Dakota Beacon

The obvious villain in the Gabrielle Giffords tragedy is the man who caused it, the very disturbed Jared Lee Loughner.  Sadly, though, there have been villains in the response to it, too – many villains.  And while it’s hard to make a pick for this Black Hat Award, one man who has certainly distinguished himself is Pima County, Arizona, Sheriff Clarence Dupnik.

As you may know, Dupnik has been busy warning of how speech has consequences while in the same breath blaming conservatives for the actions of Loughner.  Now, I don’t blame the sheriff for asking why.  It is fine to look for reasons.  It is not fine to be reckless and wrong.  And it’s a sin when it’s born of indifference to Truth.  

To be precise, Dupnik implicates right-wing talk radio – he mentioned Rush Limbaugh – and cable news in the Giffords shooting.  Yet a number of obvious things seem to have eluded this man, this supposed professional investigator.  For starters, if we’re actually going to analyze the politics of Loughner, we should note that one of his former classmates, Caitie Parker, describes him as a “left wing” “political radical” and “pot head”; moreover, Parker — who had been in a band with Loughner — states that he was a fan of the radical leftist punk-rock band Anti-Flag.  Note here that Loughner did, in fact, echo that band's ideas on his YouTube page.  Also note that on that page Loughner had listed as one of his favorite works The Communist Manifesto.

Now, question: How can one imply that an apparent leftist was provoked to violence by rightist prodding?  Aw, heck, I know – it’s Bush’s fault.

Yet there’s something even sillier here.  I’ve picked up the gauntlet the left threw down, but, really, examining Loughner’s political motivations is much like discussing a man who jumped off a roof because he thought he was a bird and pondering how his grasp of aeronautics might have influenced his decision.  Loughner’s above-linked video makes it painfully clear that he is clinically insane (he’ll probably be diagnosed with “bi-polar disorder” or “paranoid schizophrenia”) and that he was influenced not by his fellow man but by his inner demons.  Did this obvious fact also elude you, sheriff?  Columbo you’re not.

Now, Dupnik seems to be very troubled by inflammatory rhetoric; except, he only seems to thus define words when they inflame him.  I wonder, did Dupnik notice when militant atheist Christopher Hitchens said after Rev. Jerry Falwell’s death, “I think it’s a pity there isn’t a hell for him to go to” or when another of his leftist friends, Julianne Malveaux, hoped that Clarence Thomas’ wife would feed the justice a high-fat diet so he’d die of a heart attack?  Does Dupnik stay up at night worrying about Barack Obama’s statement, “If they [the Republicans] bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun” or about how the president referred to American political opponents as “enemies”?  Probably not.  After all, he seems to be of one mind and tongue with Obama, having opposed AZ’s original immigration law, calling it “racist,” “disgusting” and “stupid.”  And imagine, Dupnik’s Pima County abuts Maricopa County, home of “America’s Toughest Sheriff.”  Just cross a border and you go from Joe Arpaio to a jawing pie hole.

Although it’s clear that the left wins the inflammatory-rhetoric title hands down (although my last sentence just helped my side narrow the gap), it’s obvious that we all can be acid-tongued.  Having said this, guess what?  Dupnik is right.

Words do have consequences.

And we should watch what we say. 

The problem is that Dupnik & Co. have no idea on what basis we should self-censor.  It’s not a matter of avoiding inflammatory rhetoric because, as with certain topical medications, what inflames some may soothe others.  Besides, is it really always wrong to inflame passions?  Let’s examine the matter.

We’ve all heard about that exception to First Amendment rights: We can’t yell “Fire!” in a crowded movie theater.  But there’s an exception to that exception.

When there really is a fire.

This brings us to the point.  When discussing what should and shouldn’t be said, everyone forgets the most important question.  It isn’t whether a statement is cruel or kind, controversial or conciliatory, inflammatory or soothing. 

It is whether it’s true or untrue.

You see, sheriff, we traditionalists don’t call Obama a Marxist to be inflammatory but because his history indicates such.  And we don’t call advocacy of his health-care takeover tyrannical to be truculent; we do it to be truthful.  We yell “Fire!” because, despite what Billy Joel said, he and the rest of you liberals really did start the fire.  America is burning and we have the big red truck.

Of course, Dupnik would have you believe that such talk is un-American.  He actually said in this Fox interview that politicians got together and worked for the good of the country when he was younger.  But how frequently was American politics really defined by sweetness and light?  The Founding Fathers could attack each other viciously, and one little spat resulted in vice president Aaron Burr slaying Alexander Hamilton in a famous 1804 duel (you know, men such as Dupnik can make one pine for those days).  And an earlier disagreement involving inflammatory rhetoric led to even more bloodshed.  It was something that often happens when one entity tyrannizes another and won’t listen to reason (much like what’s happening today), so we may not want to blame the rhetoric.  I think the date of that little event was 1776.  And I think the inflammatory words started with, “When in the course of human events….”  

Speaking of which, isn’t it odd that the sheriff would find anti-big-government rhetoric inflammatory?  Our nation was born of violence instigated by men who despised big government.  They forged a constitution designed to forestall the development of big government.  Thus, to rail against big government is not “inflammatory rhetoric.”  It is American rhetoric.  It is so American, in fact, that if you have a problem with it, you should wonder if you’re American at all.

As for violence, let’s discuss what really sparks it.  And I don’t refer to the mindless Jared Lee Loughner brand but the 1776 variety – or the 1984 variety.  By the latter I mean that violence can take many forms, such as an immoral majority enforcing its will at the ballot box.  This is still called “democracy” but it can and does lead to the rise of bad politicians and policy that can kill far more than any lone gunman (the violence called abortion, failure to secure borders, etc.)  It can also lead to the loss of the ballot box, which is when 1984 violence comes to full flower.

If we wish to avoid this, we must understand the following.  There are only two ways of settling man’s inevitable disagreements: by the word and by the sword.  It’s preferable to reason things out, of course, but a condition for this is that both sides are reasonable.  As soon as one side exalts emotion, saying “If it feels good, I’ll do it – and Truth be damned” and refuses to yield to reason, the countdown to 1776 or 1984 begins.

Our countdown began long ago because a certain side in our nation did reject Truth and placed us all in a very untenable position.  I’ll explain that position like this: What if someone tries to feed your child poison?  What if you explain it’s poison, that it will kill the child and that he needs to stick to the diet of his forebears, but the poisoner is immune to reason?  Okay, so you try to insulate your child from him, but he manages to find your kid wherever he may be.  How is this all going to end?

Alright, now what if some group tries to feed your civilization poison?  What if you explain it’s poison, that it will kill the civilization and that our nation needs to stick to the diet of its forebears, but the poisoners are immune to reason?  Okay, so you try to insulate your civilization from the group, but it manages to inject ever more toxins into the body politic despite your best efforts.  How is this all going to end?  With the 1776 solution or 1984 dystopia.

The above is a metaphor for what you, Dupnik, and the rest of your leftist ilk are visiting upon our once-great nation.  Do you really want to prevent violence, sheriff?  Then drop the inflammatory-rhetoric artifice and stop the immoral actions.  Stop attacking Western culture and traditions.  Start believing in and seeking Truth, yielding to reason and abiding by the Constitution.  Stop the lies and deceit.  We yell fire because you and your fellow travelers really are pyromaniacs.  Pick up a hose and help, or America will be hosed down by 1984 – or 1776 – whether you, I, or anyone else likes it or not. 

                                                            Contact Selwyn Duke

It seems that our neutered, post-Christian culture just can’t do enough to vindicate Muslims’ accusation of Western decadence.  And the latest affront to common sense and Truth is an attack upon the family: The State Department will remove the terms “father” and “mother” from passport applications and replace them with “gender neutral terminology.”  Reporting on the story, Fox News writes:

“The words in the old form were ‘mother’ and ‘father,’” said Brenda Sprague, deputy assistant Secretary of State for Passport Services. "They are now ‘parent one’ and ‘parent two.’"

A statement on the State Department website noted: “These improvements are being made to provide a gender neutral description of a child’s parents and in recognition of different types of families [emphasis added].”

Improvements?  A real improvement would be eliminating the Brenda Spragues from government.

Yet Sprague insists that political correctness had nothing to do with the decision, explaining, writes Fox, “We find that with changes in medical science and reproductive technology that we are confronting situations now that we would not have anticipated 10 or 15 years ago.”  Ah, what an intellectual girl. 

Yes, this is all the result of a deeply cerebral process that draws upon the most serious scholarship.  I’m sure the fact that the homosexual group the Family Equality Council (FEC) had been lobbying for years to get the passport applications altered had nothing to do with this decision whatsoever.

In justifying the change, executive director of the FEC Jennifer Chrisler said that the “government needs to recognize that the family structure is changing.”  This is nonsense.  It’s much like addressing our growing obesity problem, saying that the “government needs to recognize that physiques are changing” and then casting corpulence as normal.  (With this analogy, I’m not implying that Michelle Obamaesque nanny-state intrusion is justified, only that government should not be actively undermining people’s sense of what is normal and healthy.)  Government has no business encouraging bad health.

Likewise, insofar as government is going to be involved in influencing the family, it has a duty to not undermine familial health.  The family is the central building block of civilization, and nations rise and fall with its fortunes.  And as with obesity and other physical problems, familial anomalies will inevitably exist (e.g., single-parent households).  But this doesn’t mean they should be normalized.

So this is where we stand as a society in 2011, Reader One, Reader Two, etc.  We’re so darn inclusive, we’re including the poison pill in the software of civilization.  This is Writer One, signing off. 

One of the problems with the idea of “American exceptionalism” is that it exacerbates a kind of complacency common to man.  This is the phenomenon whereby people often view themselves as exceptions, saying, after some tragedy, for instance, something such as “I never thought it could happen to me.”

On a national level — and this especially plagues great nations — this manifests itself in the notion that “it” could never happen here.  Oh, the “it” could be descent into tyranny, domination by a foreign power or dissolution.  Or, maybe, it could be the election of a leader who is a Manchurian candidate, a traitor within, someone bent on destroying the nation that gave him everything.  That…“it”…couldn’t happen here.  In fact, the idea is so preposterous to many Americans that, if such a threat loomed, they would never see it coming.  And they would call a person who warned of it a nut.

So I want to present you with a hypothetical.  Let’s say a leader were elected who had, during his childhood, been mentored by an avowed Nazi.  Let us further say that his guardians had chosen this mentor for him, indicating that they likely were sympathetic to the man’s beliefs.  Now, let us say that upon reaching college, this future leader gravitated toward Nazi professors.  Moreover, we then find out that a man who knew the leader as an undergraduate and was, at the time, a Nazi himself, said that the leader was “in 100 percent, total agreement” with his Nazi professors and was a flat-out Nazi who believed in old-style Brownshirt tactics.

Okay, we’re almost done.  After graduating, the leader-to-be spends 20 years sitting in a white-power church, has an alliance with a self-proclaimed Nazi and ex-terrorist and, apparently, becomes a member of a National Socialist party for a while.  And then, upon being elected, he appoints an avowed Nazi to his administration and also a woman who cites Adolf Hitler as one of her two favorite philosophers.  Now, here’s the million-depreciated-dollar question:

What would be nuttier, to claim that this man was a Nazi or that such an assertion was a radical statement?

Furthermore, if people appeared unconcerned about the leader’s radical past, what would be the most likely explanation?

A. They’re sympathetic to Nazism.

B. They’re ignorant of his personal history.

C. They’re rationalizing away a frightening reality.

D. Some combination of the above.

Let’s now transition to the actual.  Here is a fact: If you took the above description of my hypothetical leader and replaced “Nazi” with “communist,” “flat-out Nazi” with “flat-out Marxist-Leninist,” “Brownshirt tactics” with “communist revolution,” “white-power” with “black-power,” “National Socialist” with “socialist” and “Adolf Hitler” “with Mao Tse-tung,” you would have an accurate description of a leader in power today.

His name is Barack Obama.

We’ll start from the top.  Obama’s childhood mentor was chosen by his guardians, his grandparents, and was avowed communist Frank Marshall Davis.  Obama did in fact gravitate toward communist professors in college; moreover, we now know about ex-communist John Drew, a contemporary of Obama’s at Occidental College who verifies that Obama was “in 100 percent, total agreement” with his communist professors and was a flat-out “Marxist-Leninist” who believed in old-style communist revolution.  

We also know that upon graduating, Obama spent 20 years in a black-power church, Trinity United of Reverend Jeremiah Wright fame and had an alliance with self-proclaimed communist and ex-terrorist Bill Ayers.  It also appears — and I have yet to see anyone address and disprove this association — that Obama was a member of the socialist New Party in Chicago in the 1990s.  Then, upon being elected, Obama appointed avowed communist Van Jones to his administration and also Anita Dunn, who cited mass-murderer Mao Tse-tung as one of her two favorite philosophers.  There’s more, too, but greater detail is hardly necessary.

It also shouldn’t be necessary to ask the question, but I will:

What is nuttier, to claim that this man is a communist or that such an assertion is a radical statement?

What is the obvious conclusion?

Now, some may say that a person can change markedly over a 30-year period.  This is true.  Yet not only do we have the recent evidence of Obama’s radical communist appointments, but there’s something else as well.  It hit me just the other night.

Just as we would demand that our leaders completely reject Nazi ideas, all good Americans should agree that complete rejection of communist ideas is a moral imperative as well.  Losing a little youthful zeal or adding a dose of pragmatism just isn’t enough.  A pragmatic communist, in fact, could be more dangerous than an old-guard type.

Yet a transition from flat-out “Marxist-Leninist” to someone who rejects the red menace is a pretty big change, don’t you think?  In fact, wouldn’t such a personal evolution — some might say revolution — be a kind of conversion?  I think so.

Now, many people do experience conversions.  I think here of erstwhile radical-leftist David Horowitz; ex-liberals Michael Savage and Robin of Berkeley; and President George W. Bush, who accepted Christ as an adult.  And then there’s me: I was never a liberal, but I did transition from being a scoffer at religion and an agnostic to a devout Catholic. 

There’s an interesting thing, however, about conversions.

You hear about them.      

You see, a conversion is a sea change, a rebirth, a turning point in your existence.  You may become, as Christians say, a new creation, and you’re at least a reformed old one.  And you reflect your new state of being and often want to voice it.

And those around you will know about it.

As for this writer, everyone who knows me would say that my religious conversion was a seminal point in my life.  Horowitz has spoken of his rejection of the “loony left,” Bush’s conversion is well known, Savage has talked about his on the radio and Robin of Berkeley can’t stop talking about hers.  A conversion becomes part of your life narrative.

Now consider something.  Barack Obama is one of the most famous, most discussed individuals on the planet. 

But we have not heard about any soul-changing conversion in his life.

Not a whisper.

Nothing. 

Nothing that could reconcile the flat-out Marxist-Leninist he was in his college days with the man he supposedly is today.  There’s no one who says, “Yeah, man was he was a radical guy in his youth, and I just couldn’t believe how he became disenchanted with his old ideas.”  There are no stories about a great epiphany, an overseas trip that opened his eyes or a personal tragedy that inspired growth.  There’s nothing to explain how a radical Marxist became a reasonable politician.  And if there is such an explanation, it’s the most elusive of missing links.

So could “it” happen here?  And is it really nutty to ask if, just maybe, it already has?

This article originally posted at The American Thinker:

http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/12/the_missing_link_in_the_evolut.html

In the film “The Devil’s Advocate,” Satan poses as a powerful attorney bent on undermining man through the law.  When he finally reveals himself to the main character toward the movie’s end, he delivers a self-adulatory monologue during which he proudly states, “I’m a fan of man.  I’m a humanist.  Maybe the last humanist.” 

Speaking of devilish actions, by now most Americans have heard of Clay Duke (no relation!), the gunman who opened fire at a Panama City, Florida, school board meeting.  We know that he was upset about his wife’s dismissal from a district job and that he wanted to exact revenge on those he deemed responsible.  We also know that no innocents were harmed and the only fatality was Duke himself, who, after being wounded by a brave security guard, died by his own hand.

What few know, however, is Duke revealed that he had the philosophical foundation of what we today call “leftism”: On his Facebook page, he listed his religion as “Humanism.”

Before I explore the meat of the matter, there’s something I must mention.  Some will roll their eyes and call the above fact irrelevant, but what would the left’s reaction be if Duke had listed his religion as “Catholic,” “Evangelical” or, better yet, if he had expressed an affinity for the Tea Party?  If the last thing, the media would have had an orgiastic propaganda feeding frenzy.

The reality is, though, that claiming oneself a humanist is usually far more significant than a traditional religious identification.  After all, people may be born of Catholic or Jewish parents and, therefore, identify themselves in that manner even if they have no faith.  Hardly anyone, however — and especially not 56-year-old Southern boys — is born into “humanism.”  When you thus identify yourself, it indicates that the designation reflects what your beliefs truly are.

And what are humanist beliefs?  In our time, humanism has become almost synonymous with atheism; it rejects religion and, consequently, any moral standard above man.  Thus, moral relativism — the idea that what we call right and wrong are a function of man’s opinion — is one of its corollaries. 

Now, the reality of relativism is that it’s simply a pseudo-intellectual way of saying there is no right or wrong.  Many atheists, or humanists, try to deny this, but it is one of those rarest of things that can actually be called “philosophical fact.”  After all, if man is the author of what we call “right and wrong,” how is it any different from taste?  As I wrote in my 2002 essay “The Nature of Right and Wrong”:

Think about it: If 90 percent of humanity said it preferred chocolate ice cream to vanilla, it wouldn't mean that chocolate was "right" and vanilla "wrong."  Nor would it mean that chocolate was better in any objective sense — it would simply mean that people happened to like chocolate better.  It's illogical to say otherwise.  But would it be any more logical to say that murder was wrong for no other reason than the fact that 90 percent of all people preferred that others not kill in a way that we call unjust?  Of course not.  But if the idea that murder is wrong is simply a function of man's collective preference, it then falls into the exact same realm as the collective preference for a type of ice cream: the realm of taste.

This applies to all moral principles, of course; it is the corner into which atheists paint themselves.  I call it The Atheist’s Box.

And it’s one from which there is no escape.

That is, except by acknowledging the divine — for if morality is real, it must have a source.  The Source.

The only other alternative is the sociopath route: claiming right and wrong are just an illusion and that the credo “If it feels good, do it” is as good a guide as anything else.  After all, to accept modern humanism’s relativism is to render humanism irrelevant.  For if “morality” is “values” and values are tastes, on what credible basis can you advance humanism’s priorities?  Why should we believe that human advancement or dignity is important?  Who is to say?  Hey, don’t impose your values on me, you intolerant humanist!  This is why any relativism-based conception of virtue — or, as the atheists would say, “value system” (Do you know the difference between virtues and values, Chris, Richard and Bill?  Bueller?  Bueller?) — collapses upon itself.  To put it paradoxically, if humanism is true, humanism is false.

The problem with the relativistic folly of humanism, atheism, existentialism — call it what you will (some isms are a pseudo-intellectual effort to escape The Atheist’s Box, but they’re all getting a bit stale) — is not just that it’s a virus causing the crash of a poorly written philosophical program.  It’s that it causes the crash of civilization.  For we could say that it discredits its isms, but remember that it discredits everything and nothing — and justifies everything.  After all, rape, kill, steal, spend the nation into oblivion or, maybe, shoot up a school-board meeting?  Hey, why not?  It’s whatever works for you, dude.  And a whatever-works-for-you-dude civilization is not long for this world.

At this point, atheists may pull a Hitchens and point to all the evil, real and imagined, perpetrated by Christians.  But they miss the point: You can disagree with Christianity’s conception of moral reality, but at least it has one.  Thus, for a Christian to commit mindless violence, he must violate his world view’s prescriptions and proscriptions.  All an atheist has to do is note that his world view has none.

While still a teen, the budding serial killer and cannibal Jeffrey Dahmer said to his parents, “If there’s no God, why can’t I just make up my own rules?”  How is it that a man who lived the stuff of horror films understood the implications of atheism better than “scholars” such as Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins?  The answer lies not in superior intellect, but in superior intellectual honesty.  He simply had scraped away the pretense and explored the boundless universe of atheism to its fullest.  And this is expressed in an encapsulation of what Dostoevsky’s Ivan Karamazov believed: If there is no God, everything is permitted.

So, yes, I certainly could believe that the Devil is a humanist.  Unfortunately, he is far from the last.

                   Contact Selwyn Duke

All Selwyn Duke’s work, including more than 20 of his Savage Nation radio appearances, can be found at http://www.SelwynDuke.com.

This article originally appeared at The American Thinker

http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/12/citizen_class_warrior_florida.html

One thing that saddens me about the TSA security controversy is that we’re missing a great opportunity.  Sure, the insanity of patting down three-year-old, blonde-haired lasses and octogenarian grandmothers with prosthetics has caused a great backlash, as more and more people are realizing that our government’s common-sense-blind approach is born of a deadly allegiance to political correctness.  In fact, I’ve even heard a few usually very careful pundits float the idea that we should think about profiling Muslims.  Unfortunately, though, they invariably drop the ball in the debate.

The problem is that they don’t believe they occupy the moral high ground.  Instilled with the idea that advocating “racial profiling” (a propaganda term) amounts to bigotry, they generally back down as soon as someone looks askance at their suggestion.  This is especially frustrating to me because I’ve long been promulgating an airtight argument that, not only refutes the racial-profiling propaganda, but also illustrates why the moral high ground actually belongs to our side.  So I’ll present the argument again in the hope that it will now receive a better reception.  Here it is:

Actually, what is discriminatory is to not profile Muslims.  Why?  Well, consider that group-specific profiling is nothing unusual; for instance, law enforcement looks more suspiciously upon men and young people because those groups commit an inordinate amount of crime.  Yet do we hear complaints of “sex profiling” or “age profiling”?  Of course not, as we know that such practices are just common sense.  But if this standard can be applied to men and youth, it’s only fair and just to apply the exact same standard to all other groups that commit an inordinate amount of a given crime.  And when we refuse to do so — when we say that certain groups must receive a special dispensation from life’s realities because they enjoy privileged status — that is where the real discrimination lies.  That is what’s unfair.  That is a travesty of justice.

Now, contrary to popular belief, fellow politics wonks and pundits, no one has to pay me royalties when using the above.  There’s no truth to that rumor whatsoever.  In all seriousness, though, the argument isn’t the greatest thing since Aristotle; it’s just common sense.  And this is why the fact that it’s so uncommon is so distressing.  Because the argument does have one great flaw: It only works when used.

Of course, if we want to deepen understanding of profiling further, we could point out that there’s no such thing as “racial profiling.”  Rather, there are only two types of profiling:

Good profiling and bad profiling.

You see, profiling is simply a method by which law enforcement can determine the probability that an individual has committed a crime or has criminal intent.  And when making this determination, good profiling considers many different factors, such as dress, behavior, the car being driven, tattoos that might be displayed, sex, age, race and ethnicity.  Whatever the details, however, good profiling is practiced in accordance with sound criminological science.  And what happens when we refuse to consider certain factors in deference to political correctness, social concerns or “feelings”?

It becomes bad profiling.

It becomes unfair.

It becomes a mockery.

It becomes the TSA.

Conclusion: When rooting out terrorists, profiling Muslims is the right thing to do.

It is the moral thing to do.

It is the only thing to do.

And what if CAIR and other Islamist sympathizers are offended?  Too bad.  Did moral men or youths ever complain about the profiling of their group?  For that matter, do we hear shouts of “racial profiling” when whites are targeted (e.g., when they cruise inner-city neighborhoods in nice cars, they are often suspected of wanting to buy drugs)?  There’s only one set that should take exception to the fair and equitable application of criminological science: criminals.  As for me, I have no problem with my group being profiled as long as the same standard is applied to all other higher-crime-incidence groups.  And if CAIR will not say the same, they arouse suspicion and deserve more scrutiny themselves.

Now, at this point, the critics are often left with just one argument.  They like to say that profiling is a waste of time because if we target a certain group, the terrorists will simply use members of a different group in their operations.  Okay, now, how is this supposed to work?  Do telemarketers call people and say (cue the professional infomercial voice), “Hello, sir, how would you like to sacrifice your life for the jihadist cause today?  We’re prepared to offer you a trip straight to Paradise where you’ll be met by 72 voluptuous virgins!  But respond now because this offer expires December 14^th.”? 

The critics have it exactly backwards.  It’s virtually impossible to convince a normal person to kill himself to destroy others (unless, that is, you can first convince him to convert to Islam); it’s very easy to convince a person who is willing to kill himself to destroy others to do so in a different way.  So the truth is that if we focus on methods, the terrorists will just change their methods.  (As to this, it has just been discovered that Al Qaeda hopes to surgically implant bombs in terrorists.)  Methods don’t have a will; people do.  Methods don’t reject agendas; people do.  Conclusion?  It’s a waste of time to focus solely on methods.  We must focus on people.

Yes, on people, in just the way we do when the higher-crime-incidence group is men, youths or whites.  Of course — and those on the left who believe the Constitution is malleable ought to love this — a profile is a living, breathing thing.  It’s not set in stone.  If the facts on the ground change — if, let’s say, massive numbers of alabaster-skinned, Christian Norwegians become suicide bombers — the profile will change.  As of now, however, those willing to sacrifice themselves to blow up an airplane are 100 percent of the time Muslim and 99 percent of the time non-white.  That’s called a strong correlation.  That’s called the world’s most specific profile.  It’s called something you ignore at your own peril.      

So this is how you win the profiling debate.  Memorize the block-quoted argument in the third paragraph — verbatim if necessary.  Then, don’t just use it; shout it from the mountaintops.  Hang it around the left’s neck.  You must be just as vocal and zealous about spreading the Truth as the destroyers of civilization are about spreading lies.  And it shouldn’t be difficult.  Unlike liberals, you’re not asking for special treatment, just equal treatment.  And unlike CAIR and its enablers, you’re not asking for TSA dhimmitude for infidels, just a little fidelity from your government.

             Contact Selwyn Duke

All Selwyn Duke’s work, including more than 20 of his Savage Nation radio appearances, can be found at http://www.SelwynDuke.com.

Since I’m well aware of how leftists’ claims of erudition are as empty as their ideology, not many of their failures surprise me.  But an exception came last Tuesday when Whoopi Goldberg was interviewed by Bill O’Reilly.  The two were discussing their differing views on the nature of the Islamic threat, with O’Reilly maintaining that we have a “Muslim problem” and Goldberg insisting that, no, we have a “terrorist problem.”  In typical leftist style, she even went so far as to rationalize away the threat, implying at one point that terrorists were as likely to be white guys as anyone else.  But as ridiculous as this denial of reality is, it was followed by an admission of ignorance that was truly staggering.  It occurred during the following exchange:

O’Reilly: Do you know what a madrassah is?

Goldberg: No, I don’t.

O’Reilly: Okay, a madrassah is a school that teaches Islamic jihad, and there are madrassahs all over the Muslim world.  They teach four and five-year-old kids to hate people.

Goldberg: Bill, Bill, that may be true.

O’Reilly: It is true!

Goldberg: It may be true; I can’t prove it.  You’ve…you’ve clearly been to them, and I’ll take your word for it.

Goldberg had no idea what a madrassah was.  Wow.  Just wow.  Could you imagine if Sarah Palin exhibited such a striking lack of knowledge?

Now, if some readers didn’t know what a madrassah was, while I would recommend boning up on the subject, it’s a different matter: They’re not professional commentators (plainly, Goldberg isn’t, either).  But this is a woman who obviously feels qualified to render opinion publicly on the Muslim threat, and she knows nothing about entities that serve as perhaps the main transmitters of jihadist propaganda to Muslim youth (there are 10,000 madrassahs across Pakistan alone). 

And, of course, this has to reflect her knowledge base in general.  If she didn’t even know about madrassahs’ existence, how much has she actually read about the Muslim threat?  It’s fair to assume that she knows nothing of the history of Islam.  Could she possibly be acquainted with the Islamic conquests, from 632 A.D. onwards, of the old Middle Eastern Christian lands?  Could she know about how the Muslim hordes then swept across North Africa (also Christian at the time), invaded Spain and Portugal (then Iberia), crossed the Pyrenees Mountains into France (then Gaul), and got within 130 miles of Paris before being stopped by Charles Martel at the Battle of Tours in 732?  And could she have any idea that these continued conquests were what inspired the launch of the Crusades in 1095?  No, she probably believes that those defensive campaigns were animated by rapacious, imperialistic Europeans who suddenly got in into their heads that they wanted to convert those practitioners of the religion of peace.  (Note: Earlier this year, I addressed this in a magazine essay titled “The Crusades: When Christendom Pushed Back.”)

It’s also hard to imagine that Goldberg could know anything about the Islamic canon’s eternal prescriptions for jihad, how Muslim thought involves Sharia law, or how dhimmitude is the inevitable lot of “infidels” in Dar al-Islam.  In fact, after the O’Reilly interview, I very much doubt she knows what dhimmitude is.

Now, Goldberg was very pleasant in the interview; she’s not a person of ill will.  But while she did seem willing to listen to what O’Reilly had to say — she obviously wanted to make amends for an earlier blow-up during O’Reilly’s last appearance on The View — there is a difference between listening and trying to comprehend.  It’s clear that, like all leftists, Goldberg subordinates Truth to her ideology; thus, when the two conflict, instead of amending her ideology, she rationalizes away the Truth.  Put more simply, this is when something goes in one ear and out the other.

The ancient Chinese sage Confucius once said, “Wisdom is, when you know something, knowing that you know it; and when you do not know something, knowing that you do not know it.”  Sadly, Goldberg is ignorant of her ignorance.  What’s even sadder, though, is that such people can find a place in today’s media.

Now that “Don’t touch my junk!” has become a rallying cry, I must ask a question: What’s with this youth-culture tendency to refer to male genitalia as “junk”?

Since I keep my nose to the ground, I noticed this slang innovation long before John Tyner drew his line in the sand; it seems to be a phenomenon of the last five years or so.  And it’s one I’d like to put on the junk heap.

If I have any junk, it won’t be on my body and probably will end up in the trash bin.  And if the TSA wants to rummage through it, hey, be my guest.  It’s said that you can tell a lot about a person by examining his refuse.  So you can touch my junk — but let’s be a bit more careful when we lay our hands on the language, shall we?

When complaining about this, I must admit I’m a little self-conscious.  I really don’t want to sound like the über-sensitive professional complainers who say that the term “black hole” (density-approaching-infinity-so-not-even-light-can-escape-it hole is a little clumsy, dontcha think?) is insensitive to blacks or, God forbid, like the harridan feminists who would have us supplant “snowman” with “snowperson” (Frosty the snowperson was a San Francisco soul….).  But something needs to be said about this, and if I don’t say it, perhaps no one will.

Does it strike anyone else as strange that we’re now referring to male genitalia with a word that means “garbage”?  Oh, I know dictionaries indicate that this usage of “junk” can refer to female genitalia as well, but in the real world it seems to be used almost exclusively for the male variety. 

Some may roll their eyes and say I have to be hung-up to be focusing on this.  If that’s your attitude, then I hope your interest in reading further will at least be piqued by the idea that you’re viewing the musings of a very strange man. 

But, look, what’s truly strange is that we live in an age of intense anti-male sentiment.  This shouldn’t require illustration in 2010, but as evidence I can cite Christina Hoff Sommers’ book The War Against Boys; the continual portrayals of men as dolts in movies, on shows and in commercials; the pieces I’ve written on the subject; 11-year-old student Sam Besserman’s firsthand account; the acceptance of anti-male t-shirts sporting sentiments such as “Boys are stupid; throw rocks at them!”; or products such as the “All Men are Bastards” knife block, which gives the happy housewife the opportunity to keep her kitchen knives handy by sticking them in the body of a male figurine.  And these are just a handful of examples.    

Given the above, is it mere coincidence that this anti-male age sees a phenomenon whereby that which symbolizes manhood, at least physically, has come to be called “junk”?  And what might we conclude about this anti-male environment’s psychological effect on recent generations of boys and young men when they will readily refer to that symbol of their manhood (in fact, a fellow’s privates are sometimes called “his manhood”) with a demeaning term?  My self-image has never been so bad that I wanted to characterize part of my body as garbage.

Having said this, I won’t fall into the feminist trap of taking my own psychological analyses as gospel.  Perhaps this phenomenon is driven by nothing more than the notorious adolescent desire to be “cool” (it doesn’t seem likely, however, although it certainly is a contributing factor).  You also shouldn’t think I’m offended by it; I’ve always echoed the apocryphal saying, “Offense cannot be given, it can only be taken.”  I just think it’s stupid beyond words.  And it certainly doesn’t represent healthy social change.      

Moreover, given that feminist women don’t even like being called “girls” — when that’s just the equivalent of “guys” — I can just imagine how the “womyn” at NOW would react if the word “junk” was widely used to describe a female body part.  Oh, not that I blame this on them, or on normal women.  While the Online Etymology Dictionary doesn’t yet have an entry for this junky usage of “junk,” I’m guessing it was originated by a young man.  And men are certainly the ones who most use it.

I also don’t expect men to do much about it.  You could say that my sex rolls with the punches, that we really will take these things “like a man.”  Then again, you could also say that many of us have been feminized to the point where we’re ineffectual doormats.  This is why we’ll listen to blather about “racial profiling” without ever pointing out that men are profiled six ways to Sunday and that what’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.  And nothing will change until we junk the politically correct junk and stop acting like capons.

This article originally appeared at The American Thinker: 

http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/11/you_can_touch_my_junk_but_noth.html

With all the bad press the TSA has received recently, we can’t be sure if the acronym stands for Transportation Security Administration, Touches Sensitive Areas or Truly Scandalous Attention.  But, for sure, its pat downs and sci-fi radiation screeners give many of us another good reason to avoid the increasingly unfriendly skies.  Yet while the TSA right now has supplanted the IRS as the bureaucracy we most love to hate, its policies are merely part of a longstanding cultural trend: the failure to recognize that the good of the many outweighs the good of the few.

It’s the same reason why certain cities, most notably London, are now surveilling their residents with thousands of video cameras.  If you’re not willing to administer punishment sufficient to deter all the criminally inclined save a few intractable miscreants, some of whom you can catch, the only other solution is to have an all-seeing Big Brother that can catch all.  It’s much like treating a cancer: If you cannot target just the affected tissue, the only other solution is to treat the whole body. 

Because the former is preferable not just in medicine but also law enforcement, behavioral-sciences specialists long ago developed the method called “profiling.”  Unfortunately, social-engineering specialists soon after discredited the universal application of profiling with a method called propaganda.  Consequently, when we want to administer targeted treatment in the effort to thwart terrorism, we’re told that it’s “racial profiling” and beyond consideration.  This is utter nonsense. 

As I have said before, “racial profiling” is much like “assault weapon”: It’s an emotionally charged term designed to manipulate the public.  In reality, there are only two types of profiling: good profiling and bad profiling.  What’s the difference?  Good profiling is a method by which law enforcement can accurately determine the probability that an individual has committed a crime or has criminal intent; bad profiling makes that determination less accurate.  Good profiling considers all relevant factors — age, sex, dress, behavior and, yes, race, religion and ethnicity — without regard for political or social concerns.  Bad profiling subordinates common sense, criminological science and security to political correctness.

Good profiling is also fair.  That is to say, it discriminates on the correct basis: If a group — any group — commits an inordinate amount of a given crime, it receives greater scrutiny.  Period.  Bad profiling is invidiously discriminatory.  It says, “Hey, if you’re male, you’ll be viewed with a jaundiced eye.  If you’re young, then you, too, will be viewed more suspiciously.  Don’t like it?  Take it up with those in your group who commit crimes!”  There is no talk of stamping out “sex profiling” or “age profiling.”  But when we propose applying the same criteria to higher-crime-incidence groups sheltered by the thought police’s umbrella of protection, we hear shouts of “racial profiling!”  There then are news stories and Dept. of Injustice investigations, and people lose their jobs.  

Good profiling is also nothing unusual; it’s just the application of common sense within the sphere of law enforcement and something we all do continually.

If you cross the street upon seeing a bunch of rough-hewn young men walking your way, you’ve just engaged in profiling.  You’ve also done so if you cut a wide swath around a leashed dog; after all, he may be a very nice pooch, but, since canines are known to sometimes bite, your action is prudent.  And it doesn’t mean you’re hateful or bent on discriminating against rough young men and dogs but simply that you’re in a situation in which the cost of obtaining more information would be too great.  Consequently, as Professor Walter Williams wrote, “We can think of profiling in general as a practice where people use an observable or known physical attribute as a proxy or estimator of some other unobservable or unknown attribute.”  He then goes on to write:

Let's look at a few profiling examples to see which ones you'd like outlawed. …Some racial and ethnic groups have higher incidence and mortality from various diseases than the national average. The rates of death from cardiovascular diseases are about 30 percent higher among black adults than among white adults. Cervical cancer rates are five times higher among Vietnamese women in the U.S. than among white women. Pima Indians of Arizona have the highest known diabetes rates in the world. Prostate cancer is nearly twice as common among black men as white men.

Knowing patient race or ethnicity, what might be considered as racial profiling, can assist medical providers in the delivery of more effective medical services.

Now, should doctors be prosecuted for taking these statistics into consideration when delivering medical care?  If not, why would we prosecute law enforcement for considering racial and ethnic factors (along with sex, age and other characteristics) when tackling the moral disease known as criminality?

This brings us back to our current security concerns.  The profile here is very specific, as it’s a rare person who will sacrifice his life to destroy an airplane.  Protestants aren’t doing that.  Catholics aren’t doing it.  Nor are Buddhists, Taoists, Zoroastrians or Hare Krishna.  In our age, this is a method of people who 100 percent of the time are Muslim jihadists and 99 percent of the time are non-white.  And only the idiotic — or the suicidal — ignore such correlation.

Now, we all know what kind of suicidal idiocy engenders such blindness: a politically correct brand that panders to the sensitivities of vocal, politically favored minority groups such as Muslims.  But what about the sensitivities of millions of Americans who have to tolerate intrusive body scanning and pat-downs and watch their children subjected to same?  And the kicker is that when Janet Incompetano was asked if Muslim women sporting hijabs would have to go through the same full-body pat downs, she equivocated and said, “adjustments will be made where they need to be made” and “With respect to that particular issue, I think there will be more to come.”  Are you kidding me?  Is this Total Recall meets One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest?  Muslim women are the demographic second-most likely to commit Islamic terrorism.  If they aren’t subjected to scrutiny, what is the point (besides “security theater”)?

Moreover, why should Muslim’s imperative of modesty be respected but not others people’s?  Not only do devout Catholics place a premium on the quality as well, but millions of other individuals find it very offensive to be exposed in front of strangers and groped.  Yet we’re told that the very group criminological science dictates should receive more scrutiny may receive less due to political correctness. And if this actually happens, it will be yet another example of de facto Sharia law in deference to an alien culture and dhimmitude for us infidels.  

Of course, I realize that Incompetano’s equivocation doesn’t necessarily mean a Muslim dispensation is in the offing (although I put nothing past leftists), as she might simply have been overcome by the typical liberal reluctance to express unfashionable truths.  But is this an excuse?  If she expects Americans to tolerate the indignity of intrusive security screening and basically tells them it’s tough luck if they don’t like it, she has a duty to be just as firm with the over-coddled Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and its minions.  And to not be so was a slap in the face to you, me and anyone who has ever fought for our freedoms.  How dare she?

To cement this point, I’ll say that this is not first and foremost about whether a given security measure is or isn’t prudent.  It’s also unrealistic to think that we can have satisfactory security without some inconvenience.  The point is that whatever methods are settled upon — screening devices, bomb-sniffing dogs, pat downs, etc. — political correctness must not factor into the decision.  But it does, and this robs the government of all credibility.  And I, for one, do not take its efforts seriously.

The truth is that we don’t just have security theater but, sadly, war-on-terrorism theater.  We launch foreign military campaigns while leaving our back door to Mexico — through which terrorists and WMDs can pass — unsecured.  We even announce the charade by calling the conflict “the war on terror.”  As Ann Coulter once pointed out, using this euphemism is much like having called the WWII conflict with Imperial Japan “the war on sneak attacks.”  Terrorism is a method, not an enemy —Islamists are the enemy.  And if we’re too effete to even name names, it’s no surprise that we won’t identify groups.

What I’ve expressed here is just common sense, but it will remain uncommon unless we experience a cultural transformation.  Until the politically correct must keep their death-cult ideology to themselves for fear of scorn, social ostracism and career destruction — the very tactics they’ve used to silence others — nothing will change.  We will continue to exhibit a lack of seriousness about what is a life-or-death issue, a failing that will lead to an inevitable outcome: a mushroom cloud over an American city.  When that happens, it will have been enabled by those who gave us our cultural mushroom cloud, ushering in a cold winter of lies and preventing people from seeing the light.  And come that time, I hope we remember to thank them appropriately. 

Previously posted at The American Thinker: http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/11/profile_muslims_or_pat_down_th.html

Really, I must be a glutton for punishment.  During the past couple of weeks, I wrote two articles on libertarianism and made the point that for a law to be just, it must have a basis in morality.  These commentaries evoked quite a response, ranging from lauding me as brilliant to lambasting me for not having two brain cells to rub together.  And the negative responses were most notable.  For daring to mention morality and law in the same breath, some implied I was like the Taliban, one respondent called me a “neoconservative” and a blogger said I was a socialist (yes, really, yours truly!).  Pretty funny that, when talking about a man who proposed the Defense against Tyranny Amendment.

Now, to review the morality/law nexus in brief, I previously wrote (I recommend reading the first two pieces, here and here, for background):

…a law states that there is something you must or must not do, ostensibly because the action is a moral imperative, is morally wrong, or is a corollary thereof [emphasis added].  If this is not the case, with what credibility do you legislate in the given area?  After all, why prohibit something if it doesn't prevent some wrong?  Why force citizens to do something if it doesn't effect some good?

In response, libertarians emailed me and said that they didn’t impose morality but rather prohibited “force,” protected “property rights” or prevented “harm.”  But unless one objects to governmental use of force to apprehend a murderer or citizens’ exercise of self-defense, moral distinctions must be made.  Moreover, we couldn’t credibly prohibit force, protect property rights or prevent harm in the first place unless unjustly using the first, violating the second or causing the third wasn’t “wrong.”  Ergo, morality.

Another argument I heard was that not all law reflects morality; the example given was law mandating that we drive on the right side of the road.  Yet this is where the “corollary thereof” part comes in. Without such a law, more people will be harmed in accidents, and we believe it’s “wrong” to allow people to get harmed.   

To be fair, a couple of libertarians (one of whom is running for office) wrote me and stated that their informed ideological brethren understand that law must have a moral basis, such as the “non-aggression principle.”  Yet, while I realize many different conceptions of libertarianism exist, absent an authoritative “Church of Libertarianism” to establish official dogma, I have no choice but to draw my conclusions from libertarians’ consensus pronouncements.  After all, there are textbook/dictionary definitions of liberalism that sound pretty good, too, yet they describe no liberals I’ve ever met.  I live in the real world; if you seek a denizen of textbook dream-world, I suggest you visit your local college campus.  

And if you look at these pronouncements, something becomes clear: The problem here isn’t just one of libertarians but of moderns themselves.  It is a deep problem that concerns not just the nature of man’s law.  It concerns the nature of morality itself.

And, certainly, someone is confused.  Some respondents said it was me, and one quoted Ayn Rand, writing, “A code of values accepted by choice is a code of morality.”  But think about what this implies.  Hint: The idea isn’t merely that it’s not moral to impose morality, but that it isn’t morality if it’s imposed.

So let’s start an analysis of the nature of morality.  I ask you: Who or what determines what we call “morality”?  I addressed this in “The Nature of Right and Wrong,” writing:

[There are only two possibilities:] [e]ither man does or something outside man does.  The idea that man determines right and wrong is known as "moral relativism"; this means that morals are relative to the time, place and people.  The idea that right and wrong are determined by something outside of man is known as "Absolute Truth."

And, of course, the latter implies God.  After all, if we’re saying that “Truth” is something existing apart from man, is inerrant and that we must abide by it — which means it’s above man — what are we actually describing?  But, now, what are the implications of relativism?  I continued:

… [Moral relativism] states that morality is determined by man; what is rarely recognized, though, is that if this is so then there is no right and wrong, objectively speaking.  Think about it: If 90 percent of humanity said it preferred chocolate ice cream over vanilla, it wouldn't mean that chocolate was "right" and vanilla "wrong." Nor would it mean that chocolate was better in any objective sense — it would simply mean that people happened to like chocolate better.  It's illogical to say otherwise.  But would it be any more logical to say that murder was wrong for no other reason than the fact that 90 percent of all people preferred that others not kill in a way that we call unjust?  Of course not.  But if the idea that murder is wrong is simply a function of man's collective preference, it then falls into the exact same realm as the collective preference for a type of ice cream: the realm of taste.

Now, the Founding Fathers, men much admired in libertarian circles, understood this well.  They realized that if man is the measure of what is called “morality,” then it is merely opinion and based on nothing but air.  This is why George Washington stated, “Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion.  Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.”  It is why James Madison, known as the father of the Constitution, said in 1785, “Religion is the basis and Foundation of government.”  And it is why the framers emphasized that men’s rights are “endowed by their Creator,” as it is this — and only this — that could make them “unalienable.”  A person has a right to life not because some government somewhere thinks it’s cool, because it might cool on the idea 10 years hence.  Rather, it can only be a right because there is that eternal, unchanging moral injunction “Thou shalt do no murder.”  (Note: “killing” isn’t necessarily murder and can be justifiable in self-defense or during the prosecution of a just war based on “The Principle of Double Effect.”)  So the truth is that the founders would have been confused by only one thing in my block-quoted explanation and asked, “What is ice cream?”

Thus, to whatever extent and in whatever way the founders were libertarians, they were not libertines.  The truth is that today’s average secular libertarian has as much in common with those “classical liberals” (the actual political-science description of the founders) as modern liberals do.  In fact, how many degrees of separation are there between most moderns and the founders?  Probably about 24 — the number of the 56 signatories to the Declaration of Independence who held seminary degrees. 

If you libertarians feel unloved, I’ll emphasize that you didn’t invent relativism; it is the characteristic philosophical mistake of our time, with a poll sometime back showing that even 62 percent of so-called “Christians” don’t believe in Absolute Truth.

The latter fact is ironic, too, since relativism is joined at the hip with secularism.  And this is why the Sultans of Secularism, from Richard Dawkins to Rand (yes, Atlas shrugged and Rand slipped), do their dance of self-deceit.  They don’t want to come to terms with the implications of their atheism, with the meaninglessness of it, that its corollary of moral relativism negates any and all ideas about what is a right life, a right law, a right government, or a right right.  For it would all be taste.  Yet neither will they accept God’s existence and dominion.  So in an effort to lend the atheistic world view meaning and construct a moral foundation within it, they wiggle and jiggle, twist to and fro, jump through hoops and over hurdles, doing intellectual contortions extreme enough to create a sideshow between their ears.  All this because they insist upon trying to create the tree without the roots.  And this has been done many times — but it is always an artificial tree.

And it begets a superficial life.  It is thus not surprising that Objectivist Ayn Rand once said, “Nothing existential gave me any great pleasure.  And progressively, as my idea developed, I had more and more a sense of loneliness.”  No doubt.  The reality is that Jeffrey Dahmer, when he was a brutal serial killer, had a better understanding of philosophy than tree-without-roots secularists such as Rand.  For, when he was a teen he stated to his parents, “If there’s no God, why can’t I just make up my own rules?”  Now that is Objectivism in action.

As for lawmaking in action, to recognize that true leaves cannot exist without the roots isn’t to advocate descent into nanny-state nightmares; it is just to express an obvious truth.  And it’s one that people obviously are rationalizing away.  But why do they do so?  Pride is a factor, of course, as is attachments to long-held ideology.  Another factor, however, is that many people believe that if they acknowledge the morality/law link, it will open the door for the legislation of an excessive number of values.  And while I understand their fear, they have it exactly backwards.  Insofar as our government does legislate — which should be a rare occurrence — it must impose morals, not just “values” (which can be positive or negative).  For it is only when government imposes morals residing within its legitimate domain that laws are just; when it imposes merely values, they may be unjust.  But how can we ensure it will be the former?  Well, we must first be in touch with moral reality.  Only then will we understand when and what the government should be legislating.  But there is little hope society at large will understand something if a social-pressure gag order is placed on discussion of it.  This is why I emphasize understanding every aspect of this matter: the nexus between morality and just law; the immorality of excessive law; and, first and foremost, understanding what morality actually is.  Because to deny reality for fear it could be twisted is itself a twisting of reality — and the consequences are likely just as severe.

And doesn’t history bear this out?  Note that there were relatively few laws in far more Christian, “Bible-thumping,” morality aware early America.  Yet, as our society departs from discussion of morality and the concept itself — even replacing the term with “values” — laws proliferate.  It’s no surprise, either.  How can we expect those unschooled in morality (liberals, for instance) to understand the immorality of excessive lawmaking?

So people who want Rand can have her.  I’ll side with George, James and the rest of those Taliban, neocon socialists of dead-white-male fame.

                                                        Contact Selwyn Duke 

This article origianally appeared at The American Thinker:

http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/10/yes_folks_we_all_would_legisla.html

In a piece I recently wrote about the dangers inherent in libertarianism, I pointed out that libertarians, by applying their live-and-let-live philosophy to the moral sphere as well as the governmental, do nothing to maintain the societal moral framework that enables people to govern themselves from within and that ensures Big Brother won’t have to do so from without (I recommend you read the piece).  Not surprisingly, this provoked some angry responses and fallacious counter-arguments.  This article is my response to them.

I will start with the one thing that characterizes libertarians as much as anything else: a misunderstanding about the nature of law.  To illustrate the point, consider the commentary of “End the Fed,” a “devout libertarian” who posted under my first piece.  He wrote:

I don't spend a lot of time dwelling on whether people should smoke crack or have abortions. My choice is drug free. My choice is not to have abortions. And if you want to do those things, I won't criticize or judge you.

I simply accept the fact that those things exist whether I want them to or not.

OK, now what if I said:

I don't spend a lot of time dwelling on whether people should commit murder or rape.  My choice is to respect life.  My choice is not to commit rape.  And if you want to do those things, I won't criticize or judge you.  I simply accept the fact that those things exist whether I want them to or not.  I'm a good Libertarian.

Understand that all I did was take End the Fed’s reasoning to its logical conclusion.  After all, what do murder, rape and abortion have in common?  They are all moral matters — as is the stuff of all legitimate laws.  As I explained here:

A law is by definition the imposition of a value (and a valid law is the imposition of a moral principle). This is because a law states that there is something you must or must not do, ostensibly because the action is a moral imperative, is morally wrong, or is a corollary thereof. If this is not the case, with what credibility do you legislate in the given area? After all, why prohibit something if it doesn't prevent some wrong? Why force citizens to do something if it doesn't effect some good? You'll never see a powerful movement lobbying to criminalize chocolate ice cream or broccoli.

To provide a concrete example, what is the possible justification for speed laws? It isn't simply "me no like speedy." Rather, there is the idea that it is wrong to endanger others or yourself, and, in the latter case, it could be based on the idea that it's wrong to engage in reckless actions that could cause you to become a burden on society. Of course, some or all of these arguments may be valid or not, but the point is this: If a law is not underpinned by a valid moral principle, it is not a just law. Without morality, laws can be based on nothing but air.

So here is how you fall into the philosophical trap that has ensnared virtually all libertarians (and many others):

Step 1 — Believe in a mythical separation of morality and state.

Step 2 — Accept the laws you agree with and believe necessary, not realizing they’re an imposition of morality.

Step 3 — Turn around and oppose laws you disagree with, not on the basis that the values they reflect are wrong or are not the government’s domain, but simply because they’re an “imposition of morality.”

In truth, something doesn’t have to be proclaimed by a thunderous voice from the heavens, a bishop or Charlton Heston in a Cecil B. DeMille film to be christened “morality,” nor does something cease being so (or at least a conception thereof) because it has become the stuff of academia or wins a popular vote.  A moral does not cease to be a moral because it becomes a meme.

This is precisely, however, why we reflexively accept the impositions of morality known as laws against murder, rape and theft: These moral principles are seamlessly woven into civilization.  But this wasn’t always the case.  At one time, pillaging other peoples, à la the Vikings, was status quo, and the murder, rape and theft involved therein were simply part of doing business.  I mean, sure, perhaps you didn’t thus abuse a fellow tribesman, but foreigners were fair game. 

The lesson here is that most of the morality we take for granted is part of the Judeo-Christian ethic and for most of history would have been received like an injunction against masturbation is today.  Yet this fact eludes most because man’s default is to be a child of his age.  In fact, were today’s average good libertarian raised in a cultural milieu in which abortion was outlawed and universally equated with murder, he’d no doubt accept its criminalization as he accepts the illegality of murdering those occupying a place safer than the womb.  And were he living in ancient Rome, he might very well say, “I don't spend a lot of time dwelling on whether people should have men fight to the death in the arena.  My choice is not to attend the games.  And if you want to, I won't criticize or judge you.”  And when the Christians tried to end the games — which they were ultimately successful in doing — who knows, he might complain about how they were imposing their values on others.

Now, another argument I occasionally hear is, “Laws are not based on morality!  They’re based on property rights.  You mustn’t kill or steal from me because I own myself and my belongings.”  OK, but what if I said I didn’t think it wrong to not respect your property rights?  I’m sure you’d passionately retort, and if you were philosophically sound you might even mention Truth, or Natural Law.  Really, though, I don’t care what your arguments would be, only that you’d reflexively tried to prove a certain thing: that such a trespass is wrong.  Without a second thought, you would put forth a moral argument for laws prohibiting violation of property rights.

You see, the property-rights argument is, like so many other things, a dodge we use to avoid frank discussion about the real issue: What is good?  G. K. Chesterton addressed this in his 1905 book Heretics, writing, “Every one of the popular modern phrases and ideals is a dodge in order to shirk the problem of what is good.”  He then offers as examples the buzzwords “progress,” “education” and also, well, read it in his own words:

We are fond of talking about "liberty"; that, as we talk of it, is a dodge to avoid discussing what is good . . . .  The modern man says, "Let us leave all these arbitrary standards and embrace liberty." This is, logically rendered, "Let us not decide what is good, but let it be considered good not to decide it.

I might add that the property-rights argument can be summed up as: Let us not decide what is good, but, please, whatever you do, don’t touch my goods!

The point is that libertarians tend to live in an unreal world, one without the understanding that political battles are merely the front lines in a values death match that, ultimately, has definite winners and losers; it’s a world in which there is a disconnect between religious belief and morality and morality and law.  As an example, End the Fed also wrote:

Articles like yours continue the 'insane idea' that at some point the two warring factions, the left or the right, will somehow- someday impose their will and cause the other side to capitulate. That has not and will not ever be the case. So go on ahead and believe what you want to believe- I'm ok with that. After all, I am a Libertarian.

Actually, as the communists proved in 1917, the Nazis proved in 1933, Europeans prove with hate-speech laws and Islamists prove the world over — and as history has consistently taught — ideological conquest is, has been and always will be the case.  The story of man is one of spiritual, cultural, political and physical warfare, and each chapter has victory and vanquishment.  Zoroastrianism was extinguished by Islam, the Ainus have largely been subsumed by the Japanese, and the Maldives’ native Giraavaru culture is now only a memory.  Just like animals, countless languages, cultures, beliefs and peoples have become extinct, often the victims of invasive entities that, through superior morality or might, won that inevitable battle. 

And that is the battle for civilization.  It may sound very noble to say, “. . . believe what you want to believe — I'm ok with that.  After all, I am a Libertarian,” but when enough people believe the wrong things, you will not be OK with it.  You will be living under a regime that enshrines those things in law — you’ll be living in tyranny. 

Like it or not, imposing values is what arranging civilization is all about.  And like it or not, you’re part of this process.  The only difference among any of us is in what and how much we impose — and in that some of us actually understand this is precisely what we’re doing.

So we can avoid talk about morality if we want, but it will do nothing to ensure that morality won’t be imposed on us.  It only guarantees a descent into error that, ultimately, ensures that immorality will be. 

                                                    Contact Selwyn Duke

Originally published at The American Thinker:

http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/10/what_libertarians_misunderstan.html

While there was a time when I might have described myself as a libertarian, those days are long gone.  In fact, I don’t even call myself a conservative anymore.  Oh, don’t get me wrong, I agree with libertarians on many issues, and their governmental model is vastly preferable to what liberals have visited upon us.  Yet there is a problem: However valid their vision of government may be, their vision of society renders it unattainable.

Thomas Jefferson once said, “The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others.  But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God.  It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.”  Now, I certainly agree with the first sentence, as it’s merely a statement of the obvious.  But then we have to ask, what constitutes “injurious”?  And, when determining this, do we completely ignore indirect injury?  Then, if we do consider the latter, to what extent should it be the domain of government?  (When pondering these matters, note that the Founding Fathers didn’t reside on the modern libertarian page.  They certainly would have, for instance, supported the idea of state and local governments outlawing pornography and would be appalled at what is now justified under the First Amendment.)

However you answer these questions, you should question Jefferson’s second sentence.  While it may make sense on the surface, it ignores that spiritual/philosophical foundation affects morality.  And what happens when a people becomes so morally corrupt they elect a government that picks your pocket or breaks your leg?

Lest there be any misunderstandings, I don’t propose that our central government establish religion.  But I do have a problem with the implication that a person’s most fundamental beliefs — which influence action — always do me “no injury,” as this leads to a ho-hum attitude that lessens the will to uphold proper traditions and social codes.  And if you doubt the power of belief, wait until a European nation turns predominantly Muslim and watch what ensues — then get back to me.  

And today’s libertarians have gone Jefferson one better.  They ignore not merely religion’s effect upon morality but also morality’s effect upon government, as they apply their ideology not merely to law but also social codes.  Indulging “moral libertarianism,” they not only oppose anti-sodomy and anti-polygamy laws, they also look askance at social stigmas that could discourage such sexual behaviors.  Not only do they oppose obscenity laws, they’re wary of courageous condemnations of the obscene.  Even that most intrepid libertarian, Glenn Beck, is guilty of this.  When asked during an appearance on the O’Reilly Factor whether faux marriage was a threat to the nation in any way, he laughed and mockingly replied, “A threat to the country?  No, I don't . . . .  Will the gays come and get us?”  I don’t know, Glenn, ask the Europeans and Canadians who criticized homosexuality and were punished under hate-speech law.  

Quite fittingly, right after Beck answered, he quoted the “It neither picks my pocket . . . .” part of the Jefferson quotation, espousing the libertarian idea that we really shouldn’t care what others do as long as they don’t hurt anyone else.  To paraphrase C.S. Lewis, however, this is much like having a fleet of ships and saying that you don’t care how the vessels function as long as they don’t crash into each other.  Obviously, if they don’t function properly, they may not be able to avoid crashing into each other.  So libertarians may say “Whatever works for you — just don’t work it into government,” but what about when someone doesn’t work properly?  Thinking that personal moral disease won’t infect the public sphere is like saying, “I don’t care what a person does with his health — carry tuberculosis if you want — just don’t infect me.” 

And the proof is in the electoral pudding.  Did you ever observe what groups vote for whom and wonder why?  Churchgoing Christians cast ballots overwhelmingly for traditionalist candidates while atheists and agnostics support leftists by wide margins.  In fact, consider this: Virtually every group involved in something those Neanderthal Christians call sinful or misguided votes for leftists.  Goths?  Check.  Homosexuals?  Check.  Wiccans?  Check.  People peppered with tattoos and body-piercings?  Check.  You don’t find many vampirists, cross-dressers or S&M types at Tea Party rallies.   

In light of this, do you really believe there is no correlation between world view and political belief?  In fact, is it realistic to say that there isn’t likely causation here?  And what can you predict about America’s political future based on the fact that an increasing number of people are embracing these “non-traditional” behaviors and beliefs?  The irony of Jefferson’s statement is that whether our neighbor believes in twenty gods or no God, he will likely vote the same way (this is at least partially because paganism and atheism share a commonality with liberalism: the rejection of orthodox Christianity).  And equally ironic is that he will elect people who do injury to the very Constitution Jefferson helped craft.      

So there is a truth here hiding in plain sight: If someone is not a moral being, how can he be expected to vote for moral government?  Do you really think a vice-ridden person will be immoral in business, when raising children and in most other things but then, magically somehow, have a moment of clarity at the polls?  This is why John Adams warned, “Public virtue cannot exist in a nation without private [virtue] . . . .”

Despite this, libertarians tend to bristle at bold moral pronouncements that would encourage private virtue.  As was apparent when I penned this seminal piece on the Internet’s corruptive effects, they fear that, should such sentiments take firm hold, they will be legislated and forestall the libertarian utopia.  But they have it precisely backwards.  As Edmund Burke said:

Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites . . . .  Society cannot exist, unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without.  It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free.  Their passions forge their fetters.

Thus, insofar as the libertarian governmental ideal is even possible, it is dependent upon the upholding of morality, upon the “controlling power” of social codes.  For not only do they help shape moral compasses, thereby increasing governance “from within,” insofar as that internal control is lacking, the social pressure attending the codes serves to govern from without.  And insofar as this social control is lacking, governmental control fills the vacuum.  As freedom from morality waxes, freedom from legality wanes.

Ultimately, the tragic consequence of the libertarian mentality is that it guarantees the left’s victory in the battle for civilization.  This is because, in libertarians’ failure to fight for hearts and minds in the cultural realm, they cede it to leftists, who aren’t shy about advancing their “values.”  And proof of this is in the social pudding.  You see, if talk of establishing social codes and traditions sounds stifling, know that we haven’t dispensed with such things — that is impossible.  Rather, the left has succeeded in replacing our traditional variety with something called “political correctness,” which describes a set of codes powerful enough to control the jokes we make and words we use, get people hired or fired, and catapult a man to the presidency based partially on the color of his skin.

As for elections, political battles need to be fought, but they are the small picture.  For if the culture is lost, of what good is politics?  People will vote in accordance with their world view no matter what you do.  Thus, he who shapes hearts and minds today wins political power tomorrow.    

The libertarian chant, “I don’t care what you do, just lemme alone” sounds very reasonable, indeed.  But as hate-speech laws, forcing people to buy health insurance and a thousand other nanny-state intrusions prove, when people become morally corrupt enough, they don’t leave you alone.  They tyrannize you.  A prerequisite for anything resembling libertarian government is cast-iron morality in the people.  And we should remember that, to echo Thomas Paine, “Virtue is not hereditary.”

For this reason, neither is liberty.  Scream “Live and let live!” loudly enough in the moral sphere, and in the hearts of men the Devil will live — and the republic will die.

                                                        Contact Selwyn Duke

Unlike for most Americans, the Delaware senatorial primary was not my first introduction to Christine O’Donnell.  I remembered her from as far back as approximately two decades ago, making appearances on shows such as “Politically Incorrect.”  So when I heard about her supposed “extremist views,” I had to wonder if I was overlooking something.  It’s hard to forget such a pretty face, but did I fail to recollect some strange aspect of her ideology? 

So I did a Google search and quickly found criticism of her at the Huffington Compost.  “What better source for getting the dirt, real and imagined, on a Tea Party candidate?” I thought.  Yet I figured I knew what I’d find, and I was right.  Had she ever proclaimed herself a Marxist?  No, that was her opponent, Chris Coons.  Had she ever belonged to a socialist party?  No, that was Barack Obama in the 1990s.  Did she once advocate forced abortions and sterilization?  No, that was the president’s “science czar,” John Holdren.  Had she headed up an organization that promoted “fisting” for 14-year-olds and books featuring sex acts between pre-schoolers?  No, while Obama’s “Safe Schools Czar” Kevin Jennings did do that, O’Donnell’s sin is far different:

She believes in sexual purity.

To be precise, she is a Catholic who embraces the totality of the Church’s teachings on sexuality.  I could elaborate on that, as I’m a devout Catholic myself, but this misses the point.  To wit: The most the left can do when trying to cast O’Donnell as a danger in government is cite something that she believes has nothing to do with government.  She won’t propose the “Self-gratification Control Act” of 2011 anymore than she will mandate that you must attend Mass on Sundays, fast during Lent or believe in the true presence of Christ in the Eucharist.  (Note that former senator Rick Santorum never did, and, as a devout Catholic who often attends Mass even on weekdays, he presumably believes all O’Donnell does.)  What the left is mischaracterizing as her ideology is actually her theology of the body.

Then, I must say that I tire of how the word “extremism” is bandied about so thoughtlessly.  This isn’t primarily because the label is often misapplied.  It is because it is always misunderstood.

The late Barry Goldwater once said, “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.”  But to be more precise, extremism that happens to reflect Truth is a virtue.  After all, if you live in a land where everyone believes 2+2=5 and you insist it is 4, you’ll be considered an extremist.  All being an “extremist” means is that your views deviate greatly from those of the mainstream.  It doesn’t mean you’re wrong.

But we don’t talk about wrong, or right, as much as we should in this relativistic culture.  Instead, believing “Man is the measure of all things,” we naturally take the norms of current civilization as the default and any deviation from them as defect (in fairness, all cultures tend to be guilty of this).  But the reality is that while Truth sometimes lies at the center of a culture, other times it occupies the fringes.  Sometimes, like an abolitionist in 1800, an extremist is just someone who is right 50 years too soon.  Or you might say that an extremist is someone who upholds the wisdom of the ageless despite the folly of the age.

So saying someone is an extremist relates nothing about his rightness.  The problem with Islamic extremists, for instance, isn’t that they’re extreme — any truly religious person is thus viewed in a secular time.  It’s that they’re extremely wrong.  This brings us to O’Donnell’s opponent, Chris Coons.  

Since we’re digging up old O’Donnell quotations, it’s only fair to delve into Coons’ past.  And when we do, we find this interesting bit of extremism: An article he wrote titled “Chris Coons: The Making of a Bearded Marxist.”  It details how a trip to Kenya that Coons took as a junior in college served as a “catalyst,” completing his transformation from “conservative” to communist.  Yet, while one could elaborate further here as well, as with O’Donnell, this misses the point.  To wit: Marxism has everything to do with government, as it is about transforming it through socialist revolution into something tried and untrue, something that slays the light and visits a dark age of a thousand sorrows upon its victims.  It’s something that killed 100,000,000 people during the 20^th century and every economy it ever touched.  That is a negative extremism if ever there were one, and it should scare the heck out of every one of us.

And what is this supposedly balanced with on O’Donnell’s side?

Oh, yeah, the sexual purity thing.

Of course, Coons’ piece was written 25 years ago when he was 21 and will be excused by some as youthful indiscretion.  But I’ll make two points.  First, the ability to profile properly is always necessary when choosing candidates, as the information you have at your disposal when judging them is limited and managed.  A politician certainly wouldn’t admit to harboring Marxist passions; thus, in keeping with the maxim “The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior,” the best yardstick we have for measuring Coons is actions and pronouncements taken/made before he had a vested interest in lying about his aims.  (And wouldn’t we instinctively apply this when judging someone with a neo-Nazi or KKK history?  Would we give David Duke the benefit of the doubt many would give Coons?)  Then, when profiling, know this: People who embrace communism but then truly renounce it generally become passionate rightists.  Those who remain leftists usually haven’t renounced anything but honesty about their intentions.     

The reason why we should fear Coons is the exact reason why leftists fear O’Donnell: In their universe, moral statements are synonymous with policy positions.  If they don’t like salt, fat, tobacco (paging Mayor Bloomberg) or free markets, they play Big Brother and give us a very un-free society.  But traditionalist Americans are different: We don’t think that every supposedly good idea should be legislated.  We understand that government and its coercion aren’t the only forces for controlling man’s behavior; there is also something called society, with its traditions, social codes and persuasion; and something else called individual striving.  We can preach sexual purity while also adhering to constitutional purity.  As to this, note that while some snarky leftists have criticized O’Donnell for living in the 1800s, the men who gave us our Constitution lived in the 1700s.  And the norm back then was to have traditional sexual mores.  But guess what they didn’t have.  Marxism.

Speaking of which, that great adherent of Marx, V.I. Lenin, once said, “The way to crush the bourgeoisie is to grind them between the millstones of taxation and inflation.”  Given that we have a government poised to do just this — with steep tax increases and rapid money-printing that will cause inflation — should we really be concerned about a candidate’s views on sexual propriety?  Or should we be more concerned about a candidate who may be harboring Marxist passions?

So all the libertines amongst us should know that Christine O’Donnell will not take their sex toys away.  But Chris Coons may want to take all their toys away.  To vote for him is to play with fire.

                                                         Contact Selwyn Duke

When writing about Barack Obama’s religious orientation recently, I pointed out that while I do believe he favors Muslim over Western culture, bowing before another — even God — is above his humility grade.  I further mentioned that in keeping with this self-centeredness, Obama is (like all leftists) someone who denies moral reality. 

Ironically, after penning my piece, I became aware of an interview Obama once gave — one quite relevant to the topic at hand.  It was conducted in 2004 by Chicago Sun Times religion reporter Cathleen Falsani while Obama was running for the U.S. Senate, and it offers great insight into the nature of Obama’s “faith.”  I think you’ll be interested to hear what he had to say. 

The whole interview is infused with typical leftist philoso-babble.  Obama says he’s “a big believer in tolerance” and thus looks askance at “certainty” and believes in the necessity “doubt” (an attitude mysteriously absent when pushing health care), bringing to mind G.K. Chesterton’s observation, “Tolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions.”  Yet Obama also told Falsani that he had “deep faith.”  This might cause some to wonder “In what?”  And this brings us to the part of the interview in which he was asked “What is sin?”  Here was his answer:

 “Being out of alignment with my values.”

Perhaps this question was also above Obama’s pay grade, or maybe he studied divinity with Al Gore.  Whatever the case, this is not the definition of sin.  Rather, sin is when you violate God’s laws, or, to put it in more modernistic terms, it’s being out of alignment with God’s values (which are the Truth).  So it was an interesting answer.  Some might conclude that if you define sin as being out of alignment with your values, you believe you are God. 

An even stranger answer came earlier in the interview.  In response to Falsani’s query about whether he prayed often, Obama said, “Uh, yeah, I guess I do.  It’s not formal, me getting on my knees.  I think I have an ongoing conversation with God.  I think throughout the day, I'm constantly asking myself questions about what I'm doing, why am I doing it [emphasis mine].”

Did everyone catch that?  If I pray to God, I may ask Him questions.  I won’t say that I have “an ongoing conversation with God” and then reflexively follow up with “I’m constantly asking myself questions . . . .”

That is, unless I believe I am God.

Now, do I say that Obama thinks he is a supreme being who created the Universe?  Unless it’s a universe of programs, laws, regulations and debt, no.  But I am certain (if it’s still legal to be so) that Obama is a typical leftist: self-centered and solipsistic.  He has deified himself, in the sense that he believes he is above everyone else.  This is why he, showing no doubt whatsoever, feels so sure about reshaping our world in his own image.

His comments also vindicate my assessment of him as a moral relativist.  Whenever you hear “my values,” know that it’s the language of relativism.  It’s the belief that, hey, you have your values, I have mine — you say “potato” and I say “potahto” — and it’s all just a matter of perspective.  This is contrary to any absolutist faith, such as Christianity, Islam, and Judaism.  They teach that God has determined right and wrong and that it is something eternal and unchanging, encapsulated in a word leftists avoid: Truth. 

Understand that “values” itself is a term of relativism.  Mother Teresa had values, but so did Adolf Hitler; values aren’t good by definition — virtues are.  This is why the latter term is hardly uttered in today’s if-it-feels-good-do-it culture; instead, people may boast about how they have values, which is much like a street pusher defending his trade by saying that he provides drugs (which can cure or kill).  A value can be sinful as well as sublime.   

But in the leftists’ universe there is no sin.  After all, they believe as ancient Greek philosopher Protagoras did that “Man is the measure of all things.”  However, if this is so, what is what we call right and wrong?  It then can be nothing but opinion.  But think about the implications of this: If that unchanging and eternal thing called Truth didn’t exist, “morality” couldn’t have any basis in reality.  And this would mean that right and wrong doesn’t exist at all.  Ergo, no sin.     

Unfortunately for Obama’s opponents, however, this insight into his un-faith won’t lose him many votes.  This is because he has a lot of company, as moral relativism is the characteristic spiritual disease of our time.  And this is why I will use this opportunity as, to quote our relativist-in-chief, a “teachable” moment.

A poll in recent years found that, strikingly, 62 percent of those identifying as Christians didn’t believe in Absolute Truth.  I’ll also note that we have seen a great number of articles lately about how Christian youth leave the Church as they move through college.  These two factors are not unrelated.

On a simple level, if there’s no Truth — if virtues are just values and values are just opinion — why pick up your cross and carry it?  Why embrace a faith that places moral constraints upon you (especially the sexual variety, which interferes with moderns’ favorite recreation)?  “If it feels good, do it” then makes more sense. 

Delving a bit deeper, relativism strikes at the foundational act of Christianity: the sacrifice at Calvary.  After all, if right and wrong are just opinion and there is thus no sin, there was no reason for Jesus to die on the cross, was there?  (But He never said that His blood would be shed for you and for all so that opinions may be forgiven.)  So if you haven’t instilled your children with a belief in Truth, don’t be surprised when they leave the Church.  If they don’t believe in sin, they cannot believe in a savior. 

But this doesn’t mean they won’t desire salvation — that is, at least the worldly variety.  And this is one reason why millions of Americans, especially the ever-more-relativistic young, voted for The One.  A people who believed in Truth would never cast such a vote — and those who do believe in it generally didn’t — but when man doesn’t believe in God, he makes man God.  As to why, I explored the reasons in The New American magazine in 2009, writing:

Among other things, people find a belief in God comforting.  It involves the ideas that God, or good, will always triumph in the end; that someone is watching over them, cares for them, will help them, and will be there for them in the end.  Now, since this human need doesn’t disappear along with faith, it follows that people will replace God with something else when they lose faith in Him.  Thus did millions of Germans cheer Hitler believing he represented security, triumph, economic resurrection, hope, and change.  And it isn’t surprising that he rose during the desperate days of the Weimar Republic, with its hyper-inflation and hypo-industriousness.  It is when people are desperate that they search for a savior; when they are brought to their lowest, they have nowhere to look but up.  It is then that they find either the Deity or a demagogue.  And when you mistake the latter for the former, the danger is profound.  For you don’t disobey a god, you don’t question him; a god is infallible.  A prostrate people will follow a messianic leader to the ends of the Earth even if it takes them to the edges of Hell.

. . . Someone who would accept any degree of deification is not only unfit to be worshipped as a god, he is unfit to be followed as a leader.  As G.K. Chesterton said in his classic work The Everlasting Man, “A great man knows he is not God, and the greater he is the better he knows it.... Nobody can imagine Aristotle claiming to be the father of gods and men, come down from the sky; though we might imagine some insane Roman Emperor like Caligula claiming it for him, or more probably for himself.”  It is also correct to say that truly great people know that their leaders aren’t God, and the greater they are, the better they know it.

So, ultimately, the warning here isn’t about Barack Obama.  It is about us.  Our tendency to make man into God will always be directly proportional to our tendency to make God into myth.

Thank God, the myth of Obama has finally been punctured in the minds of many.  As with the Daniel Dravot character (played by Sean Connery) in “The Man Who Would be King,” the natives have now seen Obama bleed, and they’re not happy.  He is bleeding America, and he won’t stop until somebody (hopefully the Republicans starting January) stops him.  After all, why would he listen to the people or compromise with anyone?  Despite his extolling of uncertainty, when he has his “ongoing conversation with God” and is asking himself questions, I tend to think he views the answers as most infallible, indeed.

                                                       Contact Selwyn Duke

Twenty-year-old Naser Abdo joined the U.S. Army more than a year ago.  Now that it’s time to be sent to Afghanistan, however, he’s having second thoughts.  He is refusing deployment, claiming conscientious-objector status.

Has Pfc. Abdo suddenly developed an aversion to all war?  Hardly.  Here are his reasons, as reported by WSMV Nashville:

he said he now believes Islamic standards would prohibit his service in the U.S. Army in any war.

According to documents provided to The Associated Press, Abdo cited Islamic scholars and verses from the Quran as reasons for his decision to ask for separation from the Army.

"I realized through further reflection that God did not give legitimacy to the war in Afghanistan, Iraq or any war the U.S. Army would conceivably participate in," he wrote.

. . . "This is not about proving a point; it's about maintaining true to my Islamic faith and maintaining true to the American values," said Abdo.

Now, I would have a bit of a problem with any soldier who, after enlisting in the military, using resources during the course of his training and collecting a salary, suddenly has pangs of conscience when it’s time to do the job for which he voluntarily signed up.  But, as Fort Campbell (where Abdo has been assigned) representatives have said, they “recognize that even in our all-volunteer force, a soldier’s moral, ethical and religious beliefs are subject to change over time.”  Thus, if Abdo had become an across-the-board pacifist, I might be able to manage a smidgeon of sympathy.  (I would, however, still expect him to be required to pay back every cent the army expended during the course of his training.)  But a change to a mindset that “would prohibit his service in the U.S. Army in any war” is a different matter altogether.  And, although it’s hardly necessary, let’s place this in further perspective.

Since Muslims have been known to war against and kill one another, it doesn’t seem that the problem is simply a matter of fighting other Muslims.  Rather, it appears it’s a matter of fighting Muslims on behalf of America, our little corner of Dar al-Harb.  It seems that Abdo is taking the typical Islamist position that he won’t participate in a war waged by infidel America — only one declared by Allah.

This is a treasonous attitude, as Abdo has served notice that his allegiance doesn’t lie with our nation.  And we have to wonder, if he believed that Allah declared a war against the U.S., would he become a domestic terrorist? 

Common sense dictates that Abdo should not be deployed to a war zone, as someone harboring his beliefs would be a danger to fellow soldiers, if only because he cannot be relied upon to execute his duties.  But he doesn’t qualify for conscientious-objector status, either.  Note that the Department of Defense (DOD) instruction on conscientious objection states that to qualify for the status an individual must sincerely object “to participation as a combatant in war in any form.”  The DOD then elaborates:

3.5. War In Any Form. The clause "war in any form" should be interpreted in the following manner:

3.5.1. An individual who desires to choose the war in which he or she will participate is not a Conscientious Objector under the law. The individual's objection must be to all wars rather than a specific war.

Obviously, Abdo doesn’t object to “war in any form” — just the American form.  As for the unstated “American values” he mentioned, I hope we resurrect the almost lost American value of accountability in his case.  This would mean forcing him to repay the Army its investment in him and giving him a nice long stretch in a very American prison.

                                                         Contact Selwyn Duke  

Now that Barack Obama has decided to be for the Ground Zero mosque before being implicitly against it (perhaps), discussion about his faith has once again reached a fever pitch.  To many, his stance proves he’s a Muslim, with a recent poll showing that almost 20 percent of Americans hold that opinion; to others, it just reflects a desire to be faithful to the Constitution (now, that would be change).  The truth, however, is a bit more nuanced.  Obama is not religiously Muslim.  Culturally, though . . . well, that’s a different matter altogether.

In reality, calling Obama a “Muslim” gives him too much credit.  As G.K. Chesterton once said, “We call a man a bigot or a slave of dogma because he is a thinker who has thought thoroughly and to a definite end.”  The truth, however, is that few people have thought thoroughly and to a definite end.  And Obama is no exception.  He hasn’t even thought matters through enough to understand the folly of statism. Even more to the point, he is a moral relativist, a position the antithesis of any absolutist faith.  Inherent in Islam is that belief that Allah, not man, has authored right and wrong and that, consequently, it isn’t a matter of opinion.  Thus, Obama cannot truly believe in Islam — or in Christianity or Judaism, for that matter (he could perhaps be a Buddhist, but Buddhism isn’t truly a faith but a way of life).

Oh, and since some will ask, how do I know Obama is a relativist?  It’s simple: Virtually all leftists are, as the denial of moral reality that is relativism lies at the heart of liberalism.

Speaking of relativists, this matter of Obama’s “faith” much reminds me of Adolf Hitler and paganism. Like Obama, Hitler sometimes feigned a belief in Christianity, but in reality he held the religion in contempt.  He believed it was “the greatest trick the Jews ever played on Western civilization” and lamented that it was not a warrior creed like Islam or the ancient Germanic paganism with which the Nazis wanted to replace Christianity (I wrote about this here).  Yet, while Hitler’s second in command, Heinrich Himmler, certainly believed in the ancient pagan myths — going so far as to launch expeditions to the Far East to prove them, à la Raiders of the Lost Ark — it’s silly to think that the leader himself viewed them as anything but a utilitarian device.  He wasn’t quite that romantic.

But what about culturally?  For sure, Hitler preferred seeing Swastikas and runes (respectively, pagan symbols and letters) to crosses and crèches, rebuilt Germanic pagan temples to churches.  That was where his passions lay.  (If some are upset at a comparison between Hitler and Obama, know that I’d never call the president a National Socialist.  He’s an international socialist.  Also, Hitler was patriotic.)

Obama also has passions, and there is no question as to where they lie.  As journalist Todd Fitchette wrote in “The un-faith of Obama”:

he continues to openly praise Islam; he bows to Muslim leaders; he claims that the Muslim call to prayer is “the most beautiful sound in the world;” he regularly quotes from the Koran and cites it for directing his life . . . .

In the past year alone he made a big deal out of hosting a celebratory dinner to open the month of Ramadan — held in the state dining room; he refused to attend the 100th anniversary of the Boy Scouts (an avowed Christian organization), and, refused to attend the National Day of Prayer because he claimed to do so would be offensive to non-Christians.

Then there is that king of Freudian slips, when Obama matter-of-factly said to interviewer George Stephanopoulos, “You’re absolutely right that John McCain has not talked about my Muslim faith,” and didn’t seem headed for a correction until Stephanopoulos interjected.  (Note: This doesn’t contradict my assertion that Obama has no real faith.  Nancy Pelosi has spoken of her Catholic faith, but, also being a relativist, it can be nothing more than part of her cultural tapestry.)

And are Obama’s passions surprising?  He spent some of his formative years in the world’s most populous Muslim country, Indonesia, where he was registered as a Muslim in both schools he attended and sometimes prayed on Fridays in a mosque.  Moreover, there is another factor, one most people don’t consider.

As many know, there once was a great boxer named Cassius Clay.  He converted to Islam in 1964, seemingly bothered that Jesus was portrayed as “a white with blond hair and blue eyes,” as he put it, and took the name “Muhammad Ali.”  Of course, the irony of this is that, despite being intensely aware of his slave roots, he rejected the name of an abolitionist (Clay) and took the name of a slave owner (Muhammad).  It also perhaps eluded him that Christians were the first ones to outlaw slavery while Muslims give black Africans rope and chains to this day.

But I mention this because Ali’s path is a common one in the black community; it is why we’ve long had the Black Muslims and why Islamic names are so common among American blacks.  Many blacks have bought the bill of goods that Christianity is the white man’s religion, the faith of oppressors.  And they embrace Islam as part of a rejection of “white” society.

Obviously, being part of this milieu could only have reinforced Obama’s affinity for things Muslim and antipathy for things authentically Christian — of which Western Civilization is one.  And if Americans hadn’t been brainwashed with political correctness, they would have understood this.  With foreign and domestic Muslim influence, attendance at a Black Liberation Theology, pseudo-Christian church and alliances with ex-terrorists and declared communists, Obama perfectly fits the profile of an America hater.  The wolf never really wore sheep’s clothing; it’s just that Americans had wool pulled over their eyes.

As for Obama’s eyes, they cannot look heavenward when they’re so busy looking down on little people who “cling to guns and religion.”  I sense that Obama is a certain kind of person, one much like Hitler — who wanted to create a new German pagan religion with himself at its center — in a particular sense.  This type of person essentially says the following to God, “The Universe just isn’t big enough for the two of us.”  And his little world certainly isn’t, filled to all corners as it is with his bloated, power-hungry ego.  This, by the way, has been acknowledged by more honest secularists.  For example, Friedrich Nietzsche, the 19^th-century poster boy for atheism who is rumored to have been a philosopher (in reality, he is someone who helped discredit the field), once said through his version of Zarathustra, “If there were gods, how could I endure it to be no God?  Therefore there can be no gods.”  I have a feeling that Obama cannot endure it to be no god.

It is, again, unwise to give Obama too much credit.  Good faith is defined as “an act of the will informed by the intellect,” and any kind of faith requires submission to something higher than yourself.  Obama is neither that intellectual nor that humble.  But all humans have passions, and his aren’t hard to discern.  He is anti-American, anti-western, anti-Christian (the traditional variety), anti-white and anti-life.  He is more comfortable dining with Bill Ayres than the Queen of England, more internationalist than nationalist, and perhaps more at home in Dar al-Islam than Dar al-Harb.  He has lived abroad and traveled much, but he is a lover of nations like a Casanova is a lover of women: He has known many but loves, and is faithful to, none — not even the one to which he should be married.  He is a cultural traitor, and, as Cicero said about traitors two-thousand years ago, “A murderer is less to be feared.”  

To quote Chesterton again, he once said, “There was a time when men weren’t very sure of themselves, but they were very sure of what the truth was.  Now men are very sure of themselves but not at all sure of what the truth is.”  The latter describes Obama.  If he does have faith, it is in himself.  And that is a faith terribly misplaced.

                                                         Contact Selwyn Duke   

This article originally appeared at The American Thinker:

http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/08/the_truth_about_obamas_muslim.html