Security Without Weapons

For the weapons of our warfare are not those of the world. Instead, they have the power of God to demolish fortresses. We tear down arguments and every proud obstacle that is raised against the knowledge of God, taking every thought captive in order to obey Christ.
2 Corinthians 10:4-15

Peggy Noonan gives us reasons to be confident that we can have peace and national security without a trillion-dollar defense budget:

A veteran diplomat in the area, an American, said later that everything he'd heard in the speeches left him thinking how the great progress of the past quarter-century had been made not through warfare but through diplomacy, tough decisions, aid, encouragement and rhetorical clarity and candor.

In short, by being a "City upon a Hill," not a military-industrial complex.

Listen to the article and comments by Richard Land.

New York's Expansion of State Power

'Gay Marriage,' Libertarians, and Civil Rights
Untangling Several Confusions
George Weigel
National Review Online
June 27, 2011

"Gay marriage" in fact represents a vast expansion of state power: In this instance, the state of New York is declaring that it has the competence to redefine a basic human institution in order to satisfy the demands of an interest group looking for the kind of social acceptance that putatively comes from legal recognition.

There is a curious rhetorical fact that has usually gone unremarked in these debates, but which is worth pointing out. That what the New York state legislature approved has to be described, not as marriage, but as "gay marriage" or "same-sex marriage" is itself a verbal indicator that what is being done here is counterintuitive. We all know, or thought we knew, what marriage is, and to add the qualifier "gay" or "same-sex" is a tacit admission by the proponents of the practice that it requires an appeal to authority to enforce what seems strange, odd, not right. The verbal tic of "gay marriage" or "same-sex" marriage is thus itself a rhetorical warning sign that what was done in Albany was an exercise in raw state power, the state's asserting that it can do X simply because it claims that it has the power to do so.

And that is an exercise of power that libertarians ought, in theory, to resist, not support.

http://www.eppc.org/publications/pubID.4503/pub_detail.asp

The Treaty of Tripoli

I agree with Lew Rockwell on The Proper US Attitude Towards Muslims.

I disagree with his use of The Treaty of Tripoli to criticize "the Bachmannite myth" of America as a Christian nation.

Einstein on Socialism

A friend emailed me a link to an article by the famous physicist Albert Einstein, advocating socialism.

An extraordinarily fuzzy, mushy-headed article for Mr. E=mc².

My response is here:

http://KevinCraig.us/einstein-socialism.htm

Neo-Conservatives Hate God

Given yesterday's post, "Liberals Hate God," I thought I should appear "fair and balanced."

Many conservatives want to conserve true religion. I won't say they hate God. The aspects of true religion which conservatives want to conserve are precisely what liberals want to exterminate.

But too many conservatives are neo-conservatives, and are therefore like the Pharisees in Jesus' day, who wanted to conserve their traditions but hated God when He walked among them.

The link to "neoconservatives" above gives evidence that many conservatives also hate God, in that they hate "the least of these" -- which is to hate Jesus Himself -- and do not extend hospitality toward them. Hatred of foreigners is a hatred of the God who created them all, and a denial of pure religion (James 1:27).

Conservatives err when they seek to conserve a past which was based on the traditions of men, instead of advancing forward in the direction charted by the commandments of God:

But they hearkened not, nor inclined their ear, but walked in the counsels and in the imagination of their evil heart, and went backward, and not forward.
Jeremiah 7:24

Too many Conservatives also seem to be united in their support of the wars of the U.S. federal government, whereas God wants us to beat our swords into plowshares.

Overall, the differences between "conservative" and "liberal," and "left" and "right" are smoke and mirrors, designed to keep people divided and unable to resist the federal leviathan.

Deuteronomy 5:32
Ye shall observe to do therefore as the LORD your God hath commanded you: ye shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left.

Deuteronomy 17:11
According to the sentence of the law which they shall teach thee, and according to the judgment which they shall tell thee, thou shalt do: thou shalt not decline from the sentence which they shall shew thee, to the right hand, nor to the left.

Deuteronomy 17:20
That his heart be not lifted up above his brethren, and that he turn not aside from the commandment, to the right hand, or to the left: to the end that he may prolong his days in his kingdom, he, and his children, in the midst of Israel.

Deuteronomy 28:14
And thou shalt not go aside from any of the words which I command thee this day, to the right hand, or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.

Joshua 1:7
Only be thou strong and very courageous, that thou mayest observe to do according to all the law, which Moses my servant commanded thee: turn not from it to the right hand or to the left, that thou mayest prosper withersoever thou goest.

Joshua 23:6
Be ye therefore very courageous to keep and to do all that is written in the book of the law of Moses, that ye turn not aside therefrom to the right hand or to the left;

2 Kings 22:2
And he did that which was right in the sight of the LORD, and walked in all the way of David his father, and turned not aside to the right hand or to the left.

Proverbs 4:27
Turn not to the right hand nor to the left: remove thy foot from evil.

Mankind has certainly made progress toward "liberty under God," and then at times rebelled against that progress. It is not inappropriate during times of cultural rebellion to look back with fondness on that prior progress. But our goal should not be to conserve the past, or return to the past, but to advance ever boldly against evil and toward the City of God.

Liberals Hate God

I just tried to send the following letter to Congressman Todd Aiken:

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I just heard that you apologized for saying that "liberals hate God."

In 1923, Princeton Seminary Professor J. Gresham Machen wrote a book entitled Christianity and Liberalism, in which he presented a very scholarly proof that liberals hate God.

Liberals may love a god they created, or they may be their own god and love themselves, but liberals hate the God of the Bible.

Machen was de-frocked by the liberal Presbyterian Church. You can expect to be treated with greater intolerance by the "tolerant" liberals.

Don't back down.

I am not one of your constituents. I have been the Libertarian Party nominee for Congress in the last 4 elections, running against Roy Blunt and Billy Long. I plan to run again in 2012. Maybe I'll meet you on Capitol Hill in 2013!

www.KevinCraig.us/liberalism.htm

Would be honored to hear back from you, but it's not necessary.

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When I clicked "submit," I received this response:

Your zip code indicates that you are outside of the 2nd District of Missouri.
Regrettably, I am unable to reply to any email from constituents outside of the 2nd District of Missouri.
Click Here to return to my home page.

I can't tell if the letter was destroyed by the Congressman's website and won't be read, or if it will be read but not replied to. I had clicked the box that indicated I did not need a reply.

John Hospers | 1918 - 2011

Richard Boddie forwarded me a link to an obituary in Reason Magazine for John Hospers, who died yesterday, three days after his 93rd birthday.

I took a class in Political Philosophy from Hospers at USC -- just about the only glimmer of light in that 4-year sentence. The class text was his book, Libertarianism: A Political Philosophy for Tomorrow. I think he also introduced me to Rothbard's For a New Liberty. His goal was to impart ideas, not flunk anyone. He passed out a list of questions for his own book which was a checklist of the important ideas every student should take away. I have always liked that way of teaching. George Reisman uses the same technique.

The Reason obit says Hospers was "openly gay." This is the first I have ever heard that.

The New Pledge of Allegiance

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Why I Don't Pledge Allegiance to the Flag, and to the Republic for which it Stands

Religion and the Coming Depression

Wayne Allyn Root has written a depressing article on his blog, "Why the Greatest Depression of All Time Has Begun." Go ahead and read it and then come back here.

Maybe we could call it a "sobering" article, except that nobody is going to get sober after reading it. An article detailing all the problems caused by getting drunk all the time won't cause an alcoholic to stay sober. Root's article will not bring economic sobriety.

Isn't that why Root went to the trouble to write this article? Doesn't he believe on some level that his article will spur action and prevent the next depression?

As a political candidate, I'm always looking for the "silver bullet" -- the sound bite that will cause voters to wake up and vote the right way.

Root's article is not the silver bullet.

First of all, the title of Root's article is wrong. He only proves THAT "the Greatest Depression of All Time Has Begun," but he does not explain WHY it has begun.

Perhaps this line is the first clue:

> America has always been a land of boom and bust.
> It's just part of business cycle.

Not true.
Boom-bust has been exacerbated by the Fed since it was founded in 1913. Before 1913, "cycles" were not "cyclical." They only happened as discrete and individual incidents when banks created money out of thin air, inevitably in collusion with the government.

http://KevinCraig.us/money.htm
http://KevinCraig.us/fed.htm

But WHY did banks create money out of thin air?
Was it a technical accounting error?
An impersonal mistake?
An unavoidable, inevitable economic "cycle?"

No, it was a moral problem.
People wanted "something for nothing."
Borrowers wanted free money.
Banks wanted the interest.
Nobody wanted to work and save, earning wealth the old fashioned way.

In an introduction to his notes on the Constitutional Convention's deliberations in Philadelphia, James Madison, the "Father of the Constitution," noted that one of the defects the Convention was assembled to remedy was that

In the internal administration of the States, a violation of contracts had become familiar, in the form of depreciated paper made a legal tender.

Most Americans could not explain this statement.
They could not explain why paper money helps violate contracts.

Art. 1, § 10, ¶ 1 of the Constitution was written to remedy this problem:

No State shall ... make any thing but gold and silver a legal tender in payment of debts;

In Federalist Paper No. 44, possibly the most authoritative source for constitutional interpretation, Madison explained the provision:

The extension of the prohibition to bills of credit must give pleasure to every citizen, in proportion to his love of justice and his knowledge of the true springs of public prosperity. The loss which America has sustained since the peace, from the pestilent effects of paper money on the necessary confidence between man and man, on the necessary confidence in the public councils, on the industry and morals of the people, and on the character of republican government, constitutes an enormous debt against the States chargeable with this unadvised measure, which must long remain unsatisfied; or rather an accumulation of guilt, which can be expiated no otherwise than by a voluntary sacrifice on the altar of justice, of the power which has been the instrument of it. ... No one of these mischiefs is less incident to a power in the States to emit paper money, than to coin gold or silver. The power to make any thing but gold and silver a tender in payment of debts, is withdrawn from the States, on the same principle with that of issuing a paper currency.

Madison says paper money has "pestilent effects" on "the industry and morals of the people." This means people have come to want "something for nothing."

All of the problems listed by Root are fundamentally MORAL problems. They are not the effects of impersonal economic cycles. They are not imposed on a God-fearing, moral America by devious atheistic socialist conspirators.

I guess I'm more pessimistic and depressing than Wayne Allyn Root. He must assume that Americans are educated enough to read and understand his article. I don't.

http://KevinCraig.us/literacy.htm

But WHY are Americans largely illiterate?

Because being educated takes work, and Americans want something for nothing. They want degrees and certificates that LABEL them as being educated, but they don't want to WORK at actually being educated.

Government-run schools no longer teach students that there is a God. "Public" schools no longer teach the duty to obey "the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God." Every student is taught that he is his own god. He does not have to obey teachers. He does not have to respect the learning environment of other students. He does not have to work at being informed. He will get his diploma no matter how stupid he is. He is entitled to it. All gods are entitled to everything they want. These students will grow up to be "voters," voting to get "something for nothing." They will destroy the economy.

All of these "impersonal economic problems" are actually personal immoral actions committed by people who reject God and His Commandments.

Morality is religion externalized.

The only solution to Big Government is religious revival.

http://KevinCraig.us/religion/morality.htm

Voters must confess, "God is God; I am not."

The State must confess, "God is God; I am not."

This is "conversion" from the idolatry of the false religion of statism to the true religion of Christianity.

This is the silver bullet.

Would Jesus Celebrate Memorial Day?

www.Would Jesus Celebrate Memorial Day.com

America is Ugly: Medicare

It's been 10 days since I last posted, and I really don't have time to post anything today, but I wanted to correlate an anti-GOP commercial I saw on FoxNews the other day and a recent podcast by Chuck Colson.

The commercial shows a Republican dumping an elderly woman over a cliff, symbolizing the alleged GOP plan to eliminate Medicare, which would be a good thing, even if the GOP never proposed any such thing, and would never have the political wisdom and courage to do so. The closing line is: "Is America Beautiful Without Medicare?"

I would like to begin a conversation on the proposition that Medicare makes America Ugly.

Start with this "BreakPoint" podcast by Chuck Colson:

Caring for the Elderly

Update - June 4th
We should also consider the idea of "caring for the kids."
Libertarian Party Chair Mark Hinkle writes:

To the senior citizen who says "I paid into Medicare, and you can't cut me off!", I would refer you to this comment from the Cato Institute:

Medicare is less a "sacred bond between the generations" than a pyramid scheme allowing each generation to take advantage of the next. Since the elderly are a politically powerful group, each generation has been able to secure larger Medicare subsidies at the expense of young working-age Americans. Medicare has spawned an average of one tax increase every three years for the past 45 years.

Rather than perpetuating this system, and throwing enormous debt and taxes onto the backs of our children and grandchildren, and frankly ruining their hopes for good medical care, instead let's suffer the pain now, and end this system now, so that their lives can be brighter, and their health can be stronger.
Libertarians say Paul Ryan's Medicare plan fails

Government Workers are Cowards

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoSiPII1QLI&feature=player_embedded#t=343s

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And those who stand by silently -- or even cheer confidently -- are also full of fear.

Some of the "government workers" in the video above do not get paid by the government to do the work they do. They do govenrment work for money only indirectly, but also out of fear.

1 John 4:18

h/t: Tim Challies

McCain: Torture Did Not Lead to Osama

Bin Laden’s death and the debate over torture - The Washington Post

Windfall Profits

Gasoline Taxes Vs. Exxon Profit, Per Gallon