Memorial Day Tribute: Operation Enduring Freedom

Mural at the Bagram Pax Terminal.  Caption:  
"This is a tribute to all who have fallen during Operation Enduring Freedom. Live a Life Worthy of Their Sacrifice."

We still have people fighting and dying in Afghanistan, and Kandahar is heating up
.

KANDAHAR

I saw it for the first time from the window of the plane
We touched down I looked around, history called my name
There’s a prison made of mud and wire, the roof is caving in
It’s where they put the ones who wouldn’t listen
But they’re listening now, and looking down,
on Kandahar

We attacked them in October, we paid them back in spades
We swung the hammer from the north, a people fierce and brave
And the Taliban, made their last stand
We broke down their walls and chased them out
We spilled our blood and guts upon the ground,
at Kandahar

The Greeks were there before us, Alexander led the way
The Persians brought their fire and their gods
The Mongols swarmed out of the north and brought their cities down
Then the Arabs came, and gave their God a name,
in Kandahar

The Russians, Persians, Mongols, and the Greeks
Our soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines
Their blood is crying out from the ground
Their souls echo off the mountains way out loud
in Kandahar

Want to honor our heroes this Memorial Day?  Live a live worthy of their sacrifice.

What do Jim Crow and Today's Liberals Have in Common?

The Rand Paul-civil rights hubbub caused me somewhat of an intellectual crisis.  An ideology that indifferently resigns people to second-class status cannot be defended in my mind.  Time for Silverfiddle to abandon libertarianism?  Perish the thought!  Happily, I stumbled across two pieces that put everything in proper context.

First, David Paul Kuhn did an excellent job explaining why sincere civil rights champions were so incensed.  Then along came Jacob Sullum to reiterate basic libertarian fundamentals and apply them in defense of civil rights for all.  These two excerpts reconciled my crisis.  I'm still proudly in the libertarian camp.

Some Anger is indeed Righteous

David Paul Kuhn explains why sincere liberals and civil rights activists are upset over Rand Paul's comments concerning the 1964 Civil Rights Act.  Shorn of the MSNBC screeching and community activist bullhorn shouting, the argument makes a lot of sense. 

This calls to mind, for the left, a long-standing grievance. Many of today's conservatives speak of the civil rights movement's virtues and denounce racism. But they also rail against an activist government that was vital to ending Jim Crow. For liberals, Paul personifies how the right tries to have it both ways. They hear a conservatism that espouses the virtues of equality but opposed the only means to attain it.

Buckley later expressed deep regret for his stance on civil rights, as did Goldwater. But to liberals, that leaves much unresolved. They believe one cannot champion the civil rights movement today without coming to terms with yesterday's arguments for opposing it. This is why phrases like "states rights" still anger progressives.  (David Paul Kuhn)

Jim Crow is No Libertarian

Meanwhile, Jacob Sullum makes an important point:  Jim Crow laws also violate libertarian private property principles:

If we own ourselves, it follows that no one else can own us—the most obvious way in which slavery violates human rights.

It also follows that we own our labor, which means we decide who benefits from it and under what terms, and the fruits of our labor, which means we control access to our property.

All these rights were flagrantly violated not only by slavery but by the racist Jim Crow regime that succeeded it, which forced businesses to discriminate against blacks as customers and employees. (Jacob Sullum)

 He also defends the 1964 act by pointing out that it "belatedly implemented the 14th Amendment's guarantee of equal treatment under the law."

Every Coin Has Two Sides
But he also reminds us, with a twist on Voltaire, that "we cannot abridge the freedom of those we despise without endangering our own freedom."

As Dr. Sowell is fond of reminding us, there are no magic bullets, only trade-offs.  Defend a theoretical point or right an historic wrong?  No contest, especially if you are the one experiencing discrimination.
 

Life is full of double edged swords.

Saturday Humor: Philosophy of Ambiguity

Courtesy of my brother Toro,

1.  DON'T SWEAT THE PETTY THINGS AND DON'T PET THE SWEATY THINGS.

2.  ONE TEQUILA, TWO TEQUILA, THREE TEQUILA, FLOOR.

3.  ATHEISM IS A NON-PROPHET ORGANIZATION.

4.  IF MAN EVOLVED FROM MONKEYS AND APES, WHY DO WE STILL HAVE MONKEYS AND APES?

5.  THE MAIN REASON THAT SANTA IS SO JOLLY IS BECAUSE HE KNOWS WHERE ALL THE BAD GIRLS LIVE.

6. I WENT TO A BOOKSTORE AND ASKED THE SALESWOMAN, "WHERE'S THE SELF- HELP SECTION?" SHE SAID IF SHE TOLD ME, IT WOULD DEFEAT THE PURPOSE.

7.  WHAT IF THERE WERE NO HYPOTHETICAL QUESTIONS?

8.  IF A DEAF CHILD SIGNS SWEAR WORDS, DOES HIS MOTHER WASH HIS HANDS WITH SOAP?

9.  IF SOMEONE WITH MULTIPLE PERSONALITIES THREATENS TO KILL HIMSELF, IS IT CONSIDERED A HOSTAGE SITUATION?

10.  IS THERE ANOTHER WORD FOR SYNONYM?

11.  WHERE DO FOREST RANGERS GO TO "GET AWAY FROM IT ALL?"

12.  WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN YOU SEE AN ENDANGERED ANIMAL EATING AN ENDANGERED PLANT?

13.  IF A PARSLEY FARMER IS SUED, CAN THEY GARNISH HIS WAGES?

14.  WOULD A FLY WITHOUT WINGS BE CALLED A WALK?

15.  WHY DO THEY LOCK GAS STATION BATHROOMS? ARE THEY AFRAID SOMEONE WILL CLEAN THEM?

16.  IF A TURTLE DOESN'T HAVE A SHELL, IS HE HOMELESS OR NAKED?

17.  CAN VEGETARIANS EAT ANIMAL CRACKERS?

18.  IF THE POLICE ARREST A MIME, DO THEY TELL HIM HE HAS THE RIGHT TO REMAIN SILENT?

19.  WHY DO THEY PUT BRAILLE ON THE DRIVE-THROUGH BANK MACHINES?

20.  HOW DO THEY GET DEER TO CROSS THE ROAD ONLY AT THOSE YELLOW ROAD SIGNS?

21.  WHAT WAS THE BEST THING BEFORE SLICED BREAD?

22.  ONE NICE THING ABOUT EGOTISTS: THEY DON'T TALK ABOUT OTHER PEOPLE.

23..  DOES THE LITTLE MERMAID WEAR AN ALGEBRA?

24.  DO INFANTS ENJOY INFANCY AS MUCH AS ADULTS ENJOY ADULTERY?

25.  HOW IS IT POSSIBLE TO HAVE A CIVIL WAR?

26.  IF ONE SYNCHRONIZED SWIMMER DROWNS, DO THE REST DROWN TOO?

27.  IF YOU ATE BOTH PASTA AND ANTIPASTO, WOULD YOU STILL BE HUNGRY?

28.  IF YOU TRY TO FAIL, AND SUCCEED, WHICH HAVE YOU DONE?

29.  WHOSE CRUEL IDEA WAS IT FOR THE WORD 'LISP' TO HAVE 'S' IN IT?

30.  WHY ARE HEMORRHOIDS CALLED "HEMORRHOIDS" INSTEAD OF "ASSTEROIDS"?

31.  WHY IS IT CALLED TOURIST SEASON IF WE CAN'T SHOOT THEM?

32.  WHY IS THERE AN EXPIRATION DATE ON SOUR CREAM?

33.  IF YOU SPIN AN ORIENTAL PERSON IN A CIRCLE THREE TIMES, DO THEY BECOME DISORIENTED?

34.  CAN AN ATHEIST GET INSURANCE AGAINST ACTS OF GOD

Plug That Damned Hole!!!

Fixing Immigration Step by Step

http://chicagoray.blogspot.com

We Can't Deport Them All
It pains me to say it, but we can't.  That's the realpolitik situation we find ourselves in.

We cannot round them all up and send them home.  There are not enough planes, trains and automobiles to haul 20 million people out of the country.  Even if we could, imagine the humanitarian nightmare it would cause.  It would make the Trail of Tears look like an Easter parade. 

In light of the hysteria the recent Arizona law has caused, imagine what it would do to our society (and our nation's image) to see footage of tearful families being dragged from their homes and forcibly expelled from The Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.

So Here is My Solution

Step 1:  Secure the Damned Border!

The border is still leaking, and unscrupulous business owners are still hiring illegal immigrants and paying them slave-labor wages.  Controlling traffic in and out is a logical first step.

Step 2:  Stand and Be Counted!
To proceed to a solution, we must first know who is here, how many, and where.  We should offer illegal immigrants a deal:  Pop your head up and be counted.  In exchange we will give you documentation that allows you to work here, for say 5 years.  We may eventually ask you to leave or to go to the back of the line, but if you self-identify and have no criminal record, you've got a clean shot. 

Step 3:  Mandatory Worker Verification
Part and parcel of securing the border is putting an iron-clad worker verification law in place that harshly punishes the unscrupulous bastards who hire illegal immigrants.  Documented foreigners would be eligible to work, but no longer subject to employer abuse.  

Step 4:  End Birthright Citizenship
Some believe this would require a constitutional amendment, but George Will isn't so sure: 

Appropriately, in 1884 the Supreme Court held that children born to Indian parents were not born "subject to" U.S. jurisdiction because, among other reasons, the person so born could not change his status by his "own will without the action or assent of the United States." And "no one can become a citizen of a nation without its consent."

... this decision "seemed to establish" that U.S. citizenship is "a consensual relation, requiring the consent of the United States."

So: "This would clearly settle the question of birthright citizenship for children of illegal aliens. There cannot be a more total or forceful denial of consent to a person's citizenship than to make the source of that person's presence in the nation illegal."

Step 5:  Provide visas and citizenship opportunities based on the needs of the country
Yes, this would include "amnesty" for some with a stable history of work and home ownership.  But we should not indiscriminately hand out citizenship.  Some merely want to be able to legally come in and out of the country to work and visit family.  They should be issued visas, not given citizenship. 

Steps 1, 3 and 4 will guard against this happening again, since barriers are in place and the major magnets of illegal job opportunities and birthright citizenship have been removed. 

The Easy Way:  Self Deportation
For my friends who disagree and just want them gone, we could implement steps 1 and 3.  Seal the border and bar them from working, and most would self-deport.

Further Reading: RCP - Michael Barone

Plug The Damn Hole!

It's The Big Government, Stupid!

The Crash of 1929 kicked off the great depression and moved the country left.  Now, there appears to be a movement of similar magnitude to the right.  But is it political?

It may be that the movement being seen now is less an ideological statement by Americans and more a reflection of a broad loss of confidence in big institutions, including the government.

To the extent that Democrats are the ones who have offered up government programs as the solution to the nation's recession-induced woes, then they are the ones being hurt more now, because the public simply lacks any deep faith in government's competence to solve those problems.  (Gerald Seib - WSJ)

It's The Big Government, Stupid!

Excellent summation.  Many of us are not so much anti-Democrat as anti-big government, which explains why we aren't letting big government Republicans off the hook either.

FEMA formaldahyde trailers, Wall Street Watchdogs turned porn-surfing horndogs, and now Obama's staged outrage, fecklessly commanding his hapless staff to "Plug the damn hole!"

America, We Have a Problem

It gets worse...

WASHINGTON – Staff members at an agency that oversees offshore drilling accepted tickets to sports events, lunches and other gifts from oil and gas companies and used government computers to view pornography, according to an Interior Department report alleging a culture of cronyism between regulators and the industry. (Yahoo News)  See also WSJ - Regulators Accept Gifts

Yeah, some of it happened on Bush's watch.  So what!  It's the Big Demican-Republicrat, Statist Government, Stupid!  They had no plans to deal with such a catastrophe, no prepositioned assets...  They were literally partying and playing with themselves on our dime, and now this happens.

Plug The Damn Hole?

Yeah!  Plug the damn hole in the US Treasury!

Plug the damn hole that the toxic political lies and BS are spewing out of!

Plug your damn hole and do your damn job!

Dreams of Obama: We're Just Another Country

Screw You, America!

We are no longer respected in the world.  You can argue that it's Bush's fault, but Obama has done nothing to improve our standing. 

Anyone who's lived in a dangerous area knows how people react to the weak and the naive.  The cowardly run away to the bullies' side (some daring to take a jab before running), and the bullies draw their knives and smile.

If Obama had actually ever lived in a bad part of town like his fake biography claims, he would know this.  Maybe he's just ignorant or doesn't understand basic human nature... 

Charles Krauthammer studiously catalogs Obama's global bowing and scraping and apologizing.  He then shines a light on the logical consequences.  His focus is on Turkey and Brazil sticking a thumb in our eye by providing Iran cover to make nuclear weapons, but the article is a great laundry list of Obama's foreign policy blunders:

This is not just an America in decline. This is an America in retreat -- accepting, ratifying and declaring its decline, and inviting rising powers to fill the vacuum.

Given Obama's policies and principles, Turkey and Brazil are acting rationally. Why not give cover to Ahmadinejad and his nuclear ambitions? As the United States retreats in the face of Iran, China, Russia and Venezuela, why not hedge your bets? 

Pray for America
We have at least two and a half more years of this.  If you're a praying person, hit your knees and pray for our country.  This man is an incompetent boob.  Some say he knows exactly what he is doing, but I don't want to even contemplate that.