Rachel Lucas Learns that History Lingers

Before the eleventh century, the Celtic and Anglo-Saxon peoples of England had more trouble with each other and the Romans, Danes, and Vikings than with the French.

In A.D. 1066, William the Conqueror took over England for France. He installed Frenchmen as the new ruling class, to the point where the English we speak now probably owes as much to Old French as to Old English.

Since that time, the English have had a kind of hate-hate relationship with the French.

I look for the European Union to fix all of that in a thousand years or so.

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Not that there's anything wrong with that.

W/t Gateway Pundit

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The President Is Not the Leader of the Free World

To the extent that the world has a leader, it is not free.

I should end this post there, but something else occurs to me.

Obama, by virtue of his international and liberal upbringing, Muslim father, and not least his African lineage, may be tempted to see Southwest Asian and African leaders as more like himself than not.

Perhaps that will be a net positive for civilization in the long run, but there remains a distinct possibility that he will presume a false familiarity. Like an undercover agent trying to infiltrate a criminal operation, there are shades of loyalty and of distrust that no American can ever cast aside, as long as he remains such. Will the mullahs and warlords play on his heritage, and if so, will he play along as the cat or as the mouse?

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What's the Use?

Ross Douthat at The Atlantic writes of Armageddon, and the choice to retaliate or not to retaliate after the fall of a national capitol.

As Douthat has it, the British Prime Minister has break-the-glass orders with nuclear submarine commanders at the bottom of the ocean for what to do in case London were vaporized, King and Parliament with it. Ross wonders what Reagan would have done, and speculates that after his country were razed, Reagan may not have retaliated. He suggests that the Lion of Reykjavik would have lain down with the Wolf of Glasnost, saying that at that point, "What's the use?"

The utility of following through with destruction of their following destruction of ours is simple: lovers of liberty must oppose tyranny with every tool at their disposal. If the submarine fails to deliver retribution, evil men will dictate the history books. There, done.

The more interesting question is if the submarine commander would be bound to follow the orders of a dead Prime Minister.

Military doctrine, upon which the Geneva Conventions are based, holds that an officer's legitimacy stems from his loyalty to the State. Supposing that State no longer to exist, or to have been captured by opposing forces, the commander would be a rogue actor, or a member of the armed resistance, should he choose to obey the orders written in the safe.

But does the State no longer exist once its administrative offices and its Head are so much glowing dust? I think no easy answer to this question is possible, because there are levels of existence. If a State loses its monarch, bureaucracy, executive leadership and entire flag officer corps, does the State exist? Perhaps the question can only be answered post hoc, should the citizens of the State reformulate it into something able to control its territory.

Supposing the entirety of the nation's is land rendered inhabitable, or during the time in which the State is nonfunctional, we still have our submarine (or lunar base) commander, out of communication with the rest of the race. He may have information as to the source of the destruction that came upon his nation, or he may lack it, and in any case he will be confronted with some amount of uncertainty.

During the Cold War, he might safely have assumed that the former Soviet Union were the responsible party, and could be counted blameless for expending his arsenal against any high-value targets he could reach.

But in the 9/11 era, even a worldwide intelligence network may fail to uncover the source of mass destruction. An incommunicado commander, wishing to remain hidden, would have somewhat less certainty over how to retaliate, and against whom.

But such a commander would be loyal not just to a chain of command or the laws of a particular nation, but first to the noblest lady of our civilization: Liberty herself. If he could band together with like-minded warriors at sea, and perhaps find some undefended shoal to call home, they could once again breath the air as free men. Their war would continue until victory or defeat, by enemy or age.

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Without Obama, G20 Talks Produce Results

According The Hill:

White House officials said President Bush and other leaders had achieved five key objectives, stating they reached a common understanding of the root causes of the crisis; reviewed actions to be taken to strengthen growth; agreed on principles for financial market reform; drafted an action plan; and reaffirmed their commitment to free market principles.

With Barack Obama absent, experienced statesmen were able to agree on the root causes of the crisis, concluding with everyone else who doesn't drink the liberal happy sauce that Barney Frank, Maxine Waters, and Barack Obama were exclusively at fault.

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Obama is Embarrassed by Americans

There's a reason people in Europe a multilingual. They're Europeans. They don't have a common language, except English.

And they're having a very difficult time becoming a European nation because of it.

I understand the value of learning other languages. I've learned a smattering of Spanish, French, Japanese, Latin, and Ancient Greek, though the latter two not conversationally. But learning these languages forces one to see a different map on reality, and helps in learning one's own language better.

But I understand even more the importance of language to culture. When I can walk into any restaurant, shop, or business and know that I can communicate without trouble with the people there, it makes my life easier. It makes it easier for me to succeed, and easier to trust my neighbors.

I want the people who are my countrymen to share my culture, ideas, and beliefs. That is why having a common language is important. In America, for better or worse, we speak English. Those who immigrate here should learn the language so they can fit in, rather than insisting that everyone else adjust to them.

Everyone the world over wants to learn English. They don't want to learn French. French is a pretty language, sure, prettier than English. But still, people clamor to learn the language of freedom.

Go figure.

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The Nation in Resurgence

It seems that geography is making a comeback in its battle with ideology.

In Iraq, tribal forces have risen up to reclaim control of their territory from the transnational terrorists. Now, via Ace, they would like to show their Afghan counterparts how to do the same.

They would also like to supplant the sectarian Sunni vs Shiite electoral map in Iraq with one based on tribal association.

Some might question the philosophical underpinnings of such a shift, being a move away from using differences in abstract beliefs for political grouping and toward using ancestry. But religious beliefs will still play a big part in Iraqi politics, just inside the tribal system. Arab culture places a high value on paternal authority, and failing to include the tribal organization in the political structure of the country creates at best a dual power structure, and at worst invalidates the democratic one.

In the United States, the Democratic Party primary saw both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama use protectionism in an attempt to curry favor with the voters. But what they are really tapping in to is not some economic theory of harm in selling our products overseas. The source of protectionism's appeal is the fear of globalism, that we will be at the mercy of foreign powers, especially foreign corporate and banking interests.

The world over, it seems the pendulum is swinging away from the imagined, and back to the real. I doubt it will swing very far.

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Where Obama Gets His Ideas

Reading Fareed Zakaria's The Post-American World. Zakaria is a Yale alum with a Harvard PhD. From Zakaria's site for the book:

Zakaria describes with equal prescience a world in which the United States will no longer dominate the global economy, orchestrate geopolitics, or overwhelm cultures. He sees the "rise of the rest"—the growth of countries like China, India, Brazil, Russia, and many others—as the great story of our time, and one that will reshape the world.

Of note is this magazine interview (pdf).


In an upcoming article for Newsweek, Who is the Real Appeaser?, Zakaria slams President Bush for not talking to Hezbollah. I don't like his logic, but a thorough analysis will have to wait.

w/t Instapundit (via an AoSHQ comment)

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House Votes Greater Dependence on OPEC

oh no, i am not making this stuff up

According to shortnews.com (which links to a Reuters story at yahoo):

The U.S. House of Representatives passed in a landslide legislation that would allow the Justice Department to sue OPEC for cooperating to set high oil prices and limiting supply, but President Bush said he will veto the bill.

The bill would attempt to subject OPEC to U.S. antitrust laws and would include Saudi Arabia, Iran and Venezuela. The vote margin, 324-84, is large enough to override a presidential veto, which was threatened in fear of retaliation by OPEC.

This attempt by Congress to extend our antitrust laws to cover an organization made up of other sovereign nations is wrong-headed for several reasons, some obvious and some not.

OPEC, as known to everyone not a member of the House of Representatives, stands for the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. These countries, not being part of the United States, are not required to recognize our laws or courts.

However, the bill would leverage regulation of foreign-owned oil refinery and transport properties in the U.S to get cooperation from the individual OPEC nations, such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Venezuela.

The entire stated purpose of OPEC is to cooperate to set high oil prices and limit supply. Congress may as well say that the United States has authority over the treaties other nations may make with one another, or over the legal systems of any country doing business in the United States.

And their price-fixing scheme is not totally effective. The price of oil is set by the international oil market: sellers try to find the buyer willing to pay the highest price, and buyers try to find the cheapest source. OPEC is simply one group of sellers in the international oil market. The way to get them to lower their price is to buy from a less expensive source.

Another group of sellers is U.S. domestic oil producers. If Congress wishes to increase supply, it can allow domestic producers to drill for oil in places which are already known to have oil, such as the continental shelf off our own coasts and in Alaska.

But rather than stand up to the environmental lobby, Congressional Democrats would encourage OPEC to increase its supply, thereby increasing our dependence on foreign oil.

There is no rule or law that says an OPEC country must produce a single drop of oil. The only thing keeping them producing oil is the international market price. You can't sue someone into selling you something at your price.

What's next: legislating that pi henceforth will be equal to 3.0? Perhaps instead the Congress would like to ensure that the oil fields in Saudia Arabia meet OSHA requirements, or those in Kenya aren't harming the sensitive East African environment.

And if OPEC decides to retaliate against Congressional arrogance, they can turn off the spigot, or merely lower their output even further. That would be a minor inconvenience for them, and the consequences for us would be disastrous.

But perhaps the Democrats in Congress know that already, and believe they can blame President Bush for the economic depression that would follow their attempt to extend our laws to the whole world.

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Illegal War in Iraq

In a dull repetition of melodramatic echo, never quite dying out but never fully explained, we hear the phrase "illegal war" applied to the conflict in Iraq.

"Illegal war" means that by the very existence of the war a law has been broken. But whose law has been broken? Is it a law of the United States, or some other law, say perhaps of France or Sweden, or more likely, of the United Nations?

The United Nations doesn't have laws, despite what some power-grabbing third worlder might think. It's an organization, not a nation or sovereign entity. At most, its leadership can say that a member country is in violation of its treaty obligations, which is a different thing from being "illegal".

But even so, the United Nations authorized the use of force against Iraq (not just against the government of Saddam Hussein, but of Iraq), though such authorization is not necessary for the United States, sovereign nation that it is, to go to war against some other sovereign nation. We are subject to United Nations edicts only by our own consent. And yet, in this instance and every other of which I'm aware, we have complied with U.N. dictates.

If a law of the United States, then which United States law is it that has been broken? It can only be that the very Constitution has been "shredded" by the use of the armed forces without a formal declaration of war, And yet the Constitution gives the President the authority as Commander in Chief, and to the Congress to declare war and to establish funding and regulations for the armed forces.

Of course in the United States our laws come to be laws when the Congress passes bills and the President signs them, or when a Court decides something (which is then subject to review by higher courts). Congress can change a law made either by itself or by judicial decision at any time, with or without the President's approval.

Now, Congress has issued several bills authorizing the use of force against Iraq (not only against the government of Sadaam Hussein, but of Iraq) which the President duly signed into law, both six months before and several times after the President followed through on that authorization. Congress can, at any time, rescind its authorization. Congress can defund the war at any time also, without the President's approval.

According to WhatReallyHappened.com, the war is illegal because there were no weapons of mass destruction (WMD) found, but of course, the authorization says no such thing, and there were WMD found. They also claim that the authorization is only valid against the people involved in 9/11. But here is the text they claim says this:

... acting pursuant to this joint resolution is consistent with the United States and other countries continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorist and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001.

But that says terrorist organizations including those responsible for 9/11, not only those responsible for it. That authorization included Saddam Hussein as a supporter of international terrorism, whether he was directly involved in 9/11 or not, and it includes our current enemies in Iraq, many of whom do belong to the Al Qaeda organization responsible for 9/11. It also includes Iran, when they operate in Iraq.

It therefore must be that the war is illegal despite Congress having authorized it, and having voted several times to continue its authorization; and despite the fact that the President has certainly given his authority for the work in Iraq; and that the Supreme Court has allowed these actions to continue in the numerous attempts which have been made to bring suit to stop it.

There must then be some other branch of the government which is violating the law.

My money's on Haliburton.

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In which I agree with Nancy Pelosi

Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House and really bad economist, has one thing right. China is our enemy.

When Bill Clinton arranged for China to get Most Favored Nation trading status, he said trading with them would encourage them on the road to democracy. Nancy opposed him, saying we should not trade with wicked nations. In 1991, while Bill Clinton was seeking to pay back his Chinese masters, Pelosi went to China, as well, and found her way to Tiananmen Square:

Along with two other members of Congress, Pelosi unwrapped a banner that read, "To those who died for democracy in China." The decidedly undiplomatic delegation was immediately surrounded by police and Chinese "tourists" who pulled walkie-talkies from their backpacks.

Pelosi continues her fight against the state of affairs in China. While the Chinese Communists are calling for 'stepped up "patriotic campaigns"' in Tibet, which yearns for freedom:

Unrest among Tibet's Buddhist clergy has been blamed in part on compulsory "patriotic education" classes, widely reviled by monks for cutting into religious study and forcing them to make ritual denouncements of the Dalai Lama, who fled to India in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule.

Freedom of thought, religion, and speech are non-negotiable. I encourage athletes all over the world to reject the Chinese demand for their complicit silence during the Games.

While I disagree with Speaker Pelosi on a wide range of topics, this is not one of them.

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The Planet is Underpopulated

Is the problem with the world that we have too many people?

Many liberals would be surprised that there is even a question: population should be reduced to medieval levels to fix everything from African Hunger to Global Warming. But rather than battle that particular straw man, let me restate my counterthesis by positing rather weakly that many of our problems, to the liberal way of thinking, are caused by overpopulation.

Assuming arguendo that all (or most) of the world's problems are caused by having too many people, is the prospect of having too many people one we have to address? That is, how should we address the threat of overpopulation?

Hopefully all of the answers to that will involve attrition this time, not mass slaughter as they did in the 20th century. Now, that wasn't fair. Sorry. Just because every Communist who has ever gained power has been a world-class mass murderer doesn't mean that the next one will be. And that all communists are liberals doesn't imply that all liberals are communists of the mass-murdering persuasion.

But people are writing (and purchasing) books about how wonderful the planet would be without us. What if Man were to be wiped off the face of the Earth? I've thought about that. Seeing the weeds that grow in the cracks in the driveway, it seems obvious that in a few short years, they would overgrow it. The roof of the house would soon start to leak, the leaks would lead to rot, and soon trees would take root in the attic. No, wait, that's how it is now. I really should patch those holes soon.

There is an undercurrent in progressivism that holds Man to be a locust, destructively feeding on The Planet to the misfortune of all other living, and non-living, things. Obviously, if there weren't so many people the damage would not be so great. Mankind (and by unavoidable extension, individual people) are parasites, an unpleasant blight on an otherwise perfect world.

But even without considering the damage to the planet, overpopulation (and of the "wrong" type of people) has been the left's bogeyman since Margaret Sanger founded Planned Parenthood to do something about it. The efforts continued, branching from the eugenics movement to encompass the horrors of World War II. And it continues unabated.

According to a 1994 study at the site dieoff.org (yes, really), "U.S. agricultural productivity is already unsustainable". That quote is, fortunately, not supported very well by the study. A key logical error interposed itself, wherein the study notes that population growth is primarily due to immigration, but concludes that individuals must exercise family planning or the entire population will be at the mercy of nature. Nowhere in that study did they actually look at U.S. agricultural productivity due to technological advances over time, except noting in the conclusion

Given the fact that the supply of natural resources is finite and that the ability of technology to replace many of these resources is limited, we are left with the necessity of controlling population numbers. Certainly, diminishing consumption levels by stringent conservation programs will help slow depletion. But individual responsibility on the part of men and women to control family size is vital to control population numbers and maintain a high standard of living, otherwise the harsh realities of nature will impose its control on the population.

Another flaw in the logic employs the fallacy of Division: just because the whole population will suffer if everyone doesn't exercise "individual responsibility", that doesn't imply that anyone in particular will suffer, whether or not they choose to exercise "individual responsibility".

But a more basic problem with the logic is the assumption that resources are finite. New resources, and new uses for old resources, and new ways to avoid using resources altogether are found with a regularity and pace which blows that assumption out of the water. It's a case of failing to understand that what appears to be a constant is actually a curve that changes in ways we don't understand.

In a piece from 2005, Jeff Lindsay wrote

How can the "obvious" logic of the population control lobby be wrong? Because the resources of the planet are not a fixed pie that dwindle with each birth. The resources are whatever we can make of this planet - or solar system - and it takes the work of human beings to transform raw materials and energy into useful resources. Humans are not a liability, but a resource that we need!

Population growth is only a problem if your basis vectors are skewed. I look at population growth as the goal, and the lack of place to put the people as a problem to overcome. I want the human race to dominate the universe. That goal is unattainable at our current population numbers.

I am for any plan or technology that allows continued, sustainable population growth, and I reject any plan to artificially limit that growth. Even if the population growth curve is exponential, it doesn't mean we can't sustain it.

If the people are hungry, figure a way they can feed themselves. If that means skyscraper farms (beware the popup), or floating farms over the 70% of the Earth that's covered in seawater, then that's what it means.

Unrestricted population growth should be our goal not only because we want growth itself, but because the restrictions are worse than the growth. Artificially restricting growth is saying "I've got life, but you can't have it.", which is akin to stomping waterlogged hands from the rails of the lifeboat.

Furthermore, it has been shown that the populations of prosperous, industrialized societies naturally level off, all by themselves. Or perhaps that's all Margaret Sanger's doing, by birth control and abortion.

Humans have the right to procreate. Whether they do it well enough to suit us is irrelevant, because it isn't our call. To fret and bother about where we will get the food to feed their children is equally silly, because that is certainly not our problem, it is theirs. Is that irresponsible? No, it's simply practical. Responsibility is taking possession of the effects of your actions. Someone else's actions are not part of that.

The lifeboat metaphor fails in several ways, not least in that there is a very good chance that one extra person in the boat could drown everyone, and that is wholly unlike the effects of increased population. One extra person could be the one who saves the rest of us.

But all in all, it seems better to work on how best to keep the boat afloat, rather than telling anyone they need to swim ashore.

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Dependence Day, Part II

What is it about Liberals that makes them see an apple fall from a tree and think that apples have learned to fly?

That's a metaphor.

Rather than recognize that men are capable of evil, calling evil what it is, and insisting that those who engage in it be punished, liberals believe that if only the tools by which we commit our acts of evil were removed, we would no longer commit the evil.

Liberals like Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich want to take guns away from people. Why? Because people use them against each other. Pointing out the children who are hurt by gunfire, Blagojevich ignores the one who pulled the trigger and goes after the trigger, instead. In doing so he seeks to increase the power of government, a government he happens to head.

And yet men (and women) in prison fashion weapons from paperclips and toothbrushes, turning their creativity and copious free time to the manufacture of weapons. How is it that we can expect men and women in a supposedly free society to be any less creative in their pursuit of wickedness? And that is just to address the committed lawbreakers. When the otherwise law-abiding citizen is asked to choose between obeying a law that restricts his freedom of self-defense and breaking that law to defend himself and his family, he will often, thankfully, choose the latter.

Because people use nations against each other, liberals like Howard Zinn [edited 20070711, striking "\nLiberals"] want to take nations away from people. Pointing to the atrocities of men who inhabit nations, and even acts committed on behalf of nations, Zinn pleads that we forgo loyalty to mere nations and adopt it for all mankind. As if no evil was done before the advent of the nation, nor would ever be done on behalf of all mankind. Such evil will be much worse for its sanctimony.

Liberals target not only weapons and nations, but money. Knowing in their hearts that ordinary people are far less able to decide what to do with money than liberals are, naturally the ordinary folks should not be burdened with it. And the great evil done by wealthy people is manifest, for how otherwise did they gather wealth but by acts of evil? Therefore, liberals need to take all the money and use it as they see fit.

When will they learn? People are evil, sometimes more than others. That evil expresses itself without regard to the tools we have at our disposal, whether the tool be a pistol, an army, or a fat bank account. Guns, nations, and money are not intrinsically evil. But disarming people, disallowing the right to self-determination, and redistribution of wealth are.

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Dependence Day, part 1

This was supposed to be my July 4 post, when I started writing it in May, but I took a few days off from blogging to have a life. Well, a little.

"Nationalism" is a bit of a dirty word, conjuring as it does images of Mussolini, Hirohito, and that other fellow.

But along comes Howard Zinn to decry nationalism on the 4th of July, telling us to put away the flags and love for country, and instead to embrace the whole world with loyalty and good will for all.

There is nothing like competition to keep people honest, and so it goes with governments, too. Without any competition, the United Nations is an appalling quag of incompetence, corruption and waste. With no way to measure its success or failure, failure is assured, and achieved with ease.

But can we point to the United Nations as the model for all future transnational organizations? The mind reels with possibilities for a New United Nations. Perhaps all matters great and small could be decided by direct Internet plebiscite. Or if a region is underserved by Internet providers, because it is underserved by electricity providers, delegates could be selected to vote by proxy for the people.

In a world run by opinion polls, the demagogues would have a tall platform from which to spread their phony message of the day, whether it's to the ruin of the economy as in U.N. economic guru Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe, or in Al Gore's equally disastrous policies over global warming as he screeches his demands for reason by fiat.

If one of these fools were to gain power over the economic and political life of the whole world, he would institute controls (for our own good) that would make Josef Stalin green with envy. In such a world, to where does one escape? To climb a mountain and would draw accusation of spoiling the air and melting glaciers; to sail the seas one would be endangering dolphins, causing hurricanes, and otherwise destroying the planet. There would be no hiding from a world government.

All of that could change if the human race figures out a way to spread to more than one planet, or to have a population which could survive without Earth's assistance. In such a far-flung fantasy world, in which escape off-world were equivalent to hopping a bus for Pittsburgh for us today, a world government would not be as scary.

But we are not there, and untill such a time as we are, I'll keep my flag, and the country that goes with it.

Howard Zinn and all.

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