizens, hold on to your wallet. Or, in this case, your magazine.
But why, people ask, would you need more than 7 rounds?
Ask her.
She shoots the intruder 5 times and ran out of bullets. He was also able drive away. What if he decided to stick around. Think he would give mom a chance to reload?
I'm not the best shot in the world. In California, I'm limited to 10 rounds. If someone breaks into my house, I'll be happy for them all.
So a bipartisan hysterical reaction passed today and we're supposed to cheer. Because legislators did something. In a bipartisan fashion
That's supposed to be a good thing, right?
As yourself that question every time you strip at the TSA and throw away your sealed bottle of water. When politicians are proud of themselves for breaking land speed records in limiting the rights of law abiding citizens, hold on to your wallet. Or, in this case, your magazine.
But why, people ask, would you need more than 7 rounds?
Ask her.
She shoots the intruder 5 times and ran out of bullets. He was also able drive away. What if he decided to stick around. Think he would give mom a chance to reload?
I'm not the best shot in the world. In California, I'm limited to 10 rounds. If someone breaks into my house, I'll be happy for them all.
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