Blogs For Victory

Interesting argument from David Warren over at Inside Catholic:

…A month ago, in my daily newspaper column, I briefly reminded readers of the requirements for a just war from the Catholic or Western tradition, from Augustine and Thomas Aquinas through Westphalia. My point then was to make the reader aware that, while few wars meet all the requirements, this, if it is a war, meets none of them — not even one.

Just think of that for a moment. In outline: The enemy is not, in this instance, an aggressor against us or against any of our allies. Muammar Gaddafi’s regime is fairly monstrous, though not by regional standards. In defending it against an anarchic uprising, he is doing no grave, let alone lasting damage to the international order. The obvious alternative (which has worked in the past with him) of presenting a plausible ultimatum with a realistic deadline and specific, foreseeable penalties was not tried. It was not even seriously considered — largely because we didn’t know what we wanted him to do, besides evaporate, and be replaced by angels. There is similarly no chance of victory for our side, since we don’t know what we want to achieve. Nor, thus, can we measure the evils we impose against the good we seek to accomplish. No “post-war” order is conceivable, let alone one that would be an improvement on that which preceded our intervention…

Which is all a pretty devastating critique of the war. I, of course, wanted us to go in – and go in a lot earlier – with the avowed purpose of removing Gaddafi from power. We went in late – very late – and still haven’t a clear notion of what the goal is. We’ve pretty much done this all wrong – no clear goal, use of force not calibrated towards a desired end, no possibility of building a future which would be inherently better than the continuance of the status quo.

In the decision to launch military action there is always this requirement: that it have an end in sight. If one person is killed to no discernible purpose it is worse than if 10,000 die for a good cause. Unless we are using our military to attempt to create a better future, then we are not using it properly. I can’t really understand why Obama went in. I know why I would say, “go”, but I can’t figure out Obama’s desire. To protect civilians? Right now, plenty of civilians are suffering in Libya – from the results of what has now become a long, drawn out civil war. But, also, civilians are suffering as much – or, perhaps, more – in such places as Syria, Iran and North Korea. Nothing wrong with rushing to the aid of the weak…but it does no good to rush there and then refuse to get rid of the source of the trouble. We’re intervening to save the kids from the schoolyard bully, but our action is akin to smacking the bully in the back of the head without making and effort to get him to stop.

The end in Libya is unclear – right now, it does not appear that we are any closer to getting Gaddafi out, if that is our actual goal. NATO is proving ineffective and only the renewed application of American power – and on a much larger scale – promises a swift end to the battle. But we don’t have leadership. No leadership, that is, which can set a goal and then ruthlessly develope the means necessary to achieve it. And so the twilight war will go on – the only thing consistent will be the fact that people will die, every day.

We can retrieve this situation, but only if Obama finally wakes up to his responsibilities as President. His job, the primary reason we have a President, is to ensure that the orders given are animated by conviction and a desire for finality and victory in action. So far, we have seen none of that and while we thank God that none of ours have died, it still does not excuse us from our moral responsibility to bring a swift, just and victorious end to this war.

I guess they’ve just decided to go The Full Orwell and no longer bother to pretend – from The Nation:

…We must develop an argument that the market is a source of constraint and government an instrument of freedom. Without a strong government hand in the economy, men and women are at the mercy of their employer, who has the power to determine not only their wages, benefits and hours but also their lives and those of their families, on and off the job…

The lack of comprehension expressed in those two sentences would be astounding except for the fact that it is just the same argument the left has been using for well more than a century now. Faced with the problem of what to do with a small group of plutocrats their solution is to set up a small group of autocrats, instead. Decrying the power of some over the lives of others, they seek merely to replace one group with another with never a thought that, just perhaps, the solution is to have no one in charge. They don’t understand that you can’t make freedom – you can only leave things be, and thus have freedom.

Curiously enough, it was Barack Obama who demonstrated the problem the left has. Once upon a time, in discussing our Constitution, he opined that it was flawed because all it had was “negative rights” – it forbade government to do this, that or the other thing. To fix it up, we need a Constitution with “positive rights” – for government to be able to compel this, that or the other outcome. There is no comprehension of the fact that if you’re trying to rescue me from a Capitalist who is compelling me to work for less than my full worth, the solution will not be found in some other entity compelling me in a different direction.

There are certain requirements for a just and free market. A free market is just that – free for any to enter whenever they wish on any terms they like. A just market is one where no one loses because someone else managed to gain an unfair advantage via law and regulation. As far as possible consistent with essential safety and with full respect for the rights of others, a free market is a place where people come and go as they please and do what they like.

It is wrong to have gargantuan corporations which can distort the market and make it difficult or impossible for someone to enter and complete. But it is more wrong to have a gargantuan government deciding who can enter, when and under what terms. The corporations, even the most powerful, cannot compel me at risk of life and limb to do their bidding – government can. I can be entirely relieved of Wal Mart by the simple expedient of not shopping there – but where am I to go to get relief from the Internal Revenue Service? So vast is the difference between the power of a corporation and the power of government that it ceases to be a difference of degree and becomes a difference in kind.

In a certain sense, it is touching to see this liberal faith still on display. Undaunted by logic, unwilling to face facts, impervious to the experience of the past century, our liberals are still determined that they can take the heavy club of government and turn it in to a magic wand of peace, freedom and prosperity. All we have to do is give them more and more power and they’ll eventually fix everything up for us – they’ll tell us how to be free and have a law, regulation and tax ready for every possible contingency to ensure we never escape the straight jacket of liberal freedom. We will be forced in to a mold, turned in to what is good and we will one day cry in unison, “we are free”. Such is the liberal dream.

You some times can be very well known by the company you keep – from the Daily Mail:

Crazed cult leader Charles Manson has broken a 20-year silence in a prison interview coinciding with the 40th anniversary of his conviction for the gruesome Sharon Tate murders – to speak out about global warming.

The infamous killer, who started championing environmental causes from behind bars, bemoaned the ‘bad things’ being done to environment in a rambling phone interview from his Californian jail cell.

‘Everyone’s God and if we don’t wake up to that there’s going to be no weather because our polar caps are melting because we’re doing bad things to the atmosphere…”

After all, it is “settled science”, right? I mean, ol’ Charlie is just as up on this as any other global warming enthusiast, isn’t he? And doesn’t this environmental consciousness in some way relieve the fact that he butchered innocent people? Heck, these days you can get Democrats going to the mat defending you for doing just that…well, ok, to be fair; for doing that as long as you call it “choice” and be sure your victims are unknown. Manson just happened to take things that one, little step too far, huh?

Only about six months late to the party – from Bloomberg:

Standard & Poor’s put the U.S. government on notice that it risks losing its AAA credit rating unless policy makers agree on a plan by 2013 to reduce budget deficits and the national debt.

“If an agreement is not reached and meaningful implementation does not begin by then, this would in our view render the U.S. fiscal profile meaningfully weaker than that of peer ‘AAA’ sovereigns,” New York-based S&P said today in a report that maintained its top rating on U.S. long-term debt while lowering the outlook to “negative” for the first time…

Yeah, no kidding. Who would have guessed it? Oh, I know – all the dimwits who have been pushing stock prices higher because, you see?, the Federal Reserve has promised an endless supply of free money which won’t have any adverse effects on the economy (please pay no attention to skyrocketing food, oil and gold prices). I can only figure that, now, the richest players out there have gotten all their money in to safe harbors and now its ok to start telling the truth about the economy.

We’re in one heck of a bad position here, good people. We’ve got out of control debt, a declining dollar, massively rising prices, the productive part of our economy (hint, it ain’t the government) has been hollowed out. People are out of work, losing their homes and even those who have jobs have pay which is, at best, flat when adjusted for inflation (which the Fed says doesn’t exist). Our government is led by a man who never worked a day in his life, and he’s surrounded by people with a vested interest in keeping things just as they are.

So, brace yourselves for it – it will get worse before it gets better.

Sharia in London – from the Daily Mail:

Women who do not wear headscarves are being threatened with violence and even death by Islamic extremists intent on imposing sharia law on parts of Britain, it was claimed today.

Other targets of the ‘Talibanesque thugs’, being investigated by police in the Tower Hamlets area of London, include homosexuals.

Stickers have been plastered on public walls stating: ‘Gay free zone. Verily Allah is severe in punishment’…

…An Asian woman who works in a pharmacy in east London was told to dress more modestly and wear a veil or the shop would be boycotted.

When she went to the media to talk about the abuse she suffered, a man later entered the pharmacy and told her: ‘If you keep doing these things, we are going to kill you’.

The 31-year-old, who is not a practising Muslim, said she has since been told to take holiday by the pharmacy owners and now fears she may lose her job…

Spend more than half a century on welfare; ban Christianity from the public square; kowtow to multiculturalist notions; cease to maintain the forces necessary to defend yourself and here’s what you get – in the capitol city which once endured bombing rather than submit to tyrants, tyrants are now allowed to rule with impunity. I am certain this is just the tip of the iceberg – this is both only what has been reported (with most people fearful of speaking out) as well as being a harbinger of what is to come. And here’s the thing: the government of Britain will foster this because when faced with a choice of fighting for what is right or knuckling under to tyrants, knuckling under is easier.

Will the people of Britain rise up against this? I hope so, but I doubt it – too comfortable for too long and too heavily propagandized in to believing that the Ruling Class knows what is best.

Noel Sheppard of NewsBusters has a bit between one-time sorta-conservative Andrew Sullivan and CNBC business analyst Becky Quick and has this to say about Sullivan’s characterization of Wall Street as “parasites” and Quick’s vibrant defense of our financial system:

As readers know, Wall Street bashing has been all the vogue the past few years since the 2008 financial collapse with some good reason. However, most presidents throughout this country’s history have known that our system of capitalism is very much based on banks, brokerage firms, and insurance companies, and that our economy cannot grow without a strong financial services industry.

Irrespective of his obvious socialist leanings, even Barack Obama understands the importance of Wall Street, as he was one of many Democrats to vote for the Troubled Asset Relief Program in October 2008 along with his current Vice President Joe Biden and current Secretary of State Hillary Clinton…

…Despite their posturing and finger-pointing at Wall Streeters, when push came to shove in the fall of 2008, even Democrats realized the first thing needed to prevent a total meltdown of our economy was a stabilization of the financial services industry.

Sullivan has either forgotten that or is ignorant.

Nice job by Quick to remind him.

Not being one to normally defend Sullivan, here I have to speak up for him – he is dead right. Of course, Sheppard is a bit right, too. You see, we do need a strong financial services industry – unfortunately, what we’ve got is a bunch of parasites who have taken our financial services industry and turned in to a crap game where all losses are covered by the taxpayer. Not to put too fine a point on it, what we needed in 2008 was precisely a complete meltdown. The reason we’re still wallowing in the economic doldrums – and heading back towards recession – is because we passed TARP and stimulus and essentially propped up a lost game.

Don’t get me wrong, there is a vital role for the banker in our society. The trouble is that we have JP Morgan/Chase and don’t have a J. P. Morgan. Ever seen a picture of the old J. P.? Here ya go. He looks like a hard-nose financial guy who is always thinking about money – how to protect what you’ve got and pile up more. Here’s a picture of the guy who runs JP Morgan/Chase today, Jamie Dimon. Just screams “how can I get a bigger bonus and then jump ship?”. Its the difference between having your bank run by “JP” and having it run by “Jamie”. People like JP provided the financial sinews for turning America in to the most powerful, productive economy in the world. People like Jamie are turning us in to a Third World backwater.

The main thing which bugs me about defenders of capitalism today is that they wind up defending the most indefensible aspects of it – the dregs of the free market; the juiced-in, politically connected, Ivy-League educated dimwits who took the most vibrant and creative economy in the world and turned it in to a basket case. What sort of cretin do you have to be if you are living a lavish, American life but then figure that the next pot of investment money should go to build a factory in China, or open a mine in Chile? What kind of American, capitalist CEO are you if you’re best buds with a President who (a) never worked a day in his life and (b) thinks we should impose policies which will necessarily make energy costs skyrocket?

Don’t get me wrong here – the leftist critique is even more idiotic. Hypocritical, too, as the same left which condemns capitalism will lick the boots of any rich man who comes along with a grant for a liberal cause.

To me, the worst thing we can do is defend “capitalism”. We should be defending the free market – and free people. We should be wanting neither Big Government nor Big Corporation. We should be working for an economy geared towards the average American; towards the small and mid-sized producers of actual goods; towards the man and woman trying to raise a family of decent, educated, law-abiding children. Everyone else can get stuffed.

From The Washington Post:

Less than a month into the Libyan conflict, NATO is running short of precision bombs, highlighting the limitations of Britain, France and other European countries in sustaining even a relatively small military action over an extended period of time, according to senior NATO and U.S. officials.

The shortage of European munitions, along with the limited number of aircraft available, has raised doubts among some officials about whether the United States can continue to avoid returning to the air campaign if Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi hangs on to power for several more months…

Half a century of living off the United States has led to this – the entirety of Europe cannot sustain a month-long aerial campaign against a 5th rate power like Libya. These are the nations which are pledged to rush in to war with us if we were ever, say, attacked by China? It is a complete joke and waste of time even trying to breath life in to such a dead thing.

Think of it like this – after World War One, the allies limited Germany to an army of no more than 100,000 men. The size of the German army today? Less than 90,000. A nation of nearly 82 million people has less than 100,000 soldiers in its army. France has 123,000. Britain 144,000. Italy 108,000. Spain 82,000. We have 600,00 active army soldiers. More than all of those countries, combined.

Europe is a senile, dying area of the world – 100 years ago they were burgeoning and active. Given that even as long ago as that they had forgotten what made them, they took all that they had and smashed it up in two world wars. Now they are so debilitated they can’t even bestir themselves to maintain military forces capable of self defense. If China could simply figure out a way to move an army to Europe, Europe would be theirs for the asking. It wouldn’t even be a fight.

And so why are we “allied” with such decrepit nations? Alliances, indeed – let us have alliances. But alliances with people who have at least some spirit. India; Columbia, South Korea, Thailand…these places have both common interests with us as well as people who have some grit and determination. Meanwhile, we’re shackled to a political, economic and military corpse. Enough of this – end the asinine NATO alliance. Who knows but that it may finally wake the Europeans up? But at all events, do not continue to tie America to such a millstone.

From Zero Hedge:

The early Finnish votes are in and it does not look good for Portugal. As Reuters reports, Finland’s anti-euro True Finns made huge gains in an election on Sunday, raising the risk of disruption to an EU bailout of Portugal. The right-leaning National Coalition topped the ballot, gaining just over a fifth of all votes. Party leaders will start talks soon on forming a new government. The problem is that as the anti-euro moniker indicates, the True Finns are pretty much hell bent on vetoing the Portugal bailout which means the ongoing annexation of Europe’s periphery by Olli Rehn is about to finish (and yes there is a finish-Finnish joke in there somewhere)…

This is not the same as what happened in Iceland and Ireland – those two nations are broke and part of the problem. Finland, though, is in good economic shape – this is not a rejection of being bailed out, but of paying to bail out others from their folly. All of it, of course, is ultimately a rejection of the notion that Europe’s taxpayers have to make good the losses of banksters who essentially gambled their investment funds.

In the larger sense, what we are seeing around the world – the TEA Party in the United States, True Finns in Finland, etc – is a popular rejection of the politico-economic power structure which grew up in the post-World War Two world. While each people will work it out for themselves – and some of them will remain wedded to a socialist philosophy – the main thing to take away from all this is that no one is in a mood to bail out people who made bad investment choices. It isn’t so much a “shame on you for going broke” but more of a “you went broke; so deal with it” attitude. This popular attitude gravely threatens the powers that be – they live off the inter-connections between Big Government and Big Corporation; the world is supposed to be built for them and they are never supposed to lose out. Well, they are being told, in so many words, “sorry, losers”.

In the long term, this can only be healthy for both economics and politics. Neither the economy nor the government can work if the impression is made that only a select few are getting ahead – that people with the right corporate or government juice are getting a rake-off. Thus the increasing dislike for the whole thing – the bailed-out Big Corporation, the failing government program, the corrupt government union.

Out of this – after much pain; we will have to go through quite a bad economic time before we’re done – will come a world better in tune with the needs, desires and hopes of average people. Average people – those who are neither fabulously wealthy nor dependent upon government; the people who make the world work. As humanity cannot obtain perfection by its own efforts, the only rational policy is to ensure that most of the people, most of the time, are able to get on with their lives – and that is what we have not done for half a century, but what will come out of this global revolution.

From CNA:

A federal court has rejected of a lawsuit that sought to remove President Barack Obama’s right to proclaim the National Day of Prayer.

Kevin Theriot, senior counsel at the Scottsdale, Ariz.-based Alliance Defense Fund legal group, praised the decision.

“Public officials should be able to participate in public prayer activities just as America’s founders did.”…

Hopefully, this will start a tend – the complaint revolves around a claim that if the President of the United States, in his capacity as President, participates in a prayer breakfast, it harms all of those who don’t believe in God. This is an absurd claim, and the court rightly rejected the argument. Now, if we can just get a bit more of this common sense in our debates over State and Church, we’ll be getting somewhere.

For far too long the tiny, bigoted and hate-filled minority of anti-religious fanatics have had things all their own way in the courts – all it takes is just a complaint and, usually, everyone knuckles under. Fortunately, groups like the Alliance Defense Fund were created and now there are people who will stand up and fight against such idiocy. We might even get to a point where Christians are able to fully and freely practice their religion in the public square they pay for.