"Barack Obama and Joe Biden will enact a windfall profits tax on excessive oil company profits to give American families an immediate $1,000 emergency energy rebate to help families pay rising bills. This relief would be a down payment on the Obama-Biden long-term plan to provide middle-class families with at least $1,000 per year in permanent tax relief." [emphasis added] http://www.barackobama.com/issues/economy/#jumpstart
Where did these so-called windfall profits come from? The question really begins with where do profits come from, and why? And there is still another question which leads to an answer to both: What historical event caused the ability to make profits, when before that event capitalism did not and could not exist?
The mechanical clock changed history in the direction of capitalism. Without the clock, or something else metaphysically the same in its historical-industrial importance, there would be no capitalism. Before the mechanical clock there wasn't any capitalism; the clock was the metaphysical impetus to start the industrial revolution. That impetus needed capital to keep it operating and the industrial importance of the clock was that it demonstrated that anything--so it was believed--could now be mechanized, thus saving time in the form of manpower, and effort also in the form of saved manpower.
Savings equal profit, and it must begin with a savings of human effort.
So, before the mechanical clock, there was no capitalism, because the clock provided the mechanical means for the distribution of labor.
How?
"Mechanical clocks replaced the old water clocks, which, by the 13th century, had been around for millennia. Water flowed steadily into a vertical tank and the rising water level indicated the time of day. That's simple enough, but, like mechanical clocks, water clocks had become ornate structures with gears and dials. Like mechanical clocks, they tolled the hours and displayed the planets.
"What makes a mechanical clock is a mechanism called an escapement -- the balance wheel on a watch or the pendulum on a grandfather's clock. An escapement ticks in a steady rhythm and lets the gears move forward in a series of little equal jumps." John Lienhard; University of Houston;http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1506.htm
"Regular time-keeping and order was an essential feature of monastic life, especially under the Benedictine Rule. Work and prayer were controlled by the clock. This pattern of work was later transferred to secular working practices, and became a feature of early factory organization. It is primarily for this reason that Lewis Mumford traced the origins of the Industrial Revolution back to the tenth century.
"Writing in the 1930s, Mumford identified the clock as the key machine of the industrial age." [emphasis added]time for technology
Secular working practices were such that the machines built on the metaphysical premise of the clock, the premise in the belief that anything man could do with his hands could be done better and faster with a machine, did not become evident as "division of labor" until the machines had been built, which then naturally divided labor--one man would operate one machine, another man another, and so on, dividing the labor of the manufacturing process. This is where the time and labor savings came in to play.
But it took another six centuries after the invention of the clock until Renaissance science made the metaphysics of machines a reality. Until then, machines were still rare; the metaphysical belief that anything done by man could be done mechanically was about to be given its form and shape.
Coin-striking machines powered by horses were some of the first, followed by the loom, and of course the Gutenberg's Press. Gutenberg's press allowed the printing of one of the first encyclopedias, intended not to instruct about the things in the universe, i.e., history and such, but to instruct men in how to perform the professions, which for centuries had always been taught in guilds. We now call them "how-to" books, and they are written on every subject imaginable.
It was actually believed that no occupation could be properly learned except when taught by a master to a journeyman. That encyclopedia greatly expanded the ability of men to master new trades.
The division of labor is "the specialization of cooperative labour in specific, circumscribed tasks and roles, intended to increase the productivity of labour. Historically the growth of a more and more complex division of labour is closely associated with the growth of total output and trade, the rise of capitalism, and of the complexity of industrialisation processes." Wikipediahttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Division_of_labor
Without this division, made possible by the metaphysical nature of the desire to create machines to do man's work better and faster, there could be no capitalism. But modern men have been taught that capital is a natural resource, or at the very least is printable by the government.
It is neither. Capital is the value of increased production with the attendant savings in manpower, which lowers prices to affordable levels, so that consumers can afford them, thus driving up production and lowering prices more. (The first calculators, introduced in the late 1960s, cost $1000.) Other industries spring up to support those already operating, such as manufacturing of bags to carry store-bought goods; Ipod covers; cell phone headsets; car polish; as well as new products previously unheard of.
Factories that produce goods at affordable prices, that people want, make profits.
Therefor, there is no such thing as a "windfall profit". The American auto manufacturers that made billions of dollars when they served the market are now in the red by billions of dollars every month because they failed the market--the market did not fail them.
The oil companies that made billions of dollars from the high cost of oil and fuel may find themselves in the same place as Detroit if the Obama administration has its way with the energy market, by pouring $100 billion in the next ten years into subsidizing energy industries that until now could not offer what the public wanted at prices the public could afford because they were failing the market. Perhaps that failure was due, in part, to the oil lobby in Washington. What if Obama's policies cause a failure in the oil industry to the point where they are in the red by billions every month? Then, will anti-capitalists give back what they are intending to tax away?
The bare-bones fact is, the only windfall profits in existence will be those which the Obama administration and the Democrats will create for their own purposes, taken from those who provided the product that Americans needed and wanted; and the inflationary $trillion printed for the mortgage bailout. The proof that Americans needed and wanted their private cars is the statistic that public transportation ridership did not significantly increase when the price of gas was going up and up and up.
That is what capitalism is: we buy what we desire and the providers make a percentage--the same percentage at high prices as at low prices.
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Ontology distinguishes between entities, draws distinctions in their qualities that set them apart from other entities, and qualifies the relationships of those qualities to the qualities of other entities. Entities are defined by their qualities, e.g., the primary distinquishing characteristic of "man" is not his opposable thumb, nor his linquistic ability, since chimps have rudimentary language, and elepephant, whales and other species may also have rudimentary language. The distinguishing characteristic of "man" is "rational animal."
So when I read the November 8 edition of American Thinker http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/11/americas_third_republic.htmlI knew the subject was drawing the lines of distinction between the Constitution before and after the administration of FDR, and comparing it to the coming administration of Barak Obama:
"Theodore Lowi, a political science eminence at Cornell University, years ago drew a bead on what was wrong with the American polity. In his The End of Liberalism: The Second Republic of the United States, he claimed that the Founder's constitution of 1787 had been surreptitiously replaced with a new one by the FDR administration, and no one had actually noticed it for seventy-plus years."
The idea that no one had noticed it is so badly wrong I am surprised Lowi's editors didn't stop him from saying it.
In the blog "No Exit," Fitz Brundage wrote in Opposition to the New Deal that, "the policies of [FDR's] administration inevitably aroused opposition. The evolution of Roosevelt’s New Deal cannot be understood apart from the opposition that it aroused. [A] coalition of conservative opponents emerged and systematically curtailed the most ambitious plans of the New Deal. [ ] By early 1935, the New Deal legislation of the previous two years had aroused growing voices of criticism on the left and right of the political spectrum, and by several important Supreme Court rulings." http://david-sullivan.blogspot.com/2007/09/opposition-to-fdr-and-new-deal.html
Yet it seems as if we have done just that. Harold Kildow argues in the American Thinker about the differences between post-FDR, and the incoming administration of Barak Obama. Kildow says the Constitution post FDR was "Constitution 2.0" and now we may be in for "Constitution 3.0" without anyone ever voting to change the Constitution.
As a matter of fact, it has been an accepted fact of American politics since the publication of Emmerich de Vattel's text, "The Law of Nations" that the legislature does not have the power to change a constitution:
"American writers quoted {The Law of Nations} on constitutional law, almost immediately after the book's publication. [ ] Boston revolutionary leader Samuel Adams wrote in 1772, 'Vattel tells us plainly and without hesitation, that "the supreme legislative cannot change the constitution," that "their authority does not extend so far," and "that they ought to consider the fundamental laws as sacred, if the nation has not, in very express terms, given them power to change them." " http://east_west_dialogue.tripod.com/vattel/id4.html
This is the reason that Originalism, or original intent reading, of the Constitution is necessary. It is the only objective means of determining the qualities of the written law and the relationships between those qualities and what the Framers intented.
The coming administration of Obama will do nothing toward Originalism, and may reverse the the idea, depending on whom Obama is able to nominate to the Supreme Court and get approved in the Democrat-controlled Congress.
Modern liberals and many conservatives believe the contrary of Originalsm. It is called the Living Constitution, and is a concept which proposes the Constitution should be interpreted to evolve with the society that implements it.
The very fact that Originalism is disavowed by American liberals, democrats and others, as the proper method of interpreting the Constitution, and their reasons for that disavowal, is proof positive that we are indeed headed for Constitution 3.0, and the only people taking note of it are Originalists. The rest of the nation sees nothing wrong in impressing our own ideas "between the lines," as it were, of a document meant to be taken literally: Change it if you don't like it. The Founders never said ignore it and do what you will by pretending we meant something we didn't mean at all and wouldn't approve of if we were asked.
But "Originalism does not in any way prevent it from being applied to American law in any decade or any century. The original intent can--and ought--to be applied because that was the intent of those who wrote it. They provided us with the means to change their intentions, and that means was not to ignore their intentions. That means was not to place any meaning on their words that fit our purposes. That means which they provided was to either nullify by Amendment where necessary, or alter by legislation where allowed, the intention of their words." http://freeassemblage.blogspot.com/2008/10/free-assemblage-of-metaphysical.html
If Obama is as Marxist as he appears to be when he speaks and has his positions published, e.g., when he talks of "windfall profits," and "redistributing" profits from the capitalists to the consumers, he has no intention of Originalism in his political philosophy (except perhaps where it may serve his own policies; we shall have to wait to see.)
Neither Obama nor the Democrats are liberals in the originalist meaning of the word. The drafters and signers of the Declaration were such liberals, formed from Renaisssaince thinking, because the original meaning if not definition of "liberal" was "secular liberation of reason."
Liberating reason from the constrictions of secular law as written, in order to corrupt and destroy it, rather than changing it by the methods built in to it in order not to destroy it, is not liberalism; it is at time collectivist, at times fascist, and at times anti-reason.
But ontologically it is not Originalism, the integrity of changing the Constitution by the means provided within that document. Any other means is sabotage. It is the breaking of the oath taken by every public servant to uphold the Constitution, and it should be punishable by law. The fact that liberals scoffed--even laughed, as Joe Biden did--at the idea of the Marxism of Obama's rhetoric tells us that we are indeed getting ready for the Constitution 3.0, through subterfuge, through reading it as "living", and through previous abuses of it that were gotten away with.
The fact that Obama is an accomplished Constitutional law professor only makes the outcome of his administration darker for the liberty given us by the Minutemen and others who gave their lives in the war for freedom, the war they afterward declared was to "secure the Blessings of Liberty upon ourselves and our Posterity."
Their posterity have let them down.
Congress Shall Make No Law...Prohibiting the Free Exercise of Religion: First Amendment
But it also may make no law establishing a religion, and giving to Muslims what is not given to Christians, Jews, and the faithful of other religions --including to Atheists who are protected under precedents set in courts http://freeassemblage.blogspot.com/2008/09/atheism-is-protected-by-law-austin.html --is the establishment of the rites of religion. Click on the blue sentence for more.
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"[T]here is something particularly galling and repugnant about people who have felt the sting of discrimination, turn around and step on another minority. What happened at the ballot box feels like a personal betrayal and the hijacking of history.
"To the Mormons who bankrolled the bigotry, religious discrimination is awful, as long as it is happening to them. For the black people who voted for Proposition 8, the civil rights movement was about emancipating black people - and no one else seems to matter. These solipsistic individuals and their prejudiced pastors appear to lack an ember of empathy and have turned freedom into a private fiefdom.
"The civil rights movement was much larger than the plight of black people, just as the fight for religious freedom is bigger than Mormons. Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream that all people are equal under the law and should be judged by the content of their character. Barack Obama largely embodied this universally appealing message and this is why he made history.
"There is a lot of blame to go around for the failure of Proposition 8 and the first step to healing and moving forward is honesty. Let's not pretend that the repudiation of Martin Luther King Jr's dream by African American voters did not hurt more than, say, rejection by white evangelicals. It did."Wayne Besen - Daily Commentary
The Purpose of Judges, and the Constitution
"The most fundamental question a Supreme Court justice must answer is what in fact do the individual’s rights to life, liberty, property, and happiness include? Only then can he determine if a certain law or government action is securing or violating those rights. But no justice asks this question anymore because none believes it objectively answerable.
"Instead, and broadly speaking, judicial conservatives ask what privileges did American society at the time of ratification grant the individual. So when modern legislators make criminal offenses out of abortion, contraception, homosexuality, and other acts said to be frowned upon centuries ago, conservative judges feel duty-bound to stand aside and do nothing. To conservatives, it’s meaningless to ask whether the right to liberty in fact includes the right to use contraception (a question 18th-century Americans may have answered incorrectly). The only question is whether society at that time meant to permit this action.
"John McCain [ ] pledged to appoint judges in this conservative mold.
"Judicial liberals reject this worship of bygone days. Instead, liberals see constitutional values evolving like a motion picture, constantly updating to reflect current social mores. So when Congress declares federal dominion over every nut, bolt, and button of American industry, liberal judges feel duty-bound to stand aside and do nothing--not because earlier Americans intended to allow such controls, but because modern Americans want them. To liberals, it’s meaningless to ask whether the right to liberty in fact includes freedom of trade and contract (a question that a majority of Americans may be answering incorrectly today). The only question is whether the “will” of today’s society favors permitting such actions.
"Barack Obama has pledged to appoint judges in this liberal mold.
"But conservatives and liberals are both wrong about rights. It cannot be true that rights come from society. The very concept of a right identifies the actions you can take without anyone’s permission. Rights are not social privileges but objective facts, identifying the freedoms we need to live our lives--whether a majority in society agree or not. This is why the Founding Fathers dedicated their new government to the protection of each individual’s already-existing rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
"Thus, the Fifth and Fourteenth amendments forbid the government to deprive you of “life, liberty, or property” (except when you have violated someone else’s rights, and even here the government must follow due process, such as holding a trial). The Ninth Amendment safeguards all “rights” not listed elsewhere. These principles encompass all the innumerable actions required for your survival and happiness over a lifetime--the right to make a contract, earn a profit, build a house, make a friend, speak your mind, and so on.
murdering his father and another man appeared in court on Monday. Police say the boy confessed to shooting the two men with a .22-caliber gun, but his defense attorneys told reporters that "there could have been improper interview techniques done." What's the "proper" way to interrogate a kid?
"With kid gloves. Based on the principle that juvenile suspects may not fully comprehend a Miranda warning, most states mandate some form of added protection for children under the age of 16. In at least 20 states, police must notify the child's guardian before questioning; and in at least 13 states, either a parent or an attorney must be present.
"Under Arizona law, the state carries the "burden of proof" in juvenile interrogation cases. That is, there's a presumption that the child's statements were made involuntarily unless a preponderance of evidence indicates otherwise. The Arizona Supreme Court ruled in State v. Jimenez that in determining whether a confession was voluntary (and therefore admissible), a court should evaluate the child's age, education, background, and intelligence, plus whether the child's parents were present, whether he was in good mental and physical health during the interrogations, and whether he has a mental illness.
"There's evidence to suggest that juvenile suspects are more likely than adults to make a false confession. A 2004 study of 326 exoneration cases found that 13 percent of adults had falsely confessed, compared with 44 percent of suspects under 18 years old.
"Law-enforcement officers are often trained to conduct interrogations using the Reid Technique, which involves direct confrontation, physical gestures to appear concerned, and preventing the accused from denying the crime outright. Practitioners are encouraged to use the same methods for children as for adults. This helps explain why children are more likely to offer up false confessions." Slate.Com
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Atheism is not a religion in the sense that Christianity, Islam, and Judaism are," states a religious site.i This site is about "tolerance," but it actively sells Christian literature, promoting religion containing a deity.
Atheism by definition contains no deity.That a religious site can state that atheism is not religious in the same sense as deified religions are religious, presupposes and confirms the conviction that atheism is a different kind of religion.
"[A]n Atheist's belief system is confined to one factor: the existence or non-existence of a deity.”ii But this idea belies the fact that atheism is the distinctive lack of any belief in a deity. Atheists will say they do not believe a deity exists; not, that they believe a deity does not exist.
Yet in a strange apparition in the English language, one statement may be substituted for the other, usually without this distinction making any difference in the purpose of the statement.“I don't believe there is a table in that room,” can mean the same as “I believe there is no table in that room.”
About that table there is no belief system. No one has to go through the process of deciding on the merits of whether tables exist before making either statement. About God that process of systematizing one's beliefs is inherent in the subject. It requires many more processes of logic—and religious faith—before one has a belief system about God. So the distinction about “believing no god exists,” versus “not believing a god exists” is more than a slip of the English language. When taken literally--as any metaphysical naturalist would mean it--it means "no god exists in my belief system."
It should not be presumed that when an atheist says he “believes there is no god,” that he means it. A belief that there is no god really defines the agnostic. But for the atheist, who by definition cannot have any belief about a deity, that slip of the tongue is only a slip of the tongue, and only because of the vagaries of English. If he has thought about this oddity in the English language, he will argue against you when you point out his “belief.” Otherwise, he will agree, not having seen the error in the semantics.
There is a large distinction to be made in this semantic difference. You can choose to believe that something exists. On the other hand, you may have a total lack of belief in that same thing without making the attempt not to believe. I for one make no active attempt to disbelieve in Santa or the tooth fairy. This is not because I set out to disbelieve, but because I set out to use my faculty of Reason, which will not allow me the suspension of disbeliefiii which is automatic to every person when he/she hears a new theory or other idea. The suspension of disbelief as a phrase is usually applied to fiction or drama; but drama does not need to be fiction, and my disbelief is no longer suspended when I hear ideas that do not conform to my Reason.
My disbelief is not the same as belief in the opposite of what I cannot disbelieve. I cannot believe in the opposite of Santa or the tooth fairy; but I can find a disbelief in them. The mind cannot believe in the opposite of anything that does not exist.But god exists as a concept, if not as a real god, for all persons in all cultures, in all languages. Therefore, the contrary at least, if not the outright opposite of “god”, is Metaphysical Naturalism. In such a theory there can be, for the atheist and others, a belief in the system inherent in that concept.
The Atheist in A Church
It is hard for many to believe that an atheist can feel any spiritual needs—but we do. Not all of call it “spiritual.” Not all atheists can find a reason to call what they find within their consciousness a “spirit” or a “soul.” Some will loudly proclaim that no such thing exists, because as part of their system of belief such an admission would be contradictory to atheism itself. Yet many atheists have no problem identifying the soul within them. It is self-evident within consciousness.
“My hands . . . My spirit . . . My sky . . . My forest . . . This earth of mine. . . .
“This, my body and spirit, this is the end of the quest,” wrote Ayn Rand, in her novelette Anthem.
“I covet no man's soul, nor is my soul theirs to covet. For in the temple of his spirit, each man is alone. Let each man keep his temple untouched and undefiled. Then let him join hands with others if he wishes, but only beyond his holy threshold. This miracle of me is mine to own and keep, and mine to guard, and mine to use, and mine to kneel before! And now I see the face of god, and I raise this god over the earth, this god whom men have sought since men came into being, this god who will grant them joy and peace and pride. This god, this one word: 'I.' ” iv
In many of my previous blogs I used much the same language to describe the incredible feeling within my bosom when I look at the sunrise or the sunset; at the faun, who was born in my backyard, and the doe who I kept fed with corn and carrots all winter while I watched her belly growing; and at the million people gathered in my former hometown to watch the fireworks. Of course, I could not see all the million-plus; I could see only a few thousands at a time as I walked from park to parking lot and from one block to another through public and private areas full of people sitting on blankets or in chairs.
But I knew that million-plus was there because the city said so every year and to know that many people could gather in one general area with peace and goodwill toward all others because it was the Fourth of July is something one can feel the spirit of. That begs the question: one “feels” it where?
My answer is that it is felt in the soul. An assemblage of like-minded people, whether assembled in a building or in cyberspace, with perhaps hundreds or thousands all reading the same blog at the same time—or at separate times—has been defined as a church by many famous accounts.
But there is controversy about the origin of the word religion. “The derivation of the word 'religion' has been a matter of dispute from ancient times. Not even today is it a closed question.”v
It is surprising to me that such an admission comes from a religious encyclopedia, but I have always found this volume to be objective in its reporting.It agrees with other authorities that the word is often attributed to relegare, which Cicero defined as “to treat carefully.” It states that this is not the Catholic definition, but admits it is not “a closed question.”
If one acceptable definition of religion is “to treat carefully,” then it can be said with confidence that many atheists have treated the subject of the nature of the supernatural with utmost consideration for everything contained in the idea.It will be the purpose of the Free Assemblage of Metaphysical Naturalists to “treat carefully” these ideas of god, of nature, of naturalism, of supernaturalism, and most specifically of the nature of Man himself, and to describe the “system of belief” that admits of nothing supernatural in the origin of existence nor of anything within existence itself.And that assemblage of ideas into a system “treated carefully” is already admitted by other accounts than this one to be a religion and a church.
A System of Carefully Treated Beliefs
The website for the World Union of Deists defines a "cult" as "an embracing of unreasonable beliefs by a group of people. Based on this definition, Judaism, Christianity and Islam are all cults because their members suspend their God-given reason in order to believe or accept the unreasonable dogmas and teachings such as God giving real estate as a gift to the Jews, the resurrection and ascension of Jesus and Mohammed among many more false and unreasonable claims."vi
An atheist finds the Deist to be as "embracing of unreasonable beliefs" as any other religion is embracing; the Deist is a dyed-in-the-wool theist who believes in God. It is, however, as difficult to call Deism a "religion" as it is to call atheism "religion." Religions are generally defined as an organized practice of rituals such as prayer, kneeling, genuflecting, etc. Neither the Deist nor the atheist practices such rituals. Yet Deism believes in a supreme deity; atheism does not.And there is the crux of the definition. An atheist's belief system is that there is no deity in which to place one's belief; rather, that since nothing exists in which to place one's belief, that no belief exists. Can a church be a place for people for whom no beliefs exist? The very word atheism implies that no theism exists in that system. But does that mean that no theology exists in it?
If the church is a conceptual entity existing previously to, or in place of, a building in which an assemblage examines beliefs, then the conclusion from specious reasoning that the universe and the existence in which it exists is eternal and not of supernatural origin, is a belief, and where ever that belief is “treated carefully” or used in a heated debate, a church exists.
iii The temporary acceptance as believable of events or characters that would ordinarily be seen as incredible. [C]oined by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1817...
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While everyone in government is talking about "what we need" to get our economy going again, what is they are talking about?
They are talking about specific proposals to get the auto industry running again; to create alternative energy sources large enough to be of "use"; to create a mortgage system that will serve the people and not the "big pockets of the CEOs."
What they--everyone in government and everyone who supports the government's efforts and policies toward these ends--fail to remember is that under the doctrine of naturalism--that all things work to the degree they ought to work when left in their "natural state"--artificially created and managed industries are not natural to the nature of man.
As industries which would not be created naturally by profiteers, who seek that profit by offering what the public wants at prices it can afford, these artificially created and managed industries the government is talking about such as wind turbine farms and hybrid energy cars are already costing the public billions of dollars, in subsidies or other government handouts, years before any results are seen.
President-elect Obama seeks to sink as much as $100 million in ten years into "alternative" energy sources. This is our money. Are we going to make a profit? No. We are going to pay for research and development, because that has already been approved by the Fed and Congress. In the auto industry alone that is hundreds of billions of dollars. Now we are being told the Big Three auto companies will fail if they are not bailed out to the tune of hundred of billions of dollars more for simple overhead.
The American public will soon see that it has bankrolled almost (or more than) a trillion dollars--for products we will have to pay for again when we buy them. If windmill farms and compressed natural gas and clean-burning coal plants and nuclear power plants are economically feasible and profitable, then let the Boone Pickens, the Edison Lights, the Exxon Mobiles, and the others who have the industry knowledge and the financial backing do what they do naturally by seeking profits from these industries. And where there are government regulations standing in the way, make the government step aside. But if there is no profit to be made, there is certainly no economic reason for capitalist profiteers to get involved.
And it is never the government's mandate to "partner up" with industry and become its "big brother."
"According to Deumer [an early 20th century socialist banker], banks presently serve private interests. They serve public interests only inasmuch as these do not conflict with the former. Banks do not finance those enterprises that are most essential from the national point of view, but only those that promise to yield the highest return. For instance, they finance 'a whiskey distillery or any other enterprise that is superfluous for the economy.'" Daily Article by Ludwig von Mises
What is "superfluous" for the economy is anything the public must finance, because if the public must finance it, it is not worth the cost of profiteers seeking to sell a product that people want. Products that create profit are products people want; and products that people want which then create wealth for the profiteers are what build the economy.
The relationship of the "conscious subject" to the "object" is subjective; in other words, it depends on the metaphysics of the conscious subject to determine: the ontological relationship between him and a product; the market for the product; the profit margin that is necessary; and the means of production. But in this case we are talking about whether or not the means should be financed by all the people in an effort to nationalize one industry or another; or whether the means of production should be left to those who can finance the economy with their profiteering methods.
It all depends on the relationship of the conscious motives of the subject, you, me, our neighbors, and Congress, the President-elect, and court justices who hear the cases against such public means of production as will certainly be heard in those courts. We know the way that Congress and Obama wish to go; we do not know which way all the involved courts will render: for sovereignty of the individual to decide which markets to support, or for the government's right to absolve we individuals of our right to support a market or withdraw our support of that market. In other words, whether or not we become the subject-citizens of a socialist state.
The means of production owned by the people in this country has already become a trillion dollar "industry," which is a bailout but which is being hailed as a "necessary evil" to save the economy. Yet, we already know the direction we are headed. You could say that we are like the deer in the headlights of an on-coming car.
Unless we prevent Congress and Obama from continuing with this nationalization of the means of production, that car is going to hit us, and one industry after another will collapse from an economy artifically supported, artificially because the industries supported by the government bailouts no longer have a purpose in profiteering. Now they have a purpose in spending our money to build us cars and to finance our homes which we must then pay for again with our purchases and our mortgages.
And when we no longer have any money left because we have been artificially supporting markets that ought to be profiteering from us, we are twice poorer for it--once financially, once morally.
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Today, I refer you to several sites I think have importance to metaphysical naturalism, of which the concept of individual sovereign rights is the only moral political system qua system worthy of man.
This includes capitalism as the only economic system qua system worthy--because of its unalienablility--of the sovereign rights of man; it includes the sovereign rights of individuals to marry without the dogma of religious intolerance for homosexuals overwhelming the wall of separation between church and state; and on a little bit of a different subject, but same theme, the attempt--as bungled as it was--to make the American public see the hidden agenda of the impending Obama economic spectacle, not to mention the leftist political agenda of a man who has friends most of us would shun.
Venezuela, Russia, and other countries that nationalize natural resources are violating private property rights. By Thomas A. Bowden
For years, the Canadian operator of a huge Venezuelan gold project known as Las Cristinas has been seeking an environmental permit to start digging. Well, Crystallex International Corporation can stop waiting--the mine is being nationalized as part of dictator Hugo Chavez’s long-running program of socialist takeovers. “This mine will be seized and managed by a state administration” with help from the Russians, said Mining Minister Rodolfo Sanz.
It’s not surprising that a brute like Chavez would want to grab the 16.9 million ounces of gold estimated to lie buried in the Las Cristinas reserve. But what’s more puzzling is why--when gold mines, oil rigs and refineries worth billions of dollars are nationalized by regimes such as Venezuela and Russia--the ousted companies can muster no moral indignation, only tight-lipped damage appraisal.
[For original with Continuation, click on the headline] Ayn Rand Institute Op-Eds
I can understand why white gay people are angry. I certainly am. But, let's take a step back and look at this dispassionately. I believe our failure with the African American vote (70% voted in favor of Prop. 8) has more to do with education levels than race. In general, people with lower levels of education - of any race - do not vote for gay rights. White people are twice as likely to graduate college as black people. This accounts for the difference by race on Prop. 8.
Think of it this way. 57 percent of white people with a college education voted No on Prop. 8. Yet, 58 percent of white people with no college voted yes on 8. In other words, uneducated urban black people vote very much like uneducated rural white people.
Uneducated people - black, white and Hispanic - often derive their power from physical strength. They perceive being gay as weak and antithetical to real manhood. By voicing support for gay rights, they lose status and often fear rivals may perceive them as gay. The easiest way to gain status is dissing faggots. I see this attitude all the time in Brooklyn - in the gym and on the basketball court, where I often play. (Not the best sample, I realize this) [For original with continuation, click on headline] Wayne Besen - Daily Commentary
There was only one catch, and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind.
Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and he would have to fly more missions.
Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them.
If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to, but if he didn't want to, he was sane and had to.
Yossarian was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of this clause of Catch-22 and let out a respectful whistle.
"That's some catch, that Catch-22," he observed.
"It's the best there is," Doc Daneeka agreed. [This was the entire posting. It seems apropos to what the McCain Campaign was all about. But if you wish to see it in its original, click on the headline] No Exit
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A special California legislative session is beginning to deal with this fiscal year’s budget deficit, as high as $10 billion by some estimates.
California can learn from those states with the most economic freedom, because they perform better on all fronts.
In 2005:
-the 15 freest states grew at a rate more than six percent greater than the 15 states with the least economic freedom;
-per-capita income in the 15 most economically free states grew a full 31-percent faster than in the 15 states with the lowest levels of economic freedom;
-in the states with the most economic freedom, employment growth was a full 216% higher than other states, including California, which ranks a dismal 47th out of 50 states in economic freedom, according to PRI’s U.S. Economic Freedom Index;
-New York still ranks dead last; -in California two years ago the unemployment rate was 4.6 percent--it is now 7.7 %, predictable in a state that maintains conditions hostile to job growth. Contrast the record of other western states; -the unemployment rate in Utah is 3.5 percent, less than half of California’s and 'hardly a month goes by without Utah announcing a corporate relocation or a new factory". Condensed from: Pacific Research Institute Vol. 13 No. 45: November 5, 2008 K. Lloyd Billingsley Editorial Director
It causes alarm to think we may have elected a President who may create less economic freedom. Barak Obama inspires hope and good will, and perhaps many good things will come of his Presidency in the social/moral world. Perhaps there will be less racism, both overt, and the sort that is hidden but just as malignant. Perhaps black hopes will cause fathers to return to families they have long abandonded.
Perhaps--many many things. Obama is a breath of fresh air, he is not afraid to demonstrate his education by being the most erudite-sounding President-elect in my lifetime, and his communication skills appear to be greater than Ronald Reagan, "The Great Communicator."
But he is untested in the eyes of national affairs. All we know of him is that he is the most liberal, the Senator furthest to the left in his voting record, perhaps in the history of the Legislature.
As evidence, his website says things such as this: "Barack Obama and Joe Biden will enact a windfall profits tax on excessive oil company profits to give American families an immediate $1,000 emergency energy rebate to help families pay rising bills. This relief would be a down payment on the Obama-Biden long-term plan to provide middle-class families with at least $1,000 per year in permanent tax relief." [emphasis added] http://www.barackobama.com/issues/economy/#jumpstart
There is no ontological definition for windfall profits. When government decides what is an "excessive" profit margin, you can bet the governement will want to do something to "redistribute" all that money. Despite the enormous profits made by Exxon-Mobile, the oil industry makes a smaller percentage in returns for every dollar invested than do the majority of businesses. The same with the auto industry, which if it was doing well, could be targeted as easily as the oil companies. But it was revealed a few days ago that General Motors is burning through $1 billion a month because of lost revenues. What if it was making $1 billion a month because people liked the cars they made? Would that be excessive profits, subject to windfall taxes?
What about Wal-Mart, the most successful and biggest company in the world? Sure, they keep prices low for those Americans who can't afford the expensive department stores. But look at their profits! Whoo-weee! Now there's something Obama could easily tax!
But the point is, everything Obama has said he would do with the economy will only make it less free, less capitalistic, and more taxable, speaking in terms of wealth-spreading. (His words.)
If I understand his ideas of making NAFTA more fair--in other words, removing any incentives government may have previously offered to business who move work out of the U.S.--then I agree whole heartedly. If his idea is to punish businesses who move out, then I disagree.
The fact is, Obama inspires hope for a better world, but from everything he has said and done--so far--we can expect less economic freedom in the U.S. in the coming years, not more.
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The arbitrary and capricious use of the Administration Procedures Act [APA] by the Federal Communications Commission [FCC] is under attack--properly so, morally speaking--by many broadcast and cable networks. The airwaives have always been said to be owned by the "people" because of the limited number of them available, which made the FCC the arbiter of which companies got rights to the limited number of channels.
It is no longer the case that there are a limited number because UHF channels can be extended in number to cover new channel needs. But the FCC has decided that what once was the responsibility of the broadcasters to prevent "indecency" now covers live broadcasts wherein "fleeting expletives" are spoken by celebrities on live broadcasts are part of the "responsibility" of the networks to police.
The problem occurs with who is making the decision of what constitutes "indencency," and more importantly why.
As the Supreme Court prepares to hear arguments Nov. 4 in the so-called fleeting expletive case, Federal Communications Commission v. Fox Television Stations,* it’s clear that much more hinges on its outcome than broadcasters’ ability to air dirty words.
“The most important mistake that everyone in the political realm made is that they refused to name their enemies. The enemy is not terrorism. The enemy is totalitarian Islam. If you don’t name your enemy, you can’t fight it. I think the whole charade of the last seven years is a consequence of the fear that prevented us from naming them,” Dr. [Yaron] Brook said.
“[Totalitarian Islam] is a movement dedicated to totalitarianism: in that sense, it is not different than other totalitarian movements, like Communism or Fascism … totalitarianism means they want to control every aspect of your life,” Dr. Brook said. "New University"http://www.newuniversity.org/main/article?slug=club_objects_to_totalitarian166
"Fox Broadcasting Co., along with ABC, CBS and NBC, challenged the new policy after the commission said broadcasts of entertainment awards shows in 2002 and 2003 were indecent because of profanity uttered by Bono, Cher and Nicole Richie.
"The case before the court technically involves only two airings on Fox of the "Billboard Music Awards" in which celebrities' expletives were broadcast over the airwaves. NBC is separately challenging an FCC decision that rapped the network for airing Bono's use of the F-word during a Golden Globes awards show in 2003." http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/news.aspx?id=19804
Applications for the Charles G. Koch Summer Fellow Program are now online! The Koch Summer Fellow Program is a paid, 10 week internship program that offers placements for students and recent graduates interested in federal or state public policy. All internships include participation in the Washington, DC opening and closing workshops, a $1,500 stipend, travel reimbursement, and housing (or a housing allowance). Apply for one or both of the available tracks: State-based Policy -- Placements available at policy organizations in over 40 states. www.TheIHS.org/statepolicy Public Policy -- Spend the summer working at think tanks and nonprofit organizations around the Washington, DC area. www.TheIHS.org/publicpolicy For more information or to apply online, please visit the program website at www.TheIHS.org/intern or apply directly at www.TheIHS.org/myihs/. Deadline: January 31, 2009.
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Q from a an email I received:"I was wondering if you could help me understand the difference between Realism v. Anti-Realism. I've looked all over the Internet.. I just don't understand it. I'm talking my first PHI class, metaphysics, and really just need some assistance. I'd appreciate any help, it could be your good deed for the day :) thanks, Rachel"
A: Hi. Thanks for looking to me for your answer. In essence, they have to do with "the problem of universals." It's a problem because different philosophies say universals are different things.
To understand universals, understand this: It began, as everything did, with the differences between Aristotle and Plato. Plato proposed almost all the questions that are still asked by philoshers; Aristotle answered most of them, and his answers were very different from Plato's.
"Aristotle is the champion of this world, the champion of nature, as against the supernaturalism of Plato. Denying Plato's World of Forms, Aristotle maintains that there is only one reality: the world of particulars in which we live, the world men perceive by means of their physical senses. Universals, he holds, are merely aspects of existing entities, isolated in thought by a process of selective attention; they have no existence apart from particulars. Reality is comprised, not of Platonic abstractions, but of concrete, individual entities, each with a definite nature, each obeying the laws inherent in its nature. Aristotle's universe is the universe of science. The physical world, in his view, is not a shadowy projection controlled by a divine dimension, but an autonomous, self-sufficient realm. It is an orderly, intelligible, natural realm, open to the mind of man." http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/aristotle.html So, the "problem" is: do universals exist as "Ideas" in nature, forms, which nature then fills will material. Or, does nature create things that are material, from which man finds the common denominators we call universals. I think you can see that universals become definitions in man's mind, rather than "forms" waiting to be filled.
Aristotle's idea is called post res; Plato's is called ante res. http://www.ditext.com/runes/r.html(see Realism. This is my favorite online philosophy dictionary.)
I also like the Catholic Encyclopedia, even though I'm not Catholic. It's quite accurate and much more helpful than many other resources. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11090c.htm But anti-realism is different than Plato's idea in one sense: The basic question is: are there objective answers to the basic question of ontology? Here realists say yes, and anti-realists say no.
Ontology has to do with universals this way: "Ontology makes the distinction between entities, the things that exist, and qualities, the attributes that these things have. "What is an entity?" The first corollary of identity: Anything that exists must have some qualities. The second corollary of identity: Anything that exists must be different in some way from everything else that exists and have some quality or combination of qualities no other existent has.The third corollary of identity: Anything that exists must have some relationship to everything else that exists.http://www.geocities.com/rational_argumentator/Stolyarov_RC1.html?200826 So anti-realism says that rational, objective answers to the question of what thing is, and what qualities it has, cannot be nailed down, and any answer is going to depend on the person who is making the examination of the thing, because he comes from a different background, educational experience, etc.
Realists say none of that matters, that universals can be identified objectively, just like the first quote above states. But realists are not realistic about empirical existence enough to be totally objective:
Since we know that universals are not independent of the mind that abstracts them from particulars, Plato must be wrong on both counts."
"[Realism is the] theory of the reality of abstract or general terms, or universals, which are held to have an equal and sometimes a superior reality to actual physical particulars." http://www.ditext.com/runes/r.html[italics added]
Objectively speaking, if universals "are merely aspects of existing entities, isolated in thought by a process of selective attention [having] no existence apart from particulars," then they are not equal and cannot be superior in the realm of existents. To say that mental existents, the isolated identities existing only in the mind, are superior to empirical existents is to say that consciousness has primacy over existence itself.
But, since existence is the source of consciousness, existence has primacy and is superior in this respect: it has always existed and cannot ever go out of existence. Consciousness is dependent on life for its formation, and so while intelligent consciousness can claim to "command nature by obeying nature," it cannot claim to create or control the laws of nature.
Realism, according to Plato, means "the ideas have a status of possibility which makes them independent both of the mind by which they may be known and of the actual world of particulars in which they may take place."Since we know that universals are not independent of the mind that abstracts them from particulars, Plato must be wrong on both counts.
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