The beheading of British Army drummer, Lee Rigby, in Woolwich, a suburb of London, has horrified people all round the world. It is perhaps the blatant nature of the attack in broad daylight on a busy English street, and the swaggering defiance of the perpetrators, that has made this incident all the more horrifying. The two men involved made it clear that they regarded the butchering of this soldier who had served in Afghanistan and Cyprus as just Islamic retribution for the killing of Muslims by Western governments.
We should not be surprised that young Muslim men commit such acts of violence. Despite the attempts of Western Islamic apologists to deny it, Islam is a religion of violence. The Prophet Mohammed exhorted his followers to slay those who refuse to follow his teachings. The reason beheading is popular as a method of following the Prophet's murderous precepts is that he specifically instructed his adherents to use it: "I will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve. Therefore strike off their heads and strike off every fingertip of them" (Sura 8 verse 12). I'm not sure whether the beheadings are usually accompanied by digitectomies, but perhaps the Prophet would have excused that minor lapse in protocol by his followers.
There is another reason why we should not be surprised at such acts of terror by Islamic extremists and that is because Western governments have ceded to the terrorists any moral high ground we once might have had. It is appropriate that on the day of the killing of Lee Rigby, President Obama should make a speech justifying his use of unmanned drones against people he suspects of being terrorists, irrespective of their nationality and the likelihood of killing innocents. The president claims the means justify the ends and that the drone strikes are carefully targeted, but of course this is the same argument that the Islamist terrorists make to justify their carefully planned and targeted acts of violence. I can understand the need to resort to desperate measures in desperate times but there is nothing so desperate about the current state of America that justifies the abandonment of the fine principles on which it was founded. The use of drones is contrary to the US Constitution, natural justice, the rule of law and international treaties such as the Geneva Convention.
I am not saying the killing of Lee Rigby was in any way justified – it was a despicable act of violence by two cowardly thugs - but we will never put an end to such acts by descending to the morality of the perpetrators.
The killers of Lee Rigby lost their humanity. We shouldn't lose ours.
Friday, May 24, 2013
Thursday, May 16, 2013
Dumbest Quote on New Zealand Budget
I like to post a Quote of the Day on my Twitter account (twitter.com/kiwiwit) and have decided I will post the best or worst here.
Today's QOTD is in the "so dumb it should be illegal" category and comes from Canterbury University political scientist Bronwyn Hayward on Minister of Finance Bill English's budget due out today:
"I think what is most disappointing about this tenure is the emphasis English gives to economic growth as 'the only way we can lift incomes, create permanent jobs'."
So, how else are we going to lift incomes and create permanent jobs? Wave a Socialist wand?
Today's QOTD is in the "so dumb it should be illegal" category and comes from Canterbury University political scientist Bronwyn Hayward on Minister of Finance Bill English's budget due out today:
"I think what is most disappointing about this tenure is the emphasis English gives to economic growth as 'the only way we can lift incomes, create permanent jobs'."
So, how else are we going to lift incomes and create permanent jobs? Wave a Socialist wand?
Tuesday, May 14, 2013
Taking Offence When None is Due
In my last post I wrote about the misappropriation of language by political activists, particularly those in the left-wing. A related manifestation of the left’s cultural hegemony is their unparalleled willingness to take offence on behalf of any convenient victim.
Niall Ferguson, the Scottish born Professor of History at Harvard, recently was forced to apologise for his comments about economist John Maynard Keynes. What was this dreadful comment that Ferguson made about the famous economist? Ferguson said that Keynes did not care about future generations because he was gay.
Neither of the two principle facts in Ferguson's statement are in doubt. Keynes himself said, in response to concerns about the affordability of his economic policies by future generations, “in the long run we are all dead.” And there is no doubt that he was gay because he kept diaries detailing the many affairs he had with men. All that Ferguson did was to link the two.
Judging by the response of the media to Ferguson's comments, you would think the historian had gravely insulted a living person. If you did not know your economic history, you might think that Keynes was a contemporary colleague of Ferguson's whom the latter had called a Nazi or something equally horrid. But Keynes died in 1946, so it would be pretty difficult for him to take offence at Ferguson's recent comments, although perhaps his ghost is seething in some dark hallway of Cambridge University even as I write this.
Of course, it wasn’t the dead Keynes who took offence, but the hypersensitive serried ranks of professional offence takers in the political left-wing and their mouthpieces in the liberal media. It does not matter to these professional offence takers whether anyone who might be considered the victim of the offending comment actually takes offence. It doesn’t even matter, as we can see with the John Maynard Keynes example, whether those who have apparently been offended are actually alive. There is no shortage of causes for professional offence-taking and a great deal of competition to be the cause du jour. Muslims, gays, disabled people and various racial minorities are the objects of offence whether or not they are really offended.
I believe that words are not offensive unless they are intended to be offensive. Ferguson was attempting to make sense of Keynes’s incredibly destructive philosophy that future generations do not matter. Keynesian economics is the dominant philosophy driving Western economic policy today and is singularly responsible for the current economic failure in countries like Cyprus and Greece. Frankly, I'm offended that such a misguided and irresponsible economic philosophy has caused such human misery all over the world and I think it was not unreasonable for Ferguson to seek a personal explanation for Keynes’s philosophy, in the same way that historians look for personal motivation in the destructive philosophies of political leaders. Ferguson has said that he did not mean to imply that all gay people have a disregard for future generations and based on this I do not think he needed to apologise.
In the past, when no offence was intended, none was usually taken. Today, in the age of professional offence takers, there is always someone who is prepared to take offence for their own ends. Just as we should resist the misappropriation of language by the left-wing, we must resist the misappropriation of offence.
Niall Ferguson, the Scottish born Professor of History at Harvard, recently was forced to apologise for his comments about economist John Maynard Keynes. What was this dreadful comment that Ferguson made about the famous economist? Ferguson said that Keynes did not care about future generations because he was gay.
Neither of the two principle facts in Ferguson's statement are in doubt. Keynes himself said, in response to concerns about the affordability of his economic policies by future generations, “in the long run we are all dead.” And there is no doubt that he was gay because he kept diaries detailing the many affairs he had with men. All that Ferguson did was to link the two.
Judging by the response of the media to Ferguson's comments, you would think the historian had gravely insulted a living person. If you did not know your economic history, you might think that Keynes was a contemporary colleague of Ferguson's whom the latter had called a Nazi or something equally horrid. But Keynes died in 1946, so it would be pretty difficult for him to take offence at Ferguson's recent comments, although perhaps his ghost is seething in some dark hallway of Cambridge University even as I write this.
Of course, it wasn’t the dead Keynes who took offence, but the hypersensitive serried ranks of professional offence takers in the political left-wing and their mouthpieces in the liberal media. It does not matter to these professional offence takers whether anyone who might be considered the victim of the offending comment actually takes offence. It doesn’t even matter, as we can see with the John Maynard Keynes example, whether those who have apparently been offended are actually alive. There is no shortage of causes for professional offence-taking and a great deal of competition to be the cause du jour. Muslims, gays, disabled people and various racial minorities are the objects of offence whether or not they are really offended.
I believe that words are not offensive unless they are intended to be offensive. Ferguson was attempting to make sense of Keynes’s incredibly destructive philosophy that future generations do not matter. Keynesian economics is the dominant philosophy driving Western economic policy today and is singularly responsible for the current economic failure in countries like Cyprus and Greece. Frankly, I'm offended that such a misguided and irresponsible economic philosophy has caused such human misery all over the world and I think it was not unreasonable for Ferguson to seek a personal explanation for Keynes’s philosophy, in the same way that historians look for personal motivation in the destructive philosophies of political leaders. Ferguson has said that he did not mean to imply that all gay people have a disregard for future generations and based on this I do not think he needed to apologise.
In the past, when no offence was intended, none was usually taken. Today, in the age of professional offence takers, there is always someone who is prepared to take offence for their own ends. Just as we should resist the misappropriation of language by the left-wing, we must resist the misappropriation of offence.
Sunday, May 12, 2013
Liberal Means Anything But
One of the common characteristics of dictatorial regimes is that they recognise early on the need to control the language. This is because language is a proxy for thought. People may dissent in their minds but that is of little effect if they are incapable of expressing their dissent. George Orwell recognised this in his novel, 1984, with Newspeak, the approved language of his fictional dictatorship. Newspeak was designed to ensure people could not communicate opposition to the regime and one of the means of doing this was to confuse synonyms and antonyms, thus eliminating words like 'bad' and replacing them with euphemistic alternatives such as 'ungood'.
Orwell's novel was prescience of the Western world today. The political left-wing in our so-called liberal democracies has achieved what Hitler and Stalin could only have dreamed of - an almost complete stranglehold on the language.
Take the terms 'left-wing' and 'right-wing' - what do they really mean? Left-wing originally referred to those on the left side of the French revolutionary legislative assembly. Those who sat on the left opposed the monarchy and supported the establishment of a republic. Those on the right side of the chamber supported the institutions of the Old Regime, although not the monarchy itself. In other words, the left-wing supported change, i.e. they were radicals, the right-wing didn't, i.e. they were conservatives. In the Western world of the late 20th and early 21st Centuries these terms have lost their original meaning and distinction. Left-wingers are often the most conservative in that they want to preserve the established order of a strong, central government and comprehensive welfare state. Right-wingers are often the ones advocating change, seeking to reduce the role of government in the economy and to roll-back the welfare state. Thus we had Maggie Thatcher, a Conservative who was more radical in her policies than any modern British prime minister.
Left-wingers have co-opted the term 'extreme right-wing' to imply Fascist or National Socialist beliefs. This is ironic to say the least because, as the names suggest, both Fascism (deriving from the Italian word for 'group') and National Socialism (literally Socialism to achieve nationalistic goals) have more in common, at least in desired outcomes, with the democratic Socialism that most liberals espouse than with anything their modern opponents believe.
The word 'liberal' has similarly lost almost all of its original meaning. Today it is interchangeable with the term left-wing. Classical liberalism, as typified by the writings of 17th Century English philosopher John Locke, was all about individual freedom and rights and had little in common with the political beliefs of latter-day liberals who advocate for an all-powerful (albeit, they would say, benevolent) state. In the Newspeak of today's Western democracies, 'liberal' means the exact opposite and those who think of themselves as classical liberals prefer to use the term 'libertarian' to distinguish themselves from the faux-liberals of the left-wing.
There are many examples of this topsy-turvy use of plain words for political ends. Those who advocate equal treatment of different races before the law are labelled 'racist', those who would prefer to judge individuals on their merits rather than on their sex are 'sexist', and those who dare to question the political orthodoxy on climate change are 'deniers'.
The motivation for this misuse and misappropriate of language is always the same as that of Big Brother - to prohibit debate and control thinking. This is reason enough to resist such hegemony at every turn. Language defines the terms of any debate. Concede the language and you concede the argument.
Orwell's novel was prescience of the Western world today. The political left-wing in our so-called liberal democracies has achieved what Hitler and Stalin could only have dreamed of - an almost complete stranglehold on the language.
Take the terms 'left-wing' and 'right-wing' - what do they really mean? Left-wing originally referred to those on the left side of the French revolutionary legislative assembly. Those who sat on the left opposed the monarchy and supported the establishment of a republic. Those on the right side of the chamber supported the institutions of the Old Regime, although not the monarchy itself. In other words, the left-wing supported change, i.e. they were radicals, the right-wing didn't, i.e. they were conservatives. In the Western world of the late 20th and early 21st Centuries these terms have lost their original meaning and distinction. Left-wingers are often the most conservative in that they want to preserve the established order of a strong, central government and comprehensive welfare state. Right-wingers are often the ones advocating change, seeking to reduce the role of government in the economy and to roll-back the welfare state. Thus we had Maggie Thatcher, a Conservative who was more radical in her policies than any modern British prime minister.
Left-wingers have co-opted the term 'extreme right-wing' to imply Fascist or National Socialist beliefs. This is ironic to say the least because, as the names suggest, both Fascism (deriving from the Italian word for 'group') and National Socialism (literally Socialism to achieve nationalistic goals) have more in common, at least in desired outcomes, with the democratic Socialism that most liberals espouse than with anything their modern opponents believe.
The word 'liberal' has similarly lost almost all of its original meaning. Today it is interchangeable with the term left-wing. Classical liberalism, as typified by the writings of 17th Century English philosopher John Locke, was all about individual freedom and rights and had little in common with the political beliefs of latter-day liberals who advocate for an all-powerful (albeit, they would say, benevolent) state. In the Newspeak of today's Western democracies, 'liberal' means the exact opposite and those who think of themselves as classical liberals prefer to use the term 'libertarian' to distinguish themselves from the faux-liberals of the left-wing.
There are many examples of this topsy-turvy use of plain words for political ends. Those who advocate equal treatment of different races before the law are labelled 'racist', those who would prefer to judge individuals on their merits rather than on their sex are 'sexist', and those who dare to question the political orthodoxy on climate change are 'deniers'.
The motivation for this misuse and misappropriate of language is always the same as that of Big Brother - to prohibit debate and control thinking. This is reason enough to resist such hegemony at every turn. Language defines the terms of any debate. Concede the language and you concede the argument.
Tuesday, April 9, 2013
Maggie Thatcher was my Prime Minister
I was in my early 20s when I went to live in England. Maggie Thatcher had already been in power for several years. The Falklands War was won but she was still doing battle with the miners' union and others who wanted to return Britain to the stagnation and apathy that characterised life in Britain since the Second World War. British politics in the decade up until Thatcher's election was the politics of appeasement – successive governments caved into the unions and left-wing grievance groups and the moribund economy reflected a lack of enterprise and initiative that was evident to any visitor.
What I most admired about Maggie Thatcher was her courage. She was an outsider, not part of the Tory establishment at all. She was a compromise candidate when she was elected to lead the Conservative Party following the inept Ted Heath, but she quickly made the job her own. It is often a characteristic of great political leaders that their greatness does not become evident until they step into the leadership role. I am sure that few people in the Conservative Party in 1975 would have realised that they were electing a leader who would go on to become the longest serving British prime minister of the 20th century and one who is now remembered by many, including me, as the greatest peacetime leader of the current era.
Her critics today accuse her of enriching the powerful at the expense of the little man, but my experience of living under her leadership was the opposite. She was very much of her lower middle class origins and she never forgot it, priding herself on knowing the prices of groceries and empathising with the difficulties of the average family in making ends meet. She took on the entrenched interests of the unions, but she also took on the rich and powerful. At the same time as she was pursuing her policy of a "property owning democracy" forcing local bodies to sell their huge holdings of council flats and houses to tenants, she was also doing battle with the Dukes of Westminster and Cornwall, the two largest property owners in Britain (the latter, of course, being the pseudonymous title of Prince Charles) to sell ground leases that their families had tightly held for many centuries to the leaseholders.
I didn't agree with everything that she did it. For example, I think she prolonged the conflict in Northern Ireland (although, to her credit, it has emerged subsequently that she initiated secret negotiations with the IRA that ultimately resulted in the Good Friday Peace Agreement).
Her historical achievements will be recognised long after her petty critics are forgotten – winning the Falklands War at a time when Western nations seemed incapable of winning any sustained military battle, staring down the Soviet Union together with Ronald Reagan with the resulting collapse of that evil regime and, most of all, showing Britons that they could once again call their country "Great."
I think the best tribute to "our Maggie" came from MP George Galloway, who is best known for his support for the murderous President Bashar al-Assad in Syria. Galloway said that he hoped Maggie Thatcher rotted in hell. I am sure Maggie would not be upset by such a comment from a thug like Galloway. In any event, if that is her final destination, I imagine she will be sitting there clutching her handbag, drinking her glass of sherry, and pressing her point in a debate with Thomas Jefferson, John Locke, Benjamin Franklin and Winston Churchill.
Maggie Thatcher demonstrated that a person of principle could stand by those principles and still be elected leader of a major Western nation. The unprincipled, weak-willed, expedient politicians who dominate the leadership of almost every Western government today would do well to observe her example.
What I most admired about Maggie Thatcher was her courage. She was an outsider, not part of the Tory establishment at all. She was a compromise candidate when she was elected to lead the Conservative Party following the inept Ted Heath, but she quickly made the job her own. It is often a characteristic of great political leaders that their greatness does not become evident until they step into the leadership role. I am sure that few people in the Conservative Party in 1975 would have realised that they were electing a leader who would go on to become the longest serving British prime minister of the 20th century and one who is now remembered by many, including me, as the greatest peacetime leader of the current era.
Her critics today accuse her of enriching the powerful at the expense of the little man, but my experience of living under her leadership was the opposite. She was very much of her lower middle class origins and she never forgot it, priding herself on knowing the prices of groceries and empathising with the difficulties of the average family in making ends meet. She took on the entrenched interests of the unions, but she also took on the rich and powerful. At the same time as she was pursuing her policy of a "property owning democracy" forcing local bodies to sell their huge holdings of council flats and houses to tenants, she was also doing battle with the Dukes of Westminster and Cornwall, the two largest property owners in Britain (the latter, of course, being the pseudonymous title of Prince Charles) to sell ground leases that their families had tightly held for many centuries to the leaseholders.
I didn't agree with everything that she did it. For example, I think she prolonged the conflict in Northern Ireland (although, to her credit, it has emerged subsequently that she initiated secret negotiations with the IRA that ultimately resulted in the Good Friday Peace Agreement).
Her historical achievements will be recognised long after her petty critics are forgotten – winning the Falklands War at a time when Western nations seemed incapable of winning any sustained military battle, staring down the Soviet Union together with Ronald Reagan with the resulting collapse of that evil regime and, most of all, showing Britons that they could once again call their country "Great."
I think the best tribute to "our Maggie" came from MP George Galloway, who is best known for his support for the murderous President Bashar al-Assad in Syria. Galloway said that he hoped Maggie Thatcher rotted in hell. I am sure Maggie would not be upset by such a comment from a thug like Galloway. In any event, if that is her final destination, I imagine she will be sitting there clutching her handbag, drinking her glass of sherry, and pressing her point in a debate with Thomas Jefferson, John Locke, Benjamin Franklin and Winston Churchill.
Maggie Thatcher demonstrated that a person of principle could stand by those principles and still be elected leader of a major Western nation. The unprincipled, weak-willed, expedient politicians who dominate the leadership of almost every Western government today would do well to observe her example.
Wednesday, March 20, 2013
Cyprus - Why No One Should be Surprised
It was pleasing to see the Cypriot people rise up against the government and reject the European Community's theft of a significant part of their bank savings. At the time of writing the Cypriot government has rejected the plan.
The European Community had proposed to bail out Cypriot banks to the tune of €10 billion in return for the Cypriot government seizing 6.75% of Cypriots' bank deposits up to €100,000 and 9.9% of deposits over €100,000. The Cypriot people rightly saw this as bank robbery and took to the streets in protest. Amusingly, the proposal has been listed on Wikipedia as one of the greatest bank robberies of all time.
The global reaction to this has been interesting. It is seen as a step too far in governments' looting of private property, although I am not sure why this should be the case given that governments all around the world have wealth taxes, some of which are far more rapacious than was being proposed here. I suppose it is the blatant nature of the theft that has provoked the reaction.
In some ways, we should have limited sympathy for the Cypriots. If you want the European Community to bail out your banks – in other words, if you want German taxpayers to stump up the money – you can hardly complain if they demand a contribution from you. The real issue here is not the pilfering of Cypriot bank accounts by the European Community but whether the EC should be bailing out banks at all. Governments around the world have been throwing money at banking sector since the global financial crisis hit in 2008 and it hasn't stemmed the rot. Private profits, public losses, seems to be the policy of governments towards the banking sector all over the world.
The Cypriot situation, if it has one benefit, has woken people around the world to the fact that governments can use force to do anything they want if they are not constrained. Once you accept the power of the government to take whatever it likes in taxes, then you shouldn't be surprised when it starts taking your bank account, your house and your business. As the millionaire said to the attractive young woman, "we've established the principle, now we're just arguing over the price."
The European Community had proposed to bail out Cypriot banks to the tune of €10 billion in return for the Cypriot government seizing 6.75% of Cypriots' bank deposits up to €100,000 and 9.9% of deposits over €100,000. The Cypriot people rightly saw this as bank robbery and took to the streets in protest. Amusingly, the proposal has been listed on Wikipedia as one of the greatest bank robberies of all time.
The global reaction to this has been interesting. It is seen as a step too far in governments' looting of private property, although I am not sure why this should be the case given that governments all around the world have wealth taxes, some of which are far more rapacious than was being proposed here. I suppose it is the blatant nature of the theft that has provoked the reaction.
In some ways, we should have limited sympathy for the Cypriots. If you want the European Community to bail out your banks – in other words, if you want German taxpayers to stump up the money – you can hardly complain if they demand a contribution from you. The real issue here is not the pilfering of Cypriot bank accounts by the European Community but whether the EC should be bailing out banks at all. Governments around the world have been throwing money at banking sector since the global financial crisis hit in 2008 and it hasn't stemmed the rot. Private profits, public losses, seems to be the policy of governments towards the banking sector all over the world.
The Cypriot situation, if it has one benefit, has woken people around the world to the fact that governments can use force to do anything they want if they are not constrained. Once you accept the power of the government to take whatever it likes in taxes, then you shouldn't be surprised when it starts taking your bank account, your house and your business. As the millionaire said to the attractive young woman, "we've established the principle, now we're just arguing over the price."
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Why is it Acceptable to Promote Marxism in Our Schools?
Last week my daughter arrived home from her Wellington college and told me that her English teacher had been proselytizing Marxism under the guise of a critical analysis of the movie Lost in Translation. For those of you who have not seen the movie, Bill Murray plays a middle-aged travelling salesmen in Tokyo who has a largely platonic relationship with a young woman, played by Scarlett Johansson. The teacher said that the theme of the movie was alienation in the large modern city. Whether it is or not, is debatable. Personally, I don't think that's what the film is about at all. In fact, I think it's about the opposite - the ability of people to find connections in love even in a city as big as Tokyo. However, that is beside the point because the teacher did not stop there. He went on to say that the only solution to this problem of alienation was Marxism. He returned to the theme on the following day and spent the entire English period promoting his Marxist philosophy.
My daughter was easily able to discount his facile arguments in favour of Marxism and she highlighted to the class the obvious flaws in his arguments, including the fact that wherever it has been tried, Marxism leads to genocide (I guess you could call that "severe alienation"). Unfortunately, many of my daughter's classmates were not so critical in their thinking and the majority seem to accept the teacher's arguments.
I do not have a problem with students studying Marxism as part of a broader analysis of political theories, but remember this was an English class. The promotion of Marxism was not, as far as I can tell, part of the standard English curriculum for Year 12 students. The teacher was simply using his position of power to indoctrinate young minds into his evil philosophy. And let's make no bones about it, Marxism is an evil philosophy. It was responsible for the death of more than 100 million people in the 20th century, far more than that other derivation of socialist/collectivist thought – Fascism, and it is still being used as a justification for the murder of thousands of people around the world in places like North Korea.
Imagine the outcry if the New Zealand secondary school English teacher was promoting Nazism is a valid response to so-called alienation. Why is it acceptable for a teacher to promote an equally detestable political philosophy in our classrooms?
My daughter was easily able to discount his facile arguments in favour of Marxism and she highlighted to the class the obvious flaws in his arguments, including the fact that wherever it has been tried, Marxism leads to genocide (I guess you could call that "severe alienation"). Unfortunately, many of my daughter's classmates were not so critical in their thinking and the majority seem to accept the teacher's arguments.
I do not have a problem with students studying Marxism as part of a broader analysis of political theories, but remember this was an English class. The promotion of Marxism was not, as far as I can tell, part of the standard English curriculum for Year 12 students. The teacher was simply using his position of power to indoctrinate young minds into his evil philosophy. And let's make no bones about it, Marxism is an evil philosophy. It was responsible for the death of more than 100 million people in the 20th century, far more than that other derivation of socialist/collectivist thought – Fascism, and it is still being used as a justification for the murder of thousands of people around the world in places like North Korea.
Imagine the outcry if the New Zealand secondary school English teacher was promoting Nazism is a valid response to so-called alienation. Why is it acceptable for a teacher to promote an equally detestable political philosophy in our classrooms?
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