Sunday, January 31, 2010

Lies

Lies come in many forms. Progressives justify most lies based on a misbegotten "greater good" theory- or the ends justify the means. Their techniques vary from repeating the lie so many times that people begin to believe it (A propaganda technique of Trotsky), or enlisting media types and supposed experts to confirm the lie (in logic this is referred to as a fallacious appeal to authority), their hope being that the lie will become "common knowledge" after some time period. Time would never allow anyone to deal with even a small percentage of these, but below I will list a few put out over the last couple of years that on their face are obviously false, yet achieved the status of a "given," "accepted science," or something "we all know."

Torture doesn't work. Remember the debate about water boarding. Whether or not it is torture may be debatable, but the lefts suggestion that torture doesn't work is preposterous on its face. American soldiers are instructed if captured to give the enemy only their name rank and serial number. However, during Vietnam many were told in advance to give up information well beyond that because they would be tortured and talk then anyway. Stories came back about captured enemy soldiers riding in a helicopter where one was asked a question and when he refused to answer was summarily thrown out of the helicopter from a thousand feet in the air. The next was asked the same question. Guess what happened? I don't know if these stories are entirely true, but I do know that almost anyone will give up information to stop torture. Yet everyone on the left repeated this myth and acted as if we are idiots for laughing at them.

Al Qaeda uses Gitmo as a recruiting tool.
Would Al Qaeda say anything different or act differently if the prisoners were housed in Marion Ill? Think about the absurdity here.

Obama failed to communicate enough on his health care bill. Really his problem was he communicated too much, even though he did abandon the truth when explaining the bill. His problem was if he communicated better or more (if he told the truth) it would have been rejected faster and more completely than it was (if that is possible). He explained it his fictional way ad naseum, he gave 27 speeches about it, and still it was roundly rejected. No... he spoke enough. His problem was he was the tenth medicine man to pass through town.

Global warming is settled science.
I admit that one could be illiterate and still know the last two were lies, whereas understanding the silliness of this statement might require reading a newspaper...say about once a month. The various attempts to hide information, fudge results, and destroy climate data are well documented in the Climate-gate emails. NASA and other US government organizations have admitted to participating in fraud in climate analysis. A paper was cited at the climate conference in Copenhagen last month claiming the glaciers in the Himalayas will melt within the next 35 years. When the author of the paper on which the conclusion was based stated that the conclusion was nonsense and not his, and that it would take hundreds of years if it happened at all, we discovered that the presenter was willing to lie. But what came out later was more egregious. The head of the UN Committee on climate change knew the presentation was fraudulent two months before it was presented, yet remained silent before during and after the presentation. Why are so many lies told if it is "settled science?" Could it be because if it is scrutinized in the same way any other scientific theory is, it becomes apparent it is baseless nonsense?

Saturday, January 16, 2010

Gay Marriage is Not a Right

Ted Olsen, a great man and a great conservative, has teamed up with the liberal attorney Davis Bois to argue in the California State Supreme Court against Proposition 8 in which the people of California banned gay marriage. This week he wrote in Newsweek magazine an article defending his position. You can find it at http://www.newsweek.com/id/229957 I believe he misses at least one fundamental and game changing point, and here is why.

Dear Mr. Olsen,

As a a lifelong conservative, I take exception to the case you make for gay marriage in as much you fail to address the most conservative of all objections, that being support for the rule of law.

The arguments you present are quite moving, although you might want to trash that "settled science" bit as to the nature/nurture debate about homosexuality. I am not suggesting you are wrong, only that there is nothing at all settled on the issue. But I digress. The problem is that the proper forum for your most thoughtful and compassionate arguments is a legislative body, not a court of law. Were your arguments presented to the people's representatives, I for one might support them. But you seem to have chosen the liberal elitist approach. They know it is easier to win an unelected judge's support than a majority of the voters or their representatives.

For 200 years federal, state and local legislatures have passed laws giving privileges and responsibilities to married couples. In every case the "couple" was defined as a union between a man and a woman. This limitation may be unfair. It may be undesirable. But it is legal, and claiming that it is illegal based on an imaginary extension of a basic constitutional right is a gross misreading and misuse of the constitution. And, if it is not a constitutional violation, it is no business of the courts.

As a conservative I can support the right of people to do as they please so long as it doesn't affect others, but to enjoy privileges simply because another group has them, is offensive to me and many others. Do I have a constitutional right to park in a handicapped spot under some bizarre extension of the equal protection clause? Was the court right when it presented an incoherent argument in order to create the "right" to an abortion. As repulsive as legislatures often are, they are a lot better than unelected or unaccountable judges ruling on constitutional issues from which there is little recourse. That authority should only be used in the clearest and most egregious of violations. Certainly allowing some judge to make these public policy decisions is to undermine the greatest document in support of freedom ever written.

The length of your argument betrays its' failings. If the case you are making truly does relate to constitutional issues, you would have been able to make it in short order, much like the constitution itself.

I trust you will rethink this. Your sense of right and wrong and your compassion should not only include gays, but should extend to the very system which insures that our basic rights are inviolate. Your approach will create an uneven, chaotic application of the law, having the practical effect of denying us the freedom and the protection the law affords us when it is evenly applied.