Kevin Carson's latest paper at Center for a Stateless Society talks about the mutual aide societies that existed in the 19th century and the government intrusions that pushed them out of the market. It also goes into the high overhead costs that current regulations and subsidies create, making healthcare unaffordable for working people, and which recent healthcare "reform" will do little about.
This paper's blurb reads:
"In healthcare, subsidies to the most costly and high-tech forms of medicine crowd out cheaper and decentralized alternatives, so that cheaper forms of treatment—even when perfectly adequate from the consumer’s standpoint—become less and less available."
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Saturday, March 27, 2010
It's What A Man's Gotta Do
My internet habits must always catch up with me in one way or another, and last night when I came home my dad informed me that we don't have anymore internet - again. I'm not the only one who my own habits catch up with. So today I'm here at my favorite tax-subsidized library, typing up my reaction of something I just saw a minute ago.
There's a pamphlet on one of the reference shelves entitled "It's What a Man's Gotta Do". It's a handbook on how to register for the draft. Given that this month is dedicated to the minority that isn't really a minority, I decided that I'll dedicate this post to gender issues that run close to my heart.
When I was in highschool, I was the sole out-of-the-closet conservative among a host of teenage liberals. Now, I actually regret some of the positions I took as a Reagan child. But some of the things I had to put up with really pissed me off at the time. Every single one of my English teachers (they're always the English teachers) was one of these foaming-at-the-mouth femenists who punished me with dreary fictions about women walking naked into the sea and never coming back. The least leftward of them, some Hawaiian-Japanese-American lady who referred to the Renaissance infatuation with Roman paganism as "still superstitious", was all harping about how that women in the 19th century were relegated to the role of procreatrix and home-keeper. She went on about how that women couldn't hold office, couldn't keep even secretarial jobs, and were expected by the prevailing social norms to just get married, make babies, wash clothes, and clean houses. I raised my hand and asked "Well weren't the men expected to work outside of the home?"
The point I wanted to make was that there's more than one victim of gender division. Women had to make babies - true, but men had to breathe in coal dust.
I'll go so far as saying that the most oppressive form of human-made gender discrimination in America today targets men, not women. It's the men who have to, on pain of kidnapping, send in their information to some office with a signed statement saying that they're willing to pick up a gun and go do some killing and possibly get killed themselves for any situation the government deems necessary.
Of course, my solution isn't to force women to register for the draft too. Far be it. The solution I propose is the complete and permanent abolition of the draft. I don't want equal oppression. I want complete and equal liberty. Unfortunately, the position of His Infallible Excellency is equal oppresion.
There's a pamphlet on one of the reference shelves entitled "It's What a Man's Gotta Do". It's a handbook on how to register for the draft. Given that this month is dedicated to the minority that isn't really a minority, I decided that I'll dedicate this post to gender issues that run close to my heart.
When I was in highschool, I was the sole out-of-the-closet conservative among a host of teenage liberals. Now, I actually regret some of the positions I took as a Reagan child. But some of the things I had to put up with really pissed me off at the time. Every single one of my English teachers (they're always the English teachers) was one of these foaming-at-the-mouth femenists who punished me with dreary fictions about women walking naked into the sea and never coming back. The least leftward of them, some Hawaiian-Japanese-American lady who referred to the Renaissance infatuation with Roman paganism as "still superstitious", was all harping about how that women in the 19th century were relegated to the role of procreatrix and home-keeper. She went on about how that women couldn't hold office, couldn't keep even secretarial jobs, and were expected by the prevailing social norms to just get married, make babies, wash clothes, and clean houses. I raised my hand and asked "Well weren't the men expected to work outside of the home?"
The point I wanted to make was that there's more than one victim of gender division. Women had to make babies - true, but men had to breathe in coal dust.
I'll go so far as saying that the most oppressive form of human-made gender discrimination in America today targets men, not women. It's the men who have to, on pain of kidnapping, send in their information to some office with a signed statement saying that they're willing to pick up a gun and go do some killing and possibly get killed themselves for any situation the government deems necessary.
Of course, my solution isn't to force women to register for the draft too. Far be it. The solution I propose is the complete and permanent abolition of the draft. I don't want equal oppression. I want complete and equal liberty. Unfortunately, the position of His Infallible Excellency is equal oppresion.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Big Changes
You may have noticed that things are a bit different here. I'm glad with this change, and I hope you are too. But the aesthetic isn't the only thing that's gonna change. I've been told (again!) that my stuff reads like a mf!n textbook, and that I'm going to have to address conflicts that normal people actually give two shits about. So a topic I'll write about very soon will be the radical libertarian take on food justice. I'll be talking about the government's hand in making good food unavailable to lower-income people, among other things, and about what policies can be introduced to remedy that.
While we're on the topic of change, it was interesting to see all the hooplah about the new legislation. I got invited to a Facebook group that I'm not going to join, not because I actually support health "reform", but because I'm just tired of looking like a stereotypical conservative and fraternizing with stereotypical conservatives. The ones who are all hitting the Facebook status updates (rather than the streets, get it?) are really just talk-show conservatives to the 10th degree. Of all the policies of a bloated government threatening the safety and freedom of its own citizens, they had to wait for healthcare "reform" to roll around before getting this pissed off. Their choice of what to get angry about makes them look like a bunch of greedy white leeches who value their own stuff more than the lives of others.
On the other side of the coin, my comrades on the left are all cheering because now "change" has come. Of course, by "change" nobody means bringing the troops home and rolling back the security state. God forbid we get some change that actually looks different. And what does this make liberalism as a movement look like to me? Like a bunch of greedy multi-colored leeches who value the provision of services more than the lives of others.
While we're on the topic of change, it was interesting to see all the hooplah about the new legislation. I got invited to a Facebook group that I'm not going to join, not because I actually support health "reform", but because I'm just tired of looking like a stereotypical conservative and fraternizing with stereotypical conservatives. The ones who are all hitting the Facebook status updates (rather than the streets, get it?) are really just talk-show conservatives to the 10th degree. Of all the policies of a bloated government threatening the safety and freedom of its own citizens, they had to wait for healthcare "reform" to roll around before getting this pissed off. Their choice of what to get angry about makes them look like a bunch of greedy white leeches who value their own stuff more than the lives of others.
On the other side of the coin, my comrades on the left are all cheering because now "change" has come. Of course, by "change" nobody means bringing the troops home and rolling back the security state. God forbid we get some change that actually looks different. And what does this make liberalism as a movement look like to me? Like a bunch of greedy multi-colored leeches who value the provision of services more than the lives of others.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Saturday, March 20, 2010
C.C., and R.C. Sprowl Jr.
In his latest comment in the conversation I quote in my previous post, C.C. gave a link to this blog, where the author writes that Romans 13 commands obedience not just to government as it ought to be, but to government as it is. "That means governments whose authority is on shaky grounds, as well as governments whose activity is on shaky grounds, if they are the ones in power, are to be submitted to, unless or until they command us to do what God clearly forbids, or forbid us to do what God clearly commands."
What God clearly commands, as C.C. pointed out, is to give up to the government however much money it demands no matter what that government is going to spend it on.
This link doesn't really address the issue I raised, which is that there cannot be a moral duty to fund something that would be immoral to commit.
A few times I've heard people call Christianity a slave religion, and this is one of those areas where I think that name is more than appropriate.
What God clearly commands, as C.C. pointed out, is to give up to the government however much money it demands no matter what that government is going to spend it on.
This link doesn't really address the issue I raised, which is that there cannot be a moral duty to fund something that would be immoral to commit.
A few times I've heard people call Christianity a slave religion, and this is one of those areas where I think that name is more than appropriate.
Thursday, March 18, 2010
A Facebook Comments Conversation on the Census, God, Tax Resistance, etc.
[as a status update] J.R.B.: Does anyone know if you actually have to fill out the Census (i.e., did you or someone you know get in trouble for not filling it out in 2000)?
[after a couple comments about fines] C.C.: Yes (I Peter 2:13).
X: Constitutionally, they are only allowed to ask you how many are in your household. But the law means nothing to lawless men.
They're training people to go to households that don't respond to all of the questions to ask them in person. They've sent a letter to our church requesting the use of the building to train these "enumerators." If they don't get the answers they want, they'll starting issuing the fines mentioned above. I'm not sure how efficient the process will be (like how many people will actually get visits and/or fines), but that's what the threats are this time around.
Me: I don't know if 1 Peter 2:13 applies to the coerced surrender of information.
I actually applied to work in the Census. I took the application test, which could have been aced by an 8th grader, and then decided that working in a project that empowers a government with information on its citizens would violate my convictions. The job would have been exactly as X describes. I don't know what was going through my head, I was already an anarchist by then. I guess unemployment + student debt does things to people. There are a few things worse than unemployment, and working in the Census would be one of them.
C.C.: Isaiah, considering the context of I Peter (i.e., the apostle is writing to people who have been driven from their homes by a violently hostile government), I think we can fairly say that if they were called to submit to that government, it goes without question that we can answer some inane questions on a form.
I don't believe all of the questions asked are constitutional, so on a civic level I'm appalled by the current census; however, as a Christian, I'm not sinning by answering questions the government has no business asking, so I have no business resisting those whom God has placed over me (cf. Romans 13:1-6).
J.R.B.: I, honestly, don't know what I'm going to do with my form right now. I'll probably just completely fill it out, and turn it in. Not so much in a Romans 13 way; just in a 'I don't want to get hassled way.' I'm pretty sure God likes civil disobedience at times, but I don't think the Census is where I'm going to make my stand. It's just not that important to me.
Me: C.C., that was a good point you raised about the context, which is why I wonder why passages like these were put in the Bible in the first place.
I think the point you were trying to make by bringing up the 1 Peter verse wasn't so much that we're *not* sinning by anwering questions the government has no business asking, but that we *are* sinning *against God* by refusing to answer those questions. That looks like an uncomfortable position for freedom-loving Christians to take, since (a) it conflates morality with obedience, and (b) it draws no line in the sand to show where we may and should stop obeying.
If Romans 13:1-6 and 1 Peter 2:13 mean we have a God-given duty to answer some inane questions on a form, then they also mean we have a God-given duty to pay for abortions, since the Federal government subsidizes those with our tax dollars, and we are to render tribute to whom tribute is due.
Or maybe I'm misunderstanding something...
C.C.: Isaiah, I think that even though all of the Bible was written in a certain context that almost always differs from our own, we can still fairly and confidently draw out principles that apply to us. That's why even though we're certainly in a better situation than the people to whom Peter and Paul wrote, it's not unfair or inaccurate to look at the heart of what they're saying and apply it to ourselves. I think we really can look at the very different situation in which the apostles and the early church found themselves and still learn a lot from it.
You do understand what I'm saying about I Peter, but I'm not sure I understand your objections. As to the first one, of course there is a close relationship between the concepts of morality and obedience for Christians; I'm not sure why anybody would want to obey something they consider immoral. If obedience is the commanded "default" reaction of Christians to their government (which I believe these passages assert), then obedience is the moral requirement. Secondly, other passages in the Bible do give us examples where it is the moral imperative to "obey God rather than men" (Acts 5:29). However, these are certainly the exception to the rule.
Again, looking to the contexts of the passages shows that disobedience is wrong in this case. Romans 13 specifically points out that Christians are required to pay taxes (v. 6), and that was to a government which was actively persecuting and murdering Christians. The tax money they were compelled to pay went toward paying for crosses and keeping wild animals, but they were still compelled to pay them. As detestable as abortion is, it doesn't trump the policies which the early church faced, and they still had to pay.
Me: So if I interpreted those verses correctly, and I think you're saying I did, they mean that Christians have a God-given duty to give money to someone who they know for sure will spend that money on things that are flat out immoral.
C.L.: Depends on the context. If those irresponsible and immoral people are the civil government, and that money is in the form of taxes, yes, that's what I'm saying.
I don't think the Bible forbids civil disobedience in every instance. The fact that our government is a form of democracy means that we as a people have the ability to overthrow the government simply by voting bad leaders out. As I've already pointed out, the government which makes demands of Christians that would be sinful to keep (e.g., worshiping other gods, not gathering together to worship, not praying, not evangelizing, not teaching their children the faith) must not be obeyed in those instance because obedience to the government would be disobedience to God.
At the same time, disobedience and disrespect for the civil authorities (including those appointed by the chief of state) in non-essential matters (e.g., taxes and censuses) are disobedience and disrespect for the God who sovereignly placed them in their position (again, cf. Romans 13:1-7, I Peter 2:13-25). Peter makes it clear that the heart of this command is for Christians to do the right thing (here, showing honor and respect) even if it is to our detriment, just as Christ "did the right[eous] thing" by taking on and paying the debt for sinners who did not and could never deserve it. In fact, he explicitly says that the oppressed Christians of his day were to "honor the emperor" (I Peter 2:17) who was actively trying to wipe every one of them out. As terribly as the authorities may use our tax money, we do not sin by "pay[ing] to all what is owed them" (Romans 13:7).
Me: I don't see how a government mandate to fund murder is much less repugnant than a government mandate to burn incense in front of a statue.
I should be clear that I'm not so much saying that we sin when we pay our taxes as I am saying this: that the payment for an unwarranted abortion is a payment for murder, that informed payment for murder is participation in it, that an enforced mandate to pay for an unwarranted abortion is coercion to participate in murder, that no lover of life would pretend that we have some *moral* obligation to participate in murder, and that the only obligation we have to participate is duty "only for wrath," and not "for conscience sake". Don't get me wrong - I'm not saying it's all your fault if someone forced you to do it or pay for it. But I am saying that it's totally incoherrent to say that it's wrong to do it and then say that we have a God-given duty to pay for it. If it's a sin to do it, then there can't be a moral duty to pay for it.
So no, refusing to pay up to someone who you know is going to spend your money on murder is not disrespectful. I also don't see what's so disrespectful about refusing to answer a list of intrusive questions.
I might update this post if C.C. responds to my last comment, but judging on the way these things go, I think this conversation is pretty much - shall we say - completed.
[after a couple comments about fines] C.C.: Yes (I Peter 2:13).
X: Constitutionally, they are only allowed to ask you how many are in your household. But the law means nothing to lawless men.
They're training people to go to households that don't respond to all of the questions to ask them in person. They've sent a letter to our church requesting the use of the building to train these "enumerators." If they don't get the answers they want, they'll starting issuing the fines mentioned above. I'm not sure how efficient the process will be (like how many people will actually get visits and/or fines), but that's what the threats are this time around.
Me: I don't know if 1 Peter 2:13 applies to the coerced surrender of information.
I actually applied to work in the Census. I took the application test, which could have been aced by an 8th grader, and then decided that working in a project that empowers a government with information on its citizens would violate my convictions. The job would have been exactly as X describes. I don't know what was going through my head, I was already an anarchist by then. I guess unemployment + student debt does things to people. There are a few things worse than unemployment, and working in the Census would be one of them.
C.C.: Isaiah, considering the context of I Peter (i.e., the apostle is writing to people who have been driven from their homes by a violently hostile government), I think we can fairly say that if they were called to submit to that government, it goes without question that we can answer some inane questions on a form.
I don't believe all of the questions asked are constitutional, so on a civic level I'm appalled by the current census; however, as a Christian, I'm not sinning by answering questions the government has no business asking, so I have no business resisting those whom God has placed over me (cf. Romans 13:1-6).
J.R.B.: I, honestly, don't know what I'm going to do with my form right now. I'll probably just completely fill it out, and turn it in. Not so much in a Romans 13 way; just in a 'I don't want to get hassled way.' I'm pretty sure God likes civil disobedience at times, but I don't think the Census is where I'm going to make my stand. It's just not that important to me.
Me: C.C., that was a good point you raised about the context, which is why I wonder why passages like these were put in the Bible in the first place.
I think the point you were trying to make by bringing up the 1 Peter verse wasn't so much that we're *not* sinning by anwering questions the government has no business asking, but that we *are* sinning *against God* by refusing to answer those questions. That looks like an uncomfortable position for freedom-loving Christians to take, since (a) it conflates morality with obedience, and (b) it draws no line in the sand to show where we may and should stop obeying.
If Romans 13:1-6 and 1 Peter 2:13 mean we have a God-given duty to answer some inane questions on a form, then they also mean we have a God-given duty to pay for abortions, since the Federal government subsidizes those with our tax dollars, and we are to render tribute to whom tribute is due.
Or maybe I'm misunderstanding something...
C.C.: Isaiah, I think that even though all of the Bible was written in a certain context that almost always differs from our own, we can still fairly and confidently draw out principles that apply to us. That's why even though we're certainly in a better situation than the people to whom Peter and Paul wrote, it's not unfair or inaccurate to look at the heart of what they're saying and apply it to ourselves. I think we really can look at the very different situation in which the apostles and the early church found themselves and still learn a lot from it.
You do understand what I'm saying about I Peter, but I'm not sure I understand your objections. As to the first one, of course there is a close relationship between the concepts of morality and obedience for Christians; I'm not sure why anybody would want to obey something they consider immoral. If obedience is the commanded "default" reaction of Christians to their government (which I believe these passages assert), then obedience is the moral requirement. Secondly, other passages in the Bible do give us examples where it is the moral imperative to "obey God rather than men" (Acts 5:29). However, these are certainly the exception to the rule.
Again, looking to the contexts of the passages shows that disobedience is wrong in this case. Romans 13 specifically points out that Christians are required to pay taxes (v. 6), and that was to a government which was actively persecuting and murdering Christians. The tax money they were compelled to pay went toward paying for crosses and keeping wild animals, but they were still compelled to pay them. As detestable as abortion is, it doesn't trump the policies which the early church faced, and they still had to pay.
Me: So if I interpreted those verses correctly, and I think you're saying I did, they mean that Christians have a God-given duty to give money to someone who they know for sure will spend that money on things that are flat out immoral.
C.L.: Depends on the context. If those irresponsible and immoral people are the civil government, and that money is in the form of taxes, yes, that's what I'm saying.
I don't think the Bible forbids civil disobedience in every instance. The fact that our government is a form of democracy means that we as a people have the ability to overthrow the government simply by voting bad leaders out. As I've already pointed out, the government which makes demands of Christians that would be sinful to keep (e.g., worshiping other gods, not gathering together to worship, not praying, not evangelizing, not teaching their children the faith) must not be obeyed in those instance because obedience to the government would be disobedience to God.
At the same time, disobedience and disrespect for the civil authorities (including those appointed by the chief of state) in non-essential matters (e.g., taxes and censuses) are disobedience and disrespect for the God who sovereignly placed them in their position (again, cf. Romans 13:1-7, I Peter 2:13-25). Peter makes it clear that the heart of this command is for Christians to do the right thing (here, showing honor and respect) even if it is to our detriment, just as Christ "did the right[eous] thing" by taking on and paying the debt for sinners who did not and could never deserve it. In fact, he explicitly says that the oppressed Christians of his day were to "honor the emperor" (I Peter 2:17) who was actively trying to wipe every one of them out. As terribly as the authorities may use our tax money, we do not sin by "pay[ing] to all what is owed them" (Romans 13:7).
Me: I don't see how a government mandate to fund murder is much less repugnant than a government mandate to burn incense in front of a statue.
I should be clear that I'm not so much saying that we sin when we pay our taxes as I am saying this: that the payment for an unwarranted abortion is a payment for murder, that informed payment for murder is participation in it, that an enforced mandate to pay for an unwarranted abortion is coercion to participate in murder, that no lover of life would pretend that we have some *moral* obligation to participate in murder, and that the only obligation we have to participate is duty "only for wrath," and not "for conscience sake". Don't get me wrong - I'm not saying it's all your fault if someone forced you to do it or pay for it. But I am saying that it's totally incoherrent to say that it's wrong to do it and then say that we have a God-given duty to pay for it. If it's a sin to do it, then there can't be a moral duty to pay for it.
So no, refusing to pay up to someone who you know is going to spend your money on murder is not disrespectful. I also don't see what's so disrespectful about refusing to answer a list of intrusive questions.
I might update this post if C.C. responds to my last comment, but judging on the way these things go, I think this conversation is pretty much - shall we say - completed.
Friday, March 12, 2010
Garrett Roth Discusses Use and Occupancy
This isn't the whole lecture, unfortunately, but it does say a bit about the Use and Occupancy condition. It is nice to hear anarcho-capitalists admit the libertarianness of it.
I could save this next topic for a different post, but I'll address it here too. Some people point to the American Indians getting run off their land by white men who quote Locke, and question why the labor-mixing standard should be used anyway. My answer is two-fold: first, if people aren't entitled to the full product of their labor, then they don't own their labor, and they are slaves. So any notion of ownership that does not regard labor is going to be an apology for enslavement (and you will have some notion of ownership). Secondly, there are only two standards for ownership: one recognizes the last receiver of a chain of voluntary transfers going back to the original appropriator (the one who mixed his labor with it) as the legitimate owner; the other does things this way.
I could save this next topic for a different post, but I'll address it here too. Some people point to the American Indians getting run off their land by white men who quote Locke, and question why the labor-mixing standard should be used anyway. My answer is two-fold: first, if people aren't entitled to the full product of their labor, then they don't own their labor, and they are slaves. So any notion of ownership that does not regard labor is going to be an apology for enslavement (and you will have some notion of ownership). Secondly, there are only two standards for ownership: one recognizes the last receiver of a chain of voluntary transfers going back to the original appropriator (the one who mixed his labor with it) as the legitimate owner; the other does things this way.
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Elinor Ostrom
I was watching this video of Sheldon Richman that makes a good summary of the "left-libertarian" side of the label debate, and I came upon this name that I'm sure I'll be paying a lot more attention to: Elinor Ostrom.
She wrote quite a few books about bottom-up management of common resources, among them Governing the Commons.
A list of a whole lot of her works can be found at her Curriculum Vitae.
She wrote quite a few books about bottom-up management of common resources, among them Governing the Commons.
A list of a whole lot of her works can be found at her Curriculum Vitae.
Saturday, March 6, 2010
Three Thousand Plus and Counting...
I'm way behind in the essay that's due, so I thought I should give an update on my progress. I have been working on it, maybe too much, and as of now I'm at 3,860 words. Single-spaced and at 12-font Times New Roman on 8.5x11'' paper, it's 6 pages exact. That's about twice as long as the typical paper I did in college. The more relevant difference between this paper and the ones I wrote for college is that I actually enjoy writing this one.
I'm maybe less than half-way done with it.
I'm maybe less than half-way done with it.
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
More On the Falklands
On Sunday I made this video in response to an LRC blog post by Christopher Manion, and got some comments by a couple Brits (I'm inferring they're Brits) who are noticeably concerned over my statement that the people of the U.S. have no obligation to foreign governments. Apparently, saying that the Falkland islanders are British subjects and that Argentina has no rightful claim over the islands just wasn't enough for these two.
It seems that Brits like these two want the U.S. government to, at the very least, stand up and say on behalf of every single individual who resides within the U.S. that "the people of the United States" believe the Falklands belong to the UK and not Argentina. You see, my words, as representative of the views of one single American individual, are not official enough to count. The opinions of persons are irrelevant unless they are ascribed onto everyone else and published as "the opinion" (singular) of "a people" (again, singular).
Christopher Manion posted another blog entry in which he claims that "the British press continues to go bananas" at the sudden realization that the United States government isn't exactly at the UK's beck and call. At the end of his post he excerpts a comment that Howard Baker left on the online article. The comment is pasted in its entirety below.
"The United States of America has to entertain this ‘Special Relationship,’ not approved by our senate, and which has not been put into a treaty, and not even been publicly debated, why? We have to clean up your mess, because you don’t want to let go of some distant islands? We have committed some great transgression for not wanting to wipe your bottoms with our army? Laughable!
"Don’t get me wrong; they shouldn’t necessarily go to the Argentinians. If geography dictated which land should belong to whom, Argentina would have a good claim over Chile.
"The Brits our are friends, but so are the Argentinians (or they all should be). And we side with our friends. And in case you didn’t notice, we have our own problems to deal with. There is more to the United States than that of a personal army you direct toward your enemy. We send billions of dollars to Israel while American veterans eat of dumpsters (an unfortunate reality I suspect all of Europe will soon awaken to.) Our government will only get involved if there are assets to be secured, namely oil or uranium. Certainly not because of some fabled ’special relationship.’
"'I cannot think of a move by Washington that could do more harm at this time to the Anglo-American Special Relationship'
"What special relationship? When we feel like invading yet another country in the Mideast, we will call on you as our old-world trojan horse. We are not friends; you are the dog, and we are the master. It’s not a friendly statement, and I take no pride in expressing it, but you know it’s true. Don’t pout like a child when we don’t rush to your defense. The Argentinians booting you out of the Falklands and you sitting in bewilderment with your thumbs up your 'arses' is precisely the lesson you deserve."
It seems that Brits like these two want the U.S. government to, at the very least, stand up and say on behalf of every single individual who resides within the U.S. that "the people of the United States" believe the Falklands belong to the UK and not Argentina. You see, my words, as representative of the views of one single American individual, are not official enough to count. The opinions of persons are irrelevant unless they are ascribed onto everyone else and published as "the opinion" (singular) of "a people" (again, singular).
Christopher Manion posted another blog entry in which he claims that "the British press continues to go bananas" at the sudden realization that the United States government isn't exactly at the UK's beck and call. At the end of his post he excerpts a comment that Howard Baker left on the online article. The comment is pasted in its entirety below.
"The United States of America has to entertain this ‘Special Relationship,’ not approved by our senate, and which has not been put into a treaty, and not even been publicly debated, why? We have to clean up your mess, because you don’t want to let go of some distant islands? We have committed some great transgression for not wanting to wipe your bottoms with our army? Laughable!
"Don’t get me wrong; they shouldn’t necessarily go to the Argentinians. If geography dictated which land should belong to whom, Argentina would have a good claim over Chile.
"The Brits our are friends, but so are the Argentinians (or they all should be). And we side with our friends. And in case you didn’t notice, we have our own problems to deal with. There is more to the United States than that of a personal army you direct toward your enemy. We send billions of dollars to Israel while American veterans eat of dumpsters (an unfortunate reality I suspect all of Europe will soon awaken to.) Our government will only get involved if there are assets to be secured, namely oil or uranium. Certainly not because of some fabled ’special relationship.’
"'I cannot think of a move by Washington that could do more harm at this time to the Anglo-American Special Relationship'
"What special relationship? When we feel like invading yet another country in the Mideast, we will call on you as our old-world trojan horse. We are not friends; you are the dog, and we are the master. It’s not a friendly statement, and I take no pride in expressing it, but you know it’s true. Don’t pout like a child when we don’t rush to your defense. The Argentinians booting you out of the Falklands and you sitting in bewilderment with your thumbs up your 'arses' is precisely the lesson you deserve."
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About Me
- Isaiah
- I am a part-time philosopher and a former immigration paralegal with a BA in philosophy and a paralegal certificate from UC San Diego.