Thursday, December 31, 2009

The Fractured Fairy Tales of the Left

Just as the craziest people are those who don't realize they are, the most myth-bound people are those who imagine they're not living one. Scratch the surface of a typical leftist or secular fundamentalist, and you will find that their first principles take the form of an unexamined mythological narrative that is not so much childlike as childish.

Unlike genuine myth, these are not subject to growth, in part because these types of individuals are alienated from the mythic imagination to begin with (except in its romantic or diabolic forms). Therefore, their narrative remains "frozen," as it were, which is why they do not learn, and keep applying the same mistaken "solutions" over and over. The deep structure of their titanic narrative doesn't change, only the dreck chairs of policy.

Consider the Judeo-Christian myth, the arc of historical salvation of which our culture is an expression. This myth is so extraordinarily fruitful, that it has been nurturing souls and subject to commentary and elaboration for thousands of years; and yet, we're still no closer to exhausting it.

But what of the meager myth of Marxism, of the proletariat overturning the order of the world and remaking man? That myth was already decadent the moment it dropped into the world and filled Marx's adult diaper. And yet, new versions of it continue to haunt mankind, since this delusional myth has nothing to offer except seduction, hypnosis, and a warped and displaced hope. Truly, it is Christianity inverted.

Kirk writes that liberalism finds "its popular support in myth, but in myth distorted." What is this myth? And what are its elements? They can be difficult to recognize, for the liberal is forever lying about them. Because of the basic split in their psyche, they are literally incapable of intellectual honesty, which is why it is so frustrating trying to have a trans-rational conversation with them. You know the drill. And the teeth it goes into.

In this regard, it is no different than trying to have a rational conversation with a patient about their particular neurosis, or fixation, or trauma. As soon as you approach it, it is as if the alarms go off, and your plane is barraged by a hail of flack from the antiaircraft defenses. Either that, or the ground goes wobbly beneath you, and you enter a parallel universe of symmetrical logic, in which the person can slip like Houdini out of affirmations they made just a moment ago.

I wish had time to provide a more explicit clinical example of this process, for it's actually rather fascinating. Allan Schore discusses this in his books, and provides verbatim transcripts of what happens when the clinician approaches the "disorganizing core" of the personality. What makes things more challenging is that the person unconsciously attempts to entrain your brain into the jagged rhythm of their own, so that you begin to experience confusion and fragmentation as well.

It is very much the opposite of what occurs during "synchronous" moments of bonding and attachment between mother and infant:

"In terms of self-organization theory, the mutual entrainment of their right brains during moments of affect synchrony triggers and amplifies energy flow, which allows for a coherence of organization that sustains more complex states within both the infant's and mother's right brains. In fact, evidence indicates that the organization of the mother's brain is also being influenced by these relational transactions," to such an extent that there is actually "increased dendritic growth in the mother's brain" (Schore). So that pressure you feel in your head when you read these post is not just the shakti acting up, but a result of the neurons looking for elbow room in your cramped skull.

Now just imagine this synchronous and eunomic brain-to-brain transaction, and invert it. You will have noticed that the trolls always imagine I'm "arguing," when I'm only communicating -- or resonating -- in this direct brain-to-brain (or soul to soul) manner. But the things I communicate, instead of being synchronous with their own deep structure, provoke something that agitates and disturbs them. Let's call it, oh, I don't know, "truth."

Because of the vertical disconnect between the mythic imagination and transcendent sphere of permanent truth, the liberal is capable of creativity, but the creativity will be analogous to the bacteria that overflows from a petrie dish but goes nowhere.

You might say that it is Darwinism without evolution -- which is precisely what metaphysical Darwinism is, i.e., mere horizontal change with no telos, no purpose, no meaning. The Darwinian world is like the vast wasteland of television, in which there is a kind of protean variety that is simultaneously infinite and yet empty and meaningless, for it is merely the variety of bacterial and viral adaptations. There are so many ways to adapt to a world without light or air!

One of the core elements of the liberal myth is that humans are endowed with "rights." However, since they reject the transcendent realm that grounds and sanctions these rights, they ultimately -- and quickly -- reduce to raw power. A genuine right -- say, the right to free speech -- does not impinge upon anyone else's right. Furthermore, there is no right in the absence of a corresponding duty or obligation. But a liberal "right" is always another citizen's obligation.

I would like to ask the liberal: you say you have a "right" to free healthcare. Who or what conferred this right? And what are its corresponding duties?

But you soon realize that when the liberal says "right" he means "entitlement," and entitlements do not come with responsibilities. For example, my son is entitled to our love, guidance, and protection, but he doesn't owe us for it. His only duty is to be a child. It's truly a free launch, the only one you get in your life.

Unless you fall for the myth of liberalism. And even then, it's not really free. It just goes on the tab of the collective parent. The sad -- and truly unjust -- thing is that most of the debtors are just children now, but they'll spend the rest of their lives paying for the entitlements of the present dysfunctional adult babies of the left. This is the ultimate inversion: babies caring for the parents.

Real myths are free (and freeing). But the false ones are always paid for with someone else's blood and treasure. A reality denied comes to rule those who deny it. But do they have to take the rest of us with them?

53 comments:

jp said...

Bob says:

"Unless you fall for the myth of liberalism. And even then, it's not really free. It just goes on the tab of the collective parents. The sad -- and truly unfair-- thing is that most of the debtors are just children now, but they'll spend the rest of their lives paying for the entitlements of the present adult babies of the left."

Maybe a corresponding myth is that the debt will actually be paid back.

My guess is that a ton of the debt is going to debt heaven and that process is going to be extremely unpleasant.

It's a giant game of "let's pretend."

walt said...

I recall hearing an interview in 2008 with Myron Rolle, a star football player at Florida State, who qualified as a Rhodes Scholar and decided to go to Oxford rather than coming out for the NFL Draft. He was considered to be a potential high pick, so the storyline was that he was passing up millions in order to continue his education.

Since his field of study involved medicine, the interviewer got around to asking his opinion about Healthcare. He said that he was all for Obamacare, that healthcare was without question - "most definitely" - a right and that no one should be denied it.

A "result" of higher education.

Anonymous said...

Bob, on one level I get what you are trying to say about the libs.

I've run into the strange illogic you encountered.

I used to hunt for squirrels and the like; my family found this shameful and barbaric.

Quite a few people out here in coastal California think hunting is some kind of perversion of the soul.

Yet clearly even beeve cows have to be put down before they are cut up for use. So? What gives?

I think the objection is the thrill of killing. Because killing IS thrilling. There is no way around it. Placing the shot is a rush. It is fascinating to see life suddenly removed, and by your hand. It gives you some kind of connection with..something.

And yet, I used to hunt. Because as a soul ages and wizens, it becomes apparent that if there is beeve to be had and money in the wallet, then there is no need to shoot the animal.

Unless, that is, you want the thrill of the kill. And that thrill, in the final analysis, is...I must admit it...shameful and somewhat of a perversion.

In the same sense that someone who likes, say, some kind of nasty fetish.

Not needed for reproduction, but done for the thrill alone.

The mature soul, using Coonsvision, can see what's wrong.

Hunting when a food animal is already cut up and available turns out to be wrong.

How many hunters among the Raccoons?

I'm guessing not a one.

So in the end (but for the wrong reasons?) the liberals were correct.

It was humbling.

My takehome message here is, Bob, are you sure you are digging deep enough in your analysis?

Is Obama such a bad prez?

Are Americans really so mythologically challenged? Are they really bacteria on a Petri dish?

Would you be willing to go door-to-door in your neighborhood and notify some of your brethren they have no true creativity, and are susceptible to Ampicillin?

I mean, check yourself, sirrah. You do run the pen something ferocious.

Anonymous said...

Oh, you don't argue, you just "resonate". How nice for you. What's the frequency Kenneth? I guess my role is to put some discordant notes into your harmonic convergence.

I would like to ask the liberal: you say you have a "right" to free healthcare. Who or what conferred this right? And what are its corresponding duties? But you soon realize that when the liberal says "right" he means "entitlement," and entitlements do not come with responsibilities.

What nonsense. It's quite obvious to all liberals that the right to healthcare involves a concomitant duty to pay for it via taxes (or in the current half-assed scheme on the table, compulsory insurance premiums).

You may believe that healthcare is not a right, and that government should not be involved in the area at all. There are perfectly legitimate arguments that do not involve gross distortions of the opposing position. You must not really have faith in your own beliefs if you have to resort to such transparent tactics. But then, you don't argue, you resonate. Whatever you are vibrating to, it isn't truth, or it wouldn't produce such obvious lies.

Gagdad Bob said...

" the right to healthcare involves a concomitant duty to pay for it via taxes"

I see. Your duty is to compel me at gunpoint through the medium of the State to pay for your healthcare. I think we agree.

Cousin Dupree said...

Found at American Digest -- just remember: "The people calling for Rush Limbaugh to die are the same people who ask to control your healthcare."

Stephen Macdonald said...

Off-topic quick question:

Bob or other coons, have you read any David Bentley Hart? Racoonmended?

Gagdad Bob said...

He strikes me as being rather turgid and weighted with that leaden academicspeak that renders simple things convoluted. Just from the samples I've read. But the samples made me not want to investigate further.

Anonymous said...

Try resonating with what I actually said.

The government taxes its citizens (at gunpoint) to pay for all sorts of things -- roads, fire departments, food inspection, public libraries, scientific research, schools, a huge military. None of those are "free" -- taxpayers fund all of them. For any of those, it is possible to argue rationally that the government should not be involved in the delivery of that good. Maybe it's not a legitimate use of government, maybe the private sector could do a better job. But that's not what you are doing.

And how do you know that it's going to be you paying for my healthcare? It could very well be the other way around. In our current system, medical bankruptcy can strike anyone, any time, excepting only the very wealthy.

Warren said...

NB,

Don't know about Bob, but David Bentley Hart comes highly recommended by me at least, FWIW. I would especially recommend "Atheist Delusions" (on how our modern concept of the individual human being was created by Christianity) and "The Doors of the Sea" (on Christian theodicy).

"The Beauty of the Infinite" is a great book as well, but you'd better put on some heavy wading boots if you're going to tackle that one.

Cousin Dupree said...

None of the things you mentioned are "rights." Besides, the federal government has no rights, only powers. But the ones you mentioned are legitimate powers (at least at the state level), whereas there is nothing in the Constitution that gives the federal government the power to regulate what goes on between me and my trusted physician, Dr. Quackenbush.

Warren said...

NB,

Re Bob's comment on David Bentley Hart's writing style - he's correct about that. But what he forgot to add is that DBH is also brilliant.

I rather enjoy DBH's turgid style, myself, since it's often employed to express snark, but that's a personal taste of mine. I can easily see how Bob got the impression he did. YMMV

Stephen Macdonald said...

Hunting: I hunted when younger. Was never enthusiastic. Would only do it now if I needed the food. (i.e., if the Shiite really hits the fan in next 20 years).

Stephen Macdonald said...

Warren/Bob:

I read one of his posts at First Things. He essentially disembowels Dawkins with relish. The turgid style I may be able to deal with if there's more of that blood sport to come.

I ordered Atheist Delusions from Amazon in any event, so will see how that goes.

Ephrem Antony Gray said...

There's a difference between a general agreement that there should be some kind of public healthcare - whether it be simply a fund like medicare or a government run healthcare - and the notion of it as a 'right'. We do not have a right to roads, but we for the most part are willing to pay to have them around. If roads went up 10x in cost, we might decide that it wasn't something we'd agree to pay for.

By dubbing something a 'right' we're completely misusing the language and thought of the constitution and other such documents. We do not have a right to schooling. We do not have a right to water or power.

The point of the whole operation is to make the simpler folks - who by the way probably either need help with medical bills or would if they had significant ones - think that they are being denied not a possible service for which we need to weigh the costs and benefits such as roads, water, power, etc, but a right which must be theirs and who are these unjust people who are keeping them from it?

Quite simply it is a kind of political power play; it would be the same if you heard Wall Street folks claiming they had a right to government-paid yachts or trips to the Riviera. Sure, we might decide at one time that putting them all on a boat and sinking it or sending them on permanent vacation could benefit the country, it is by no means a right.

It may be argued out from our declaration which says "Right to life, liberty & pursuit of happiness" - but last I saw, those three ain't on the books, kna'm'sayin'.

Stephen Macdonald said...

Re health care, some conservatives seem to think that there is a pure market solution here. Well yes and no. A pure market solution would essentially mean that rich people would get excellent health care and the poor would get very little. That's the way it is today with consumer goods, but we don't care so much because nobody really needs a Bentley, much less a 60" TV. The closest things in comparison would be food, clothing and shelter, however we've already covered those 100% for even the poorest of the poor in the West. Not so, health care. Cancer treatments get better and better, but also more and more expensive (I spent most of 2008/09 consulting to one of the biggest pharma corps). Costs do come down over time, but the drug someone might need right now at $27,000 per month which could mean the difference between life and death would be totally beyond the means of most Americans, but a minor expense for the top million or so wealthiest people. There is no simple answer to all this unless you really do believe that the system should just allow the best medical care to go to the wealthiest, and that everyone else will eventually benefit from trickle-down (as with cars -- a Corolla today is as safe as a 1990 Mercedes S Class, more or less).

Pure socialism as in Canada/UK certainly is not the answer. The current US system actually works remarkably well over all. America spends as much on a GDP basis on socialist medicine as does Canada (~10%) but also far more on private medicine.

I don't really see how it is possible to avoid a mixed public/private system.

walt said...

"...you will find that their first principles take the form of an unexamined mythological narrative..."

Back in the Clinton years, the '90s, the business buzz was all about the "Information Age," and how it bred a "Service Economy." In part, this new economy meant that, for a lot of folks, they didn't really have to know how to "do" anything, but they could earn a pretty good living just moving and shuffling stuff around - plus "showing up," of course.

This worked well for many businesses, as everybody became intertwined and dependent on everyone else. And businesses noticed: people liked being served!

In previous posts, Bob has drawn the distinctions about "freedom for" and "freedom to". It seems to me that the Service Economy gives many people a lot of freedom to, and they like it. It soothes them, in its way. Stuff comes to them, and it's far easier to pay for it than to make it, or do it themselves. Sure, a raft of other people determine many of the details of their lives, but in a modern, secular, urbane, "cosmopolitan" society, er, who cares and so what?

Mmm ... well, maybe the person who is concerned about freedom for? He or she may hold liberty and freedom as a first principle, or as one of the Highest Values ... or at least as one of the most useful of qualities. Such principles have no relevance to a service-based person, and can be brushed aside as "a side issue." It's very common in business to hear that an independent sort needs "to get with the program."

In California, the legal basis for divorce is "irreconcilable differences." I suspect that the people wanting freedom to and the people wanting freedom for are unlikely to ever agree.

Joan of Argghh! said...

The more I witness the debacle of Environmentalism and all other attempts at the commie-social "isms" the more I am convinced that L. Ron Hubbard had the drop on the real motivation behind the myths. His genius, however, was in making it irresistible to ego maniacs with money. He raked it in with no obligation to any redistribution in order to assure his "re-election." In that sense, Scientology has been a less harmful myth than most.

And it keeps Tom Cruise off the streets, so, there's that.

Stephen Macdonald said...

Walt:

What happens in the next 5-10 years will determine whether these questions are for Americans moot. Approximately 0% of the gargantuan Daily Show audience cares a whit about the recent amendment to Executive Order 12425.

It's really hard to see how America can endure in anything resembling her traditional form much longer. It isn't that the American people are doing anything particularly unusual: they are simply decaying to the level of every other nation on earth. The typical American liberal thinks life in Holland is vastly superior to that in the US. Unless the Tea Party movement results in a truly massive change in the public (it would have to be a considerably bigger shift than under Reagan) then freedom will erode quite rapidly for Americans, just as it has radically where I currently am in Canada. Indeed, as move back and forth between my places in Canada and Massachusetts it gets harder and harder to really tell much difference. Canadians have changed radically in 50 years. Americans have too, although not quite as much yet. However the rate of change for the worse is now considerably greater in the US than in Canada. Canada has arrested the free-fall into socialism/soft fascism (UK has not) while in America it is picking up steam at an alarming rate.

One thing I can tell you: no Canadian Prime Minister would subvert the Canadian Constitution by allowing Interpol free reign in this country the way Obama just did in the US. It's getting scary.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous 9:34, Walt, NB, RC: Very good, very balanced and thoughful comments today on the healthcare/taxation debate and the service economy and the rhetoric of entitlement . I gained useful information here. I feel GDB is in the company of able counselors.

9:34 makes a valid point about taxation and services: the people decide what they will pay for. If GDB doesn't like the will of the people in deciding to pay taxes for healthcare, he can bewail it but he must go with the majority. There is no choice. It will do him no good to complain.

NB debunks, and convincingly, the notion that free-market medicine is a valid choice. Americans don't want lassaiz-faire capitalism, and that's that. End of story.

RC analyzes the spin on the word "right." There is, of course, no right to healthcare. Its a pay for service thing like anything else.

Walt puts his fingers on one of the prime movers behind the US movement towards more taxatation for more services--the service economy, in which life is just a little "too" easy, and entitlement gets to seem real.

And I will add, I've yet to meet a Raccoon, online or in person, who was not formerly a musician, a liberal, or both. Now how to explain that one, Mr. Van?

Perhaps the similarities run deeper than the differences?

Hmmmm?

walt said...

One of the problems with leaving comments on the internet is the risk of being misunderstood -- or equally (ahem) not making oneself clear.

The fact that Anon could "read" my previous comment so benevolently gave me the clue that I had failed to make myself perfectly clear, as the Prez is wont to say.

So, here 'tis:
I, myself, value freedom for, as a first principle. If my comment implied otherwise, then "my bad." Witnessing is not assenting.

Dang, I hate s'plainin' myself!

debass said...

I'm still a musician and have always been a conservative.

About the time our original thirteen states adopted their new constitution in 1787, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years earlier:
“A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government.”
“A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury.” or in the words of Robert A. Heinlein, “When the people find out that they can vote themselves Cake & Champagne and force you to pay for it, they will.”
“From that moment on, the majority always vote for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.”
“The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years”
“During those 200 years, those nations always progressed through the following sequence:
1. from bondage to spiritual faith;
2. from spiritual faith to great courage;
3. from courage to liberty;
4. from liberty to abundance;
5. from abundance to complacency; America’s sheeple today (mostly identified as Liberals)
6 . from complacency to apathy;
7. from apathy to dependence;
8. from dependence back into bondage”

Where are we?

NoMo said...

Is it not twistedly entertaining to watch these yahoo liberal politicos struggling with what is more important - Obamacare or abortion. I say, abort Obamacare!

wv says "asify"...throw in another 's' and you've got it!

Van Harvey said...

Thumbs up to the Post.
A wet Phbbt to the comments (you know which ones).

What the leftist either will not do, or is incapable of doing, is to ever start at fundamentals, never defining their terms, they seek to hide in their own intellectual waste and confusion. For instance, none of our troll's will
1) define what a political Right is, ignorantly confusing it with a human need, which in their even deeper ignorance, they ASSume to mean something which govt must supply, and all citizens must 'contribute' to.
2) define what the purpose of Govt is.
from that sloppy 'starting point' they will equivocate on all points they can't avoid making, then tote up their wish list, coupled with a muggers gun.

I'm not in much of a mood to play today... I'll settle for tossing out a few duh's.
1)A political Right is an action a person can properly expect to be able to engage in, in a Just society, without being forcibly interfered with. The force of law, as defined in public codes, defends them in the exercise of their Rights. A Right does not guarantee their being provided anything, it defends against being forcibly prevented from acting, or retaining, what is theirs. For instance, the right to free speech is the right to engage in political speech, if they should choose to, it doesn't guarantee that anyone will listen, or compel anyone to listen, or guarantee or compel a venue or a means of speaking (paper, radio, etc), and so on.

2)Govt, properly speaking, and in the original American formulation, is the institution which establishes laws to defend your political rights - your right to be free from being forcibly prevented from engaging in your pursuit of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, as you conceive of it.

It is as a result of that definition that Govt, that it provides those necessary services, military, judicial, and at the local levels, law enforcement, in order to defend those rights from all enemies, foreign and domestic, and to arbitrate disputes. By the very nature of Rights, no one can have a right to abstain from acknowledging these rights, or from supporting them - there is no right to not support Rights - yours and the citizenry in general, and proper methods of taxation are the means for doing so.

There is no right to infringe on the rights of others, or to forcibly compel them to satisfy your needs and whims; any attempt to do so would be a perversion of the concept of Rights, the institution of Govt and the nature of Justice and it's Laws - aka leftism.

Van Harvey said...

NB said "...Well yes and no. A pure market solution would essentially mean that rich people would get excellent health care and the poor would get very little. ..." and "...I don't really see how it is possible to avoid a mixed public/private system..."


Aside from the fact that it is precisely the "mixed public/private" that has inflamed the problem, you're missing out on a key factor in the health care issue.

One, there will always be, as with any product or service, a cost. Any attempt to interfere with, or obscure the prices and availability for those products and services, will result in an increased demand for them, simply because of the seemingly lowered cost of them to the consumer. Any and all insurance will always result in an increase in prices, because of the seemingly lower cost which insurance presents to the consumer at the time of need for that cost or service.

Look into the origin of HMO's, and particularly of Blue Cross/Blue Shield and the governments interference in them (going back to the ... 40's?), and the resulting ripple effects of others trying to match their prices and offer more services... and then less and less direct experience with and knowledge of prices to the consumer - patient - steadily drove prices up, while at the same time making them more and more easily available.

The current mess is a direct result of that cycle ratcheting up and up, and increasingly distancing both the consumer and provider (patient and Doctor) from the pricing, services and costs involved.

I included several links to outside sources which detail the history of this mess, especially at the bottom, of this post.

Van Harvey said...

Regarding NB's comment about Executive Order 12425, I hadn't heard of it before, but Googled this up,
"... Though this matter seems to be fraught with serious implications, among the MSM, only Jake Tapper at ABC News has shown any interest.
He notes on his Twitter page [see, http://twitter.com/jaketapper/status/7167692544] that he repeatedly raised the question with the WH Press Office, to no avail until, it seems that they had no choice but to deal with it, "i've asked the WH twice now about the executive order the president signed exempting Interopl from certain laws. No response."

According to Tapper's account [see, http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2009/12/just-what-did-president-obamas-executive-order-regarding-interpol-do.html Just What Did President Obama's Executive Order regarding INTERPOL Do?] the WH considers the issue a non-story, simply legal housekeeping correcting an alleged mistake made in 2004 when Interpol allegedly opened its "first permanent office" in the U.S.

This reasoning is flimsy at best.

...

Moreover if the issue is so mundane and easily explicable why did it take multiple requests for information by Mr. Tapper before the WH responded?

As former Fed prosecutor Andy McCarthy notes in National Review, "Why would we elevate an international police force above American law? Why would we immunize an international police force from the limitations that constrain the FBI and other American law-enforcement agencies? Why is it suddenly necessary to have, within the Justice Department, a repository for stashing government files which, therefore, will be beyond the ability of Congress, American law-enforcement, the media, and the American people to scrutinize?" [source, Why Does Interpol Need Immunity From American Law? ...
"

It just gets better and better with this bunch.

libtard said...

Bob said,

"I would like to ask the liberal: you say you have a "right" to free healthcare. Who or what conferred this right? And what are its corresponding duties? "

Nancy, conferred it, of course.
Corresponding duties? Uhhh, one third of YOUR income or jail time for non-compliance?

hoarhey said...

Anon. 8:56

Speak to your own thrills and perversions and try not to lump others in with them.
I hunt but take no pleasure in killing an animal. The pleasure comes later, around the barbeque pit. ;*)
"... it becomes apparent that if there is beeve to be had and money in the wallet, then there is no need to shoot the animal."
If you're eating the meat then someone is shooting the animal. I guess if you pay someone else to do the hit, everything's cool?
You are one glib and shallow S.O.B. but then, you already know that.

Jack said...

Happy New Year everyone! Here's to a great 2010!

anonymous said...

"...but then, you already know that."

and you are one cloistered and sour S.O.B. Good on ya, except you're scrabbling for purchase in a spiritual back-slapping club. Maybe you should fire up the old forgiveness exercise starting with yourself since wherever you go there you are. But then, you already know that.

hoarhey said...

Too easy.
I knew I could get past the facade of your "reasonableness" to the true hatful lib underneath,
Scratch, scratch.

Buffer said...

Let's get ready to rummmmble!

Warren said...

NB,

If you've got a taste for disemboweling atheists, I can't recommend Edward Feser's "The Last Superstition" too highly, at least in that regard. Ed not only disembowels them, he eats the entrails (with relish?). Plus you'll get a thorough grounding in classical Greek and medieval Catholic philosophy - can't beat a deal like that!

Vox Day's "The Irrational Atheist" would probably be second on my blood-sport list, although he goes far too easy on Daniel Dennett.

"Atheist Delusions" by David Bentley Hart indulges in a bit of atheist anthropophagy as well, but Hart's so damned erudite that no atheists I know of would even be able to realize how thoroughly they've been lunched.

Gagdad Bob said...

The most lucid, concise, and intellectually devastating refutation of atheism I've ever read is in the first few chapters of Schuon's Logic and Transcendence. There is simply no counter-argument (although his arguments are way over the head of your typical middlebrow village atheist).

anonymous said...

Wow. How did you know of my hat collection? You are not only bitter, but a damn'd able concocter as well. Perhaps you should brew beer while you work your trap line.

hoarhey said...

What is it with a guy who'll spend years commenting anonymously on a blog for the sole purpose of obfuscation and muddying the waters?
You aren't making any converts since your sham reasonableness only reinforces what lying sophists you leftists are.
You do know that you'll burn in hell for what you're doing to this country and the decent who live here.

Dr. Freud said...

Uhhh, Psycho?

anonymous said...

Too easy.
I knew I could get past the facade of your "bitterness" to the seething psycho underneath.
So how is Hell these days anyway?

Warren said...

NB,

One more to add to the Atheist Busters list: "The Devil's Delusion" by David Berlinski. A very unusual and intelligent book all-around - and especially interesting in that Berlinski is an agnostic.

Todd of Sitka said...

Bob, awesome!

I dropped in to see how the pelt party was going, and well, very cool.

I have a family member that is a leftist, and the thing I've learned about this, is that if this person tosses out a comment, and you decide to reply, you end up in a storm of angry responses.

I came to understand this as they seem to feel it is a direct assault on their myth. I may have well as said, "Oh yeah? Well you're ugly and your mother dresses you funny!" -rather than anything cogent.

I suspect that the truth tends to make them feel the trembling of the foundations of their house of cards (house of mythtery?) ;)

So, their response is not intellectual, but friend or foe, fight or flight.

That all being said, I have to point out (being somewhat grey in the hairs) -that all these "rights" -healthcare, education, old age coverage, etc. are ALL "rights" in the constitution...

... of the USSR.

As is the actual phrase "..separation of Chruch and state.." -which is not in ours at all.

Go figure.

God bless you Racoons, you are the best.

-Todd

Todd in Sitka said...

Anonymous doth spew:

"The government taxes its citizens (at gunpoint) to pay for all sorts of things -- roads, fire departments, food inspection, public libraries, scientific research, schools, a huge military. None of those are "free" -- taxpayers fund all of them."

Nice, but somewhat rhetorical. Having been alive -before- "The Great Society" and having been around my family members who were alive -before- the Roosevelt Administration's socialist moves, we are paying way more than we need to for so much that is redundant and useless.

Get a grip Anon, it is manipulation, to create a dependency class, and to destroy the financial force that this nation is. All under a mentally screwed up ruse, being shoved by propagandistic methods.

It makes me sick that so many people just seem to not care about tossing their freedom aside, assuming it to be some static thing out there, and that their feel good about myself-isms should be paid for by everyone else.

Look at your tax form, there is a line at the bottom for paying more if you want to -sign up buddy, just don't mandate I do it to make you feel good, and buy votes for politicians.

-Todd

Susannah said...

Excellent post, Bob. "free launch" Heh!

"we're completely misusing the language" Amen, River...pure unadulterated demagoguery. I may genuinely love some of the soft-hearted folks who fall for it, but I can't respect their intellect. Let's just put it that way.

Hoarhey nailed the wimpy non-hunter anon who lets others do his butchering for him and then considers himself the nobler for it. BTW, my children eat venison at least twice a week. We also raise our own poultry. (We also trap and tan the hides of the innumerable--protected by liberals in neighboring counties--foxes that continually try to interrupt our operations here.) I guess we'd rather spend our hard-earned income building our own homestead than spending it at the butcher counter.

And it sure seems our current infestation of anony's have no problem justifying up, down, and sideways the gov't's ever-increasing strong-arming of our sustenance *away* from our kids and their home. Only to have it larded off into Congress's many pork barrels. Yep, they spend it SO responsibly. Much more "compassionately" than we ever could on our own family.

What about the children???!!! (cue bleeding heart)

Bob, your account of the equivocation leftists engage in is spot on. (Right vs. Power.) Liberals always mask their true intentions by doing violence to the language. One recent example I came across was the John Yoo interview in the NYT...the interviewer questioned his "ethics" using the Berkleyites who are protesting an upcoming course he'll be teaching as a mouthpiece. Now, first of all, how do these postmodernists reconcile with the idea of a higher moral ground in the first place? I was given to understand that one man's narrative was as good as the next man's. And in the same vein, the sort of people who deem cutting down a tree, hunting, or fishing unethical have to relinquish all future rights to using that term as if it had *any* meaning. Relativists cheat with language like this all the time, to the point of self-deception. I want to ask them to go examine in close detail their position on abortion and infanticide, and then get back to me on "torture" and "ethics."

Ephrem Antony Gray said...

Here here, to a civil new year;
When times here are short and dear
Taxes are high, houses? Goodbye -
Politicians lie, Earth don't fry;
But we all have time for a beer.

Susannah said...

Happy New Year, fellow Raccoons!!

Todd in Sitka said...

This latest Anonymous reminds me of the comments in the intro to Malachai Martin's "Hostage to the Devil" -wherein he discusses the stages of confrontation with demons.

It is too bad my copy is in storage, or I'd type it in. Perhaps someone else has a copy?

Ahh, such a predictable, bitter, toady to the dark side.

-Todd

Van Harvey said...

Todd, Happy New Year! Tipping one back for Ximeze here,

Happy New Year All!


(and here's hoping that the trolls here at least try to make an argument this year... not that they've got a chance of making a good one ya'unnerstan... but here's wishing they at least give it a shot for once)

Todd in Sitka said...

Hey Van,

Was intending to write, but I'm kind of the type who does not wish to intrude.

My uncle sent me some single malt for Christmas, so I'll be knocking one back for Ximese as well.

I located one of her college projects, a cookbook she wrote when she got back from Japan. It has recipes from all over her experience. I am considering publishing it and letting her local favorite shop sell it.

I also bought a new digital camera, as the el-cheapo I brought up finally gave up the bytes.

So, part of my time I spend photographing things here that she would have loved to see, or share, in memory of her. I send them to her family mostly, and to some friends.

Today, I saw this HUGE Husky, napping on the toolbox of a pickup truck at the airport (went there for lunch.)

This dog was so huge, he was reposing and covered -most of the toolbox- -gorgeous woofy, so I took some pictures and of course, had to make friends and scratch his ears for him.

At least this year, I don't have to duck all the gunfire like back in California!

God bless all and happy new year!

-Todd

hoarhey said...

Buffer said...
Let's get ready to rummmmble!

Bruce?
That you?

Buffer said...

Hoarhey, you know it, bro. ; )

phil g said...

Happy New Year fellow coons! 2010 should be a very interesting year. I pray for our country.

G. Beck said...

I fear for my country... (*sob*)

Jordan179 said...

What you term the purposelessness of Darwinism without evolution could be more accurately termed "Gouldism." Charles Darwin assumed that evolution yielded progress because it was a process which by its nature tended to yield progress: it's Stephen Gould who argued that evolution is utterly random with no net gains.

And, if you're interested, I think that Gould was wrong: I think that long-term trends towards greater diversity, extent and intelligence can be identified over the history of life on Earth.

Cathy R. said...

debass said:
"..., Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years earlier:..."

Er, Snopes doesn't think so. I absolutely hate when that happens but it appears the "quote" came from an email that went viral around the time of the 2000 Presidential election.

"The "Alexander Tyler" quoted at the head of the article is actually Lord Woodhouselee, Alexander Fraser Tytler, a Scottish historian/professor who wrote several books in the late 1700s and early 1800s. However, there is no record of a Tytler's having authored a work entitled The Fall of the Athenian Republic (or The Decline and Fall of the Athenian Republic), and the quoted material attributed to him above is likely apocryphal."

I was able to find only this quote properly attributed from Lord Woodhouselee:

"It is not, perhaps, unreasonable to conclude, that a pure and perfect democracy is a thing not attainable by man, constituted as he is of contending elements of vice and virtue, and ever mainly influenced by the predominant principle of self-interest. It may, indeed, be confidently asserted, that there never was that government called a republic, which was not ultimately ruled by a single will, and, therefore, (however bold may seem the paradox,) virtually and substantially a monarchy."

- A.F. Tytler, University History, vol. 1, book 2, chapter 6, p. 216 (1838).

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