Three hundred cheers for Angela Merkel, who has stood up against the failed politics of Gordon Brown and Nicholas Sarkozy, not to mention the whole stinking EU bureaucratic machine. Angela Merkel, you will remember, is the leader of Germany, a country with an export-driven economy, a balance of payments surplus, a banking sector not discombobulated by its own greed, much tigher credit controls than debt-addicted Blighty: in short a successful country not a failed one. Not only has she and her colleague, Peer Steinbruek questioned the new fiscal orthodoxy that we the best way to rescue ourselves from insolvency is to spend more, but they are resisting the economically destructive Poznan Climate Change agreement. Is there any coincidence in the fact that those countries without a creditable industrial policies are the ones who support the Climate Change Targets?
One silver lining is that the Germans are becoming more euro-sceptic. After years of financing the EU, they are beginning to grumble at underwriting habitual failure.
Saturday 13 December 2008
Collapse of the US car industry - don't mention Free Trade policies
A short piece on the possible collapse of the American automotive industry on the Today programme failed to mention America’s suicidal Free Trade policy. It mentioned globalisation, possible bad decision-making from the big three manufacturers on the issue of fuel consumption; but it failed to mention that the tariffs of Asian manufacturers are consistently higher than those of the United States. With a lack of a level playing field, then one by one American – and European – industries will die away leaving the Western World de-industrialised, impoverished and militarily unable to defend ourselves. But hooray! maybe we’ll achieve our climate change targets? Think of the plaudits from all those EU and UN agencies, not to mention global climate change campaigners like George Monbiot.
This is an area where the West must think strategically about its long-term interests. The all-pervasive ideology of global internationalism, the baleful influence of which can be seen in climate change targets, mass immigration, free trade and outsourcing, even the War on Terror, is the great distraction: it prevents us seeing clearly and safeguarding our own interests. This crosses left and right boundaries because the internationalist left has made an alliance with a big business sector, which recognises no loyalty to any country, only its own profits.
Defenders of Free Trade said that only low-tech industries like textiles would go abroad, the West would keep high-tech industries; now we see computers and sophisticated electronics are manufactured in China, the US Car industry is collapsing. Our competitors have high tariffs while ours are low; unless the West raises its tariffs in response, the Asian countries will continue to ignore our protestations about Free Trade and the Global Good, and keep trading with an unfair advantage. Why should they do otherwise, if we don’t take reasonable measures to defend our interests? The reason we keep our tariffs low is due confusion between our interests and the supposed interests of the global community, a misplaced belief that a lack of trade barriers leads to greater security and long-term prosperity. Note how free traders, when pressed about the benefits or lack of benefits to the West, end up saying that it lifts millions of people in the third world out of poverty – i.e. it is good for the world (they say), if not for us. This is at best only partially true. The fact that China keeps targeting its industrial output towards export to the West rather than their own consumers is detrimental to their own people, but good for the country’s long-term quest for hegemony over the United States. Moreover, the dependence of China on our debt-fuelled consumption means that their people are now losing their jobs because of our lack of finance; if they had been less export-dependent, the pain for Chinese workers would be less than it is going to be. Limited trade is good, too much trade will lead to greater volatility.
This is an area where the West must think strategically about its long-term interests. The all-pervasive ideology of global internationalism, the baleful influence of which can be seen in climate change targets, mass immigration, free trade and outsourcing, even the War on Terror, is the great distraction: it prevents us seeing clearly and safeguarding our own interests. This crosses left and right boundaries because the internationalist left has made an alliance with a big business sector, which recognises no loyalty to any country, only its own profits.
Defenders of Free Trade said that only low-tech industries like textiles would go abroad, the West would keep high-tech industries; now we see computers and sophisticated electronics are manufactured in China, the US Car industry is collapsing. Our competitors have high tariffs while ours are low; unless the West raises its tariffs in response, the Asian countries will continue to ignore our protestations about Free Trade and the Global Good, and keep trading with an unfair advantage. Why should they do otherwise, if we don’t take reasonable measures to defend our interests? The reason we keep our tariffs low is due confusion between our interests and the supposed interests of the global community, a misplaced belief that a lack of trade barriers leads to greater security and long-term prosperity. Note how free traders, when pressed about the benefits or lack of benefits to the West, end up saying that it lifts millions of people in the third world out of poverty – i.e. it is good for the world (they say), if not for us. This is at best only partially true. The fact that China keeps targeting its industrial output towards export to the West rather than their own consumers is detrimental to their own people, but good for the country’s long-term quest for hegemony over the United States. Moreover, the dependence of China on our debt-fuelled consumption means that their people are now losing their jobs because of our lack of finance; if they had been less export-dependent, the pain for Chinese workers would be less than it is going to be. Limited trade is good, too much trade will lead to greater volatility.
Tony Benn against postive discrimination: we all should be
That fine old warhorse, Tony Benn, was on the Today programme with his granddaughter, and he came out against positive discrimination. His own solution was a double representation for each seat of one man and one women. This was an interesting idea, and in a political entity untroubled by ethnic politics, it might have worked; but as even John Humphries was able to notice, a call for men-women seats would lead to a call for white-black-asian seats, such is the logic of identity politics as conceived today where everyone who is not a white male heterosexual is assumed to be oppressed. Benn’s common sense article was that black women would also benefit, Asian women would also benefit .. but this got lost in the discussion. However, it is interesting how a radical from a previous generation can cut through the pieties of today.
As for positive discrimination for women in parliamentary seats, it is an attack on local democracy, because it means that a higher proportion of candidates imposed on the constituency by the party leadership on the basis that they are women, black, Asian, gay, etc. Whatever the supposed justification, this means more top-down control and less chance that a local man or woman of whatever race or religion or sexuality will get the nomination. That local person might be more inclined to represent his constituents than the leader whose placeman (placeperson) he is. Of course whether you call him a placeperson or placeman will not make the candidate a more honest politician or alleviate the potential for cronyism that an increase in top-down appointments will cause. That person will have been appointed because they fit well with the ideas of the current leadership rather than the party base, and he or she will vote accordingly. We have seen how pliant the Blair Babes were, and how Parliament as an institution has sunk even further since 1997. More women in parliament has done nothing to prevent that; I would suggest that the increase in the proportion of MPs placed there because of their sex, will have assisted the decline in parliamentary democracy.
True to her generation, Tony Benn’s granddaughter, Emily, seemed to cautiously support positive discrimination for women. There is a flaw here in that supporters of this policy assume that woman’s interests are the same, that the women elected truly represent other women: in Parliament today, we have a lot of women with children, looked after no doubt by nannys and the best childcare; not surprisingly they voted for child care solutions that benefit women who go out to work rather than helping women who stay at home and look after their children, a choice which, it is increasingly recognised, affects the development of the child (children with stay-at-home mothers being advantaged); so these women may represent working women but they fail to represent the traditional role of motherhood, which many women would like to follow if they could afford it. The same argument can go for candidates selected on the basis or race or religion.
What positive discrimination achieves is diversity of sex, creed, race, sexuality etc – i.e., it ticks all the boxes in an identity-obsessed political culture; but it further homogenises political opinion, because the particular woman or black person promoted to office by the centre will be chosen because they are amenable to their political patrons. This is the diversity the BBC likes: lots of black and brown faces all peddling, with occasional exceptions, the same stultifying, narrow left-liberal views. This is especially true of flagship prime-time shows like the Today programme. As Mary Kenny said (on The Moral Maze), the output of opinion from the BBC is very homogenous, in spite of all the tick-boxing pretensions to diversity. But why stop at identity politics: why not discriminate against political apparatchiks in favour of software engineers?; or for scientists against lawyers? That would bring a much more meaningful diversity into the political culture and would be more likely to improve the quality of decision-making.
As for positive discrimination for women in parliamentary seats, it is an attack on local democracy, because it means that a higher proportion of candidates imposed on the constituency by the party leadership on the basis that they are women, black, Asian, gay, etc. Whatever the supposed justification, this means more top-down control and less chance that a local man or woman of whatever race or religion or sexuality will get the nomination. That local person might be more inclined to represent his constituents than the leader whose placeman (placeperson) he is. Of course whether you call him a placeperson or placeman will not make the candidate a more honest politician or alleviate the potential for cronyism that an increase in top-down appointments will cause. That person will have been appointed because they fit well with the ideas of the current leadership rather than the party base, and he or she will vote accordingly. We have seen how pliant the Blair Babes were, and how Parliament as an institution has sunk even further since 1997. More women in parliament has done nothing to prevent that; I would suggest that the increase in the proportion of MPs placed there because of their sex, will have assisted the decline in parliamentary democracy.
True to her generation, Tony Benn’s granddaughter, Emily, seemed to cautiously support positive discrimination for women. There is a flaw here in that supporters of this policy assume that woman’s interests are the same, that the women elected truly represent other women: in Parliament today, we have a lot of women with children, looked after no doubt by nannys and the best childcare; not surprisingly they voted for child care solutions that benefit women who go out to work rather than helping women who stay at home and look after their children, a choice which, it is increasingly recognised, affects the development of the child (children with stay-at-home mothers being advantaged); so these women may represent working women but they fail to represent the traditional role of motherhood, which many women would like to follow if they could afford it. The same argument can go for candidates selected on the basis or race or religion.
What positive discrimination achieves is diversity of sex, creed, race, sexuality etc – i.e., it ticks all the boxes in an identity-obsessed political culture; but it further homogenises political opinion, because the particular woman or black person promoted to office by the centre will be chosen because they are amenable to their political patrons. This is the diversity the BBC likes: lots of black and brown faces all peddling, with occasional exceptions, the same stultifying, narrow left-liberal views. This is especially true of flagship prime-time shows like the Today programme. As Mary Kenny said (on The Moral Maze), the output of opinion from the BBC is very homogenous, in spite of all the tick-boxing pretensions to diversity. But why stop at identity politics: why not discriminate against political apparatchiks in favour of software engineers?; or for scientists against lawyers? That would bring a much more meaningful diversity into the political culture and would be more likely to improve the quality of decision-making.
Friday 12 December 2008
Global warming trumps legitimate environmentalism
Climate change is the new Socialism. Just as the fight to end inequality and class oppression justified sidelining all other practical and ethical concerns in the 20th Century, so the struggle against global warming takes precedence today. The left love it because it justifies regulations, interference, bloated bureaucracies; it also legitimises ignoring the democratic wishes of electorates, the flip side of which is the supposed need to move towards globalised governance, nations being too small and too concerned with their particular interest to be trusted.
There are many levels of environmentalism: noise and air pollution are legitimate health issues irrespective of the Climate Change hypothesis; even without the hopelessly optimistic threadbareness of the economic arguments, they are enough to justify opposing the 3rd runway at Heathrow. None of that matters much: expansion of air traffic is BAD for Climate Change and it is this front which the government had to defend on the Today Programme (5 December 2008): how does it square with its Climate Change targets and pledges to the EU? Of course it shows how bogus the government's environmentalism is: despite the global warming rhetoric, so beloved of pontificators and summit junkies on the left, they allow the third runway because they can meet their targets in some other way (by outsourcing British industry for example – which of course moves to more intensively polluting factories in China – they fall foul of the targets, not us). There are other issues of more direct concern to people living near Heathrow: the noise levels will increase and the air quality will degrade, bad news for the long-suffering residents of West London and Thames Valley; but they can be classed as nimbies, Not In My Back-yard, small-minded bourgeios, who fail to see the global picture. Nor has there been an intelligent debate about the supposed economic benefits or yet more air traffic in an area that is traditionally overheated economically. Yet everything is seen through the prism of climate change rather than realistic environmental or economic concerns.
There is a good argument for saving energy: it is called national security. Minimise reliance on energy from unfriendly powers. If governments emphasized this, people might be more willing to look at how they as individuals increase demand; global concerns don’t provide the same motivation.
Moreover global concerns, as defined by our liberal overlords in the labour-libdem caucus and the media, can conflict with our legitimate interests, even our safety. The popular discontent with the new orthodoxy can be sampled in a rake of letters in the Daily Telegraph about the new energy saving light bulbs. These show a common-sense scepticism related to their practical defects and the hazards associated with their use, namely the headache-inducing quality of the light, their slowness to turn on when speed is required, their mercury content. Christopher Howse summarised this at http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/christopher_howse/blog/2008/12/02/bits_of_light_bulb_in_your_tuna_sandwich in the Telegraph.
This shows how the battle against climate change trumps not only practical and cost concerns but also health and environmental issues. That the government should encourage the use of mercury in light bulbs in spite of its extreme toxicity shows how the interests of people and extreme envionmental hazards are subsumed to the greater global struggle. If it breaks we are supposed to leave the room. What about if you have children? Mine like to play ball in the living room and hall; they have even been known to throw things at the lights. Their health is secondary of course to the global problem. You can see how every problem will be subordinated to the Climate Change agenda.
There are many levels of environmentalism: noise and air pollution are legitimate health issues irrespective of the Climate Change hypothesis; even without the hopelessly optimistic threadbareness of the economic arguments, they are enough to justify opposing the 3rd runway at Heathrow. None of that matters much: expansion of air traffic is BAD for Climate Change and it is this front which the government had to defend on the Today Programme (5 December 2008): how does it square with its Climate Change targets and pledges to the EU? Of course it shows how bogus the government's environmentalism is: despite the global warming rhetoric, so beloved of pontificators and summit junkies on the left, they allow the third runway because they can meet their targets in some other way (by outsourcing British industry for example – which of course moves to more intensively polluting factories in China – they fall foul of the targets, not us). There are other issues of more direct concern to people living near Heathrow: the noise levels will increase and the air quality will degrade, bad news for the long-suffering residents of West London and Thames Valley; but they can be classed as nimbies, Not In My Back-yard, small-minded bourgeios, who fail to see the global picture. Nor has there been an intelligent debate about the supposed economic benefits or yet more air traffic in an area that is traditionally overheated economically. Yet everything is seen through the prism of climate change rather than realistic environmental or economic concerns.
There is a good argument for saving energy: it is called national security. Minimise reliance on energy from unfriendly powers. If governments emphasized this, people might be more willing to look at how they as individuals increase demand; global concerns don’t provide the same motivation.
Moreover global concerns, as defined by our liberal overlords in the labour-libdem caucus and the media, can conflict with our legitimate interests, even our safety. The popular discontent with the new orthodoxy can be sampled in a rake of letters in the Daily Telegraph about the new energy saving light bulbs. These show a common-sense scepticism related to their practical defects and the hazards associated with their use, namely the headache-inducing quality of the light, their slowness to turn on when speed is required, their mercury content. Christopher Howse summarised this at http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/christopher_howse/blog/2008/12/02/bits_of_light_bulb_in_your_tuna_sandwich in the Telegraph.
This shows how the battle against climate change trumps not only practical and cost concerns but also health and environmental issues. That the government should encourage the use of mercury in light bulbs in spite of its extreme toxicity shows how the interests of people and extreme envionmental hazards are subsumed to the greater global struggle. If it breaks we are supposed to leave the room. What about if you have children? Mine like to play ball in the living room and hall; they have even been known to throw things at the lights. Their health is secondary of course to the global problem. You can see how every problem will be subordinated to the Climate Change agenda.
Thursday 27 November 2008
Authoritarianism consolidates power after anarchy
News that the Russian upper parliament will extend the presidential term to 6 years has come as no surprise, with many expecting Prime Minister Putin to return to the presidency for 12 years. Given the terrible poverty and disorder of the nineties, however, most russians are happy to see a strong man in power.
What Burkean conservatives should note is how the Gorbachov revolution follows the pattern of all revolutions in essentially three stages: destruction of the old order by idealistic revolutionaries, terror and/or anarchy followed by a strong man, bringing authoritarianism and order. The French Revolution led to Jacobinism and the terror followed by Napoleon; the Russian Revolution led to Lenin and the Bolshevik terror, followed by Stalin; the downfall of the Kaiser led to the Weimar Republic and then Hitler; the Austria-Hungarian monarchy led to short-lived, unstable nationalistic democracies followed in most cases by relatively stable nationalistic dictators. With Gorbachov, we had the dismantling of Communism, followed by Yeltsin and croney-capitalism followed by Putin. I suspect that Putin will be the least-malign in that he has retained the machinery of democracy. Given the anarchy that preceded him, history may well look on him kindly, at least in the areas where western liberals criticise him. His main failure is in not curbing the abortion rate, and in general not addressing the birth rate: it is demographics which is likely to lead to the demise of Mother Russia, not an absence of freedom.
But back to the fate of all revolutions, which is to be succeeded eventually by a far less benign power than the one it overturned. Who can deny that Mugabe is far far worse than Ian Smith of Rhodesia? I suspect that history will see Smith as a generally benign figure. Even peaceful revolutions can follow this trajectory: did the downfall of apartheid lead to the extremely high crime rates of present-day South Africa? will a dictator follow? or will the humanity shown by figures such as Nelson Mandela and Bishop Tutu (in the midst of their ideological errors) be the reason why South Africa will survive as a free country?
The most pertinent case of the progress of Revolution is the West in our era: after the cultural revolution of the 60's debunking a christianity-based morality, we have had a period of permissive freedom, which is quickly being superseded by the dictates of political correctness; after the collapse of the culture of responsibility and the subsequent weakening of the forces of law enforcement, we have a period of high crime and disorder leading to successive legislation which progressively (in every sense) takes away our traditional liberties. We seem to be living through a transition from the 2nd stage to the 3rd stage. Only the fact that we are a democracy and still have some semblence of free speech gives us hope that a counter-revolution can save us. But where is the Conservative party?
What Burkean conservatives should note is how the Gorbachov revolution follows the pattern of all revolutions in essentially three stages: destruction of the old order by idealistic revolutionaries, terror and/or anarchy followed by a strong man, bringing authoritarianism and order. The French Revolution led to Jacobinism and the terror followed by Napoleon; the Russian Revolution led to Lenin and the Bolshevik terror, followed by Stalin; the downfall of the Kaiser led to the Weimar Republic and then Hitler; the Austria-Hungarian monarchy led to short-lived, unstable nationalistic democracies followed in most cases by relatively stable nationalistic dictators. With Gorbachov, we had the dismantling of Communism, followed by Yeltsin and croney-capitalism followed by Putin. I suspect that Putin will be the least-malign in that he has retained the machinery of democracy. Given the anarchy that preceded him, history may well look on him kindly, at least in the areas where western liberals criticise him. His main failure is in not curbing the abortion rate, and in general not addressing the birth rate: it is demographics which is likely to lead to the demise of Mother Russia, not an absence of freedom.
But back to the fate of all revolutions, which is to be succeeded eventually by a far less benign power than the one it overturned. Who can deny that Mugabe is far far worse than Ian Smith of Rhodesia? I suspect that history will see Smith as a generally benign figure. Even peaceful revolutions can follow this trajectory: did the downfall of apartheid lead to the extremely high crime rates of present-day South Africa? will a dictator follow? or will the humanity shown by figures such as Nelson Mandela and Bishop Tutu (in the midst of their ideological errors) be the reason why South Africa will survive as a free country?
The most pertinent case of the progress of Revolution is the West in our era: after the cultural revolution of the 60's debunking a christianity-based morality, we have had a period of permissive freedom, which is quickly being superseded by the dictates of political correctness; after the collapse of the culture of responsibility and the subsequent weakening of the forces of law enforcement, we have a period of high crime and disorder leading to successive legislation which progressively (in every sense) takes away our traditional liberties. We seem to be living through a transition from the 2nd stage to the 3rd stage. Only the fact that we are a democracy and still have some semblence of free speech gives us hope that a counter-revolution can save us. But where is the Conservative party?
Tuesday 25 November 2008
Today programme fails to investigate claims of embryo researchers
More stories on stem cell research in the mainstream media: this morning we have the BBC's Today programme running a 4-minute piece asking why Britain, a leader in stem cell research, is falling behind in technological transfer or medical application of stem cells – in spite – as the report said of the fact that President Bush cut off funding for stem cell research.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_7747000/7747348.stm
This leaves out a crucial detail in that Bush cut off funding for embryonic stem cell research; the report as a whole failed to make a distinction between the two different types of stem cell research, even though adult stem cells are act differently on cell growth and maintenance compared to embryonic stem cells; a patient's own stem cells do not produce immune reactions when transferred to recipients, nor do they cause tumours. These are key reasons why adult (somatic) stem cells have been shown to have practical medical applications when embryonic stem cells do not.
The research project highlighted is the London Project to cure blindness, represented on the programme by Professor Pete Coffey of UCL, who is working with embryonic stem cells to find a cure for AMD (Age-related Macular Degeneration). Therapeutic applications for this research have so far not materialized, the reason being, he says, because not enough money has been given; in fact all the money comes from US philanthropists, not the UK government. What listener would against a project to cure blindness? Not I, not anyone; only one of those pro-life religious bigots, you might think. Let us investigate the UCL web page on this project is http://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-articles/0706/07051602. The key paragraph on this page is:
“The radical approach of the London Project to cure AMD will involve producing a cell replacement therapy from human embryonic stem cells. Trials using patients’ own [i.e., adult] cells have proved that this approach can work.”
Why do the work, if adult (own) stem cells have already succeeded? It is a mystery, but I suspect that the joy of pure research and the scientific tour-de-force is a large part of the motivation. Ethical issues be damned. However, perhaps the £4m donation has dried up, through lack of results, and they need government funding? That the project is looking for funding can be seen by its profile on the Justgiving charity donation website, http://www.justgiving.com/londonprojectucl, where the synopsis for “London Project to Cure Blindness at UCL, Charity Registration No X6243” is:
“Supporting world class researchers in breakthrough research to develop surgical applications to cure blindness such as Age-Related macular Degeneration which affects 25% of people over 60 (12 million in Europe, 14 million in USA and countless others worldwide)”
No mention of embryos here, but there is a link to donate. Given the moral controversy over embryonic stem cell research and increasing doubts over its usefulness, shouldn’t they have mentioned what is being researched.
However, the questions the BBC Today programme interviewer, Stephanie Montague did not ask was whether embryonic stem cell research is not a discredited area of work and whether it was wasting public money to fund it; a further question would be whether work funding embryonic stem cell research was taking money away from useful research on stem cells.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_7747000/7747348.stm
This leaves out a crucial detail in that Bush cut off funding for embryonic stem cell research; the report as a whole failed to make a distinction between the two different types of stem cell research, even though adult stem cells are act differently on cell growth and maintenance compared to embryonic stem cells; a patient's own stem cells do not produce immune reactions when transferred to recipients, nor do they cause tumours. These are key reasons why adult (somatic) stem cells have been shown to have practical medical applications when embryonic stem cells do not.
The research project highlighted is the London Project to cure blindness, represented on the programme by Professor Pete Coffey of UCL, who is working with embryonic stem cells to find a cure for AMD (Age-related Macular Degeneration). Therapeutic applications for this research have so far not materialized, the reason being, he says, because not enough money has been given; in fact all the money comes from US philanthropists, not the UK government. What listener would against a project to cure blindness? Not I, not anyone; only one of those pro-life religious bigots, you might think. Let us investigate the UCL web page on this project is http://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-articles/0706/07051602. The key paragraph on this page is:
“The radical approach of the London Project to cure AMD will involve producing a cell replacement therapy from human embryonic stem cells. Trials using patients’ own [i.e., adult] cells have proved that this approach can work.”
Why do the work, if adult (own) stem cells have already succeeded? It is a mystery, but I suspect that the joy of pure research and the scientific tour-de-force is a large part of the motivation. Ethical issues be damned. However, perhaps the £4m donation has dried up, through lack of results, and they need government funding? That the project is looking for funding can be seen by its profile on the Justgiving charity donation website, http://www.justgiving.com/londonprojectucl, where the synopsis for “London Project to Cure Blindness at UCL, Charity Registration No X6243” is:
“Supporting world class researchers in breakthrough research to develop surgical applications to cure blindness such as Age-Related macular Degeneration which affects 25% of people over 60 (12 million in Europe, 14 million in USA and countless others worldwide)”
No mention of embryos here, but there is a link to donate. Given the moral controversy over embryonic stem cell research and increasing doubts over its usefulness, shouldn’t they have mentioned what is being researched.
However, the questions the BBC Today programme interviewer, Stephanie Montague did not ask was whether embryonic stem cell research is not a discredited area of work and whether it was wasting public money to fund it; a further question would be whether work funding embryonic stem cell research was taking money away from useful research on stem cells.
This looks like a classic example of lazy, uninformed journalism, the kind to which the so-called nation's broadcaster is as much subject as the tabloid press, if not more. The authority of the BBC and its virtual monopoly over the broadcast media, in news especially, means it has a great power to shed light on or obscure an issue, this being an example. I suspect, however, that there is an ideological agenda here in that the liberal intelligentsia support embryonic stem research as part of a gesture of support for the abortion culture and to be seen publicly to make a stand against the supposedly anti-science views of the pro-life lobby. Abortion is so entrenched in our society, a position that depends on the denial that the embryo is human life, although the moment of conception is the only contender, biologically speaking, for the beginning of human life. What better way of emphasising this than finding utilitarian reasons to treat the embryo as less than human? The irony is that the pro-embryo research people are indulging in bad science, assertions without evidence and the promotion of ideologically-motivated and non evidence-based causes such embryo research.
Earlier article on adult stem cell applications
To be fair to Roger Highfield, after I attacked him, on obscuring the distinction between adult and embryonic stem cells (http://socialconservativeview.blogspot.com/2008/11/editor-of-national-scientist-is.html), his website, http://www.rogerhighfield.com/ has the following link and strapline, Embryo-free stem cell method means treatments are nearer, leading to a Daily Telegraph article.
(The URL Is http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/science/sciencenews/3352426/Embryo-free-stem-cell-method-means-treatments-are-nearer.html)
The article itself still seems to regard adult stem cells as an unproven technology compared to the "potential" applications of embryonic stem cells, as seen in the paragraph,
"However, the researchers say that it will be important to determine if human cells generated in the future using this kind of virus are as potent as human embryonic stem cells for potential clinical applications."
Well, the evidence is that the actual applications of adult stem cells are as potent as the hype for the "potential" of embryonic stem cells.
(The URL Is http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/science/sciencenews/3352426/Embryo-free-stem-cell-method-means-treatments-are-nearer.html)
The article itself still seems to regard adult stem cells as an unproven technology compared to the "potential" applications of embryonic stem cells, as seen in the paragraph,
"However, the researchers say that it will be important to determine if human cells generated in the future using this kind of virus are as potent as human embryonic stem cells for potential clinical applications."
Well, the evidence is that the actual applications of adult stem cells are as potent as the hype for the "potential" of embryonic stem cells.
Monday 24 November 2008
Tax rises for the rich will be popular, conservatives take note
Independently of whether it works economically (£2 billion might be all the revenue gained), the proposed tax rate increase is well judged politically, because it catches the mood in the country, much of whom will want the rich to pay. Politically it makes the labour government look like it is concerned with social justice and it creates a dilemma for the conservative party in that they either go along with it or been seen to be siding with the bad guys in the financial sector. Arguments about whether it is a cynical move are irrelevant to the political signal it gives.
There is evidence for diminishing returns of increasing high-income tax rates, but many electors will be impatient of this, because they are frustrated with the inequalities associated with the last decade; this group goes beyond leftists protesting about Thatcherite economics. We still hear on the right “Is it a return to class war and the politics of envy?”; on the left, “capitalism is unjust because it creates inequalities and in our society we have a growing pool of disadvantaged, vulnerable, excluded, poor people”. These miss the point because they have a simplistic contrast between rich and poor. There is not just rich and poor: there is also a middle class, which for our purposes includes many working class people who have been honourably employed over the last 10-15 years. We live in a dispensation, unaffected by Thatcherism of the rich getting richer (and less taxed) combined with a welfare state that rewards people who don't work at all. How do you get a council house?: not by working hard; the best way is to a complete misfit or have a large family while not working; or turn up as an asylum seeker with nothing but a family to feed. Those people who can't get a council house, but are too poor to obtain a mortgage have nowhere to go; as the housing boom progressed, under a labour government, an ever increasing pool of people were priced out of being able to afford a home. In London, ordinary working people, including professionals, were priced out in favour of bankers and non-domiciles; stealth taxes squeezed their incomes and funded the underclass; immigration lowered their wages and increased the scarcity of resources. These are the people who conservatives should be helping, the bedrock of the country. The fact that we have been increasingly living beyond our means as a country has been funded by ordinary people, while the very rich and the non-working poor have not been obliged to pay their share.
A higher tax rate for the rich points a way, perhaps tokenistic, to a more just system, one where people who are not very rich or living off welfare can get the share of the pie they deserve. If the right doesn’t address this, they will lose legitimacy. Into the moral vacuum will step the left, who will extend big government, erode our traditions and suppress our freedoms even further.
There is evidence for diminishing returns of increasing high-income tax rates, but many electors will be impatient of this, because they are frustrated with the inequalities associated with the last decade; this group goes beyond leftists protesting about Thatcherite economics. We still hear on the right “Is it a return to class war and the politics of envy?”; on the left, “capitalism is unjust because it creates inequalities and in our society we have a growing pool of disadvantaged, vulnerable, excluded, poor people”. These miss the point because they have a simplistic contrast between rich and poor. There is not just rich and poor: there is also a middle class, which for our purposes includes many working class people who have been honourably employed over the last 10-15 years. We live in a dispensation, unaffected by Thatcherism of the rich getting richer (and less taxed) combined with a welfare state that rewards people who don't work at all. How do you get a council house?: not by working hard; the best way is to a complete misfit or have a large family while not working; or turn up as an asylum seeker with nothing but a family to feed. Those people who can't get a council house, but are too poor to obtain a mortgage have nowhere to go; as the housing boom progressed, under a labour government, an ever increasing pool of people were priced out of being able to afford a home. In London, ordinary working people, including professionals, were priced out in favour of bankers and non-domiciles; stealth taxes squeezed their incomes and funded the underclass; immigration lowered their wages and increased the scarcity of resources. These are the people who conservatives should be helping, the bedrock of the country. The fact that we have been increasingly living beyond our means as a country has been funded by ordinary people, while the very rich and the non-working poor have not been obliged to pay their share.
A higher tax rate for the rich points a way, perhaps tokenistic, to a more just system, one where people who are not very rich or living off welfare can get the share of the pie they deserve. If the right doesn’t address this, they will lose legitimacy. Into the moral vacuum will step the left, who will extend big government, erode our traditions and suppress our freedoms even further.
Embryonic stem cells qualitatively different from adult cells
People may ask what makes embryonic stem cells so different from adult stem cells. They are qualitatively different in that adult stem cells maintain and repair human cells, embryonic cells help grow the embryo into a foetus and baby. Embryonic stem cells are inherently unstable and when transplanted into the bodies of recipients, they have a tendency to produce tumours; moreover, they are rejected by the recipient's immune system because they do not come from his own body and are unlikely to be genetically compatible; with adult stem cells therapy, the stem cells can come from the patient himself, causing no immune problems.
See http://www.stemcellresearchfacts.com/pros_cons.html,
http://www.lifeissues.org/cloningstemcell/bradsarticle.html, http://www.i-sis.org.uk/stemcells2.php, http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2003/nov/03112001.html (note date).
See http://www.stemcellresearchfacts.com/pros_cons.html,
http://www.lifeissues.org/cloningstemcell/bradsarticle.html, http://www.i-sis.org.uk/stemcells2.php, http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2003/nov/03112001.html (note date).
Saturday 22 November 2008
ideology and embryonic stem cell research
If you are not on the pro-life side of the debate, you might ask what is all this fuss about embryos. Leaving aside that moral question, you should note that many public figures support embryo research as a gesture against religion and irrationality and for progress and science. However, given the decline of our manufacturing base and of educational standards in schools, a situation in part created by a liberal thinking on economics and society, it should be clear that these people are more interested in ideology than supporting scientific endeavour. The call for state-funding for embryonic research is so high because they can't get private funding: the medical applications have not come through. This is about the corruption of science and scientific report by ideology.
Editor of National Scientist is propagandist for research using embryos
Another example of the obscuring of the distinction between adult and embryonic stem cells appeared in a page-long article in Thursday's Daily Telegraph (20 November, On the verge of a new era in medicine, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/science/sciencenews/3486000/Transplant-of-windpipe-grown-from-stem-cells-heralds-new-era-in-medicine.html) by Roger Highfield, describing the rebuilding of a human trachea as “human windpipe, constructed partly from stem cells”. He then comments: “At long last, the glint in the researcher's eye has been turned into a significant advance in the clinic. Forget all this fuss about embryos and angst about playing God: this is unadulterated good news.”
The language is indeterminate here: adult stem cells or embryonic stem cells, but the context implies they are all one and the same. Here at last, the casual reader will think, we have the evidence: embryonic stem cell research is justified, the religious luddites were wrong. This is an article by the editor of a prestigious Science magazine in a National newspaper, so it must be credible.
Not mentioned was the fact that this breakthrough is a medical application of adult stem cells.
In the detail of the article, to be fair, he says, as it were in passing, that this particular application comes from the patient's bone marrow, but you have to read closely to understand this. The suggestion has been made already that embryonic stem cells are to be given credit. For the most part, he refers to stem cells as if all types of stem cells are the same in medical terms. If we should forget the fuss about embryos, this is not for the reasons given by the editor of the New Scientist, but because it was by using adult stem cells that, as the article says, “scientists can now fashion organs using a patient's own cells, eliminating the problems with rejection that always plagued transplants”. A reasonable conclusion from the facts of the case would be that we should not rely on morally dubious research on difficult to obtain embryos and concentrate on ethical, successful research into adult stem cells; the article implies otherwise by obscuring the distinction between the two technologies. It is so obscure in fact that I don't discount the possibility that Roger Highfield is writing very poorly, failing to clarify the topic; however, by reading the entire article, I conclude that he is advocating (without justification from the facts) the benefits of embryonic stem cell research. Towards the end, after noting a number of applications for adult stem cell research (he doesn't make it explicit which type of stem cell, but you can be sure it is adult cells), the article changes direction, but seamlessly:
“And there is there is the astonishing potential [my italics] of embryonic stem cells, the means by which Mother Nature fashions our entire bodies. Our understanding of how to guide the development of stem cells is primitive [my italics] – but unlike the bone marrow cells used in the Castillo case, embryonic stem cells can [my italics] turn into any one of the 200 or more different cell types in our bodies, rendering the opportunities potentially [my italics] limitless.
Note the move from fact to aspiration. He continues:
“much work must be done to determine how to make then grow the right way, and then to mould them into organs ... the potential .. is vast ..” and “The path ahead is difficult: more funding and more testing .. false alleys and blind starts, but in the long term, a brave new world beckons”. So far the funding and testing has gone into false alleys and blind starts before ... I still wonder if he is being satirical here.
Note the words, “can turn into” “much work” “potential”, “potentially”, “path ahead is difficult”, a tacit admission by the editor of the New Scientist that embryonic stems cells are not producing medical applications. Yes, Dr Highfield, you need funding because the smart (according to empirical success) money has gone into adult stem cell research.
He concludes: “Medically and ethically, the bottom line is simple: if we follow the path blazed by Claudia Castillo and her doctors, no one need ever die waiting for a donated organ again.”
Roger, the path blazed used ethically created adult stem cells. Please make this clear instead of touting for embryonic research.
The language is indeterminate here: adult stem cells or embryonic stem cells, but the context implies they are all one and the same. Here at last, the casual reader will think, we have the evidence: embryonic stem cell research is justified, the religious luddites were wrong. This is an article by the editor of a prestigious Science magazine in a National newspaper, so it must be credible.
Not mentioned was the fact that this breakthrough is a medical application of adult stem cells.
In the detail of the article, to be fair, he says, as it were in passing, that this particular application comes from the patient's bone marrow, but you have to read closely to understand this. The suggestion has been made already that embryonic stem cells are to be given credit. For the most part, he refers to stem cells as if all types of stem cells are the same in medical terms. If we should forget the fuss about embryos, this is not for the reasons given by the editor of the New Scientist, but because it was by using adult stem cells that, as the article says, “scientists can now fashion organs using a patient's own cells, eliminating the problems with rejection that always plagued transplants”. A reasonable conclusion from the facts of the case would be that we should not rely on morally dubious research on difficult to obtain embryos and concentrate on ethical, successful research into adult stem cells; the article implies otherwise by obscuring the distinction between the two technologies. It is so obscure in fact that I don't discount the possibility that Roger Highfield is writing very poorly, failing to clarify the topic; however, by reading the entire article, I conclude that he is advocating (without justification from the facts) the benefits of embryonic stem cell research. Towards the end, after noting a number of applications for adult stem cell research (he doesn't make it explicit which type of stem cell, but you can be sure it is adult cells), the article changes direction, but seamlessly:
“And there is there is the astonishing potential [my italics] of embryonic stem cells, the means by which Mother Nature fashions our entire bodies. Our understanding of how to guide the development of stem cells is primitive [my italics] – but unlike the bone marrow cells used in the Castillo case, embryonic stem cells can [my italics] turn into any one of the 200 or more different cell types in our bodies, rendering the opportunities potentially [my italics] limitless.
Note the move from fact to aspiration. He continues:
“much work must be done to determine how to make then grow the right way, and then to mould them into organs ... the potential .. is vast ..” and “The path ahead is difficult: more funding and more testing .. false alleys and blind starts, but in the long term, a brave new world beckons”. So far the funding and testing has gone into false alleys and blind starts before ... I still wonder if he is being satirical here.
Note the words, “can turn into” “much work” “potential”, “potentially”, “path ahead is difficult”, a tacit admission by the editor of the New Scientist that embryonic stems cells are not producing medical applications. Yes, Dr Highfield, you need funding because the smart (according to empirical success) money has gone into adult stem cell research.
He concludes: “Medically and ethically, the bottom line is simple: if we follow the path blazed by Claudia Castillo and her doctors, no one need ever die waiting for a donated organ again.”
Roger, the path blazed used ethically created adult stem cells. Please make this clear instead of touting for embryonic research.
Thursday 20 November 2008
Reuters confused about difference between adult and embryonic stems cells
For another scientific advance for adult stem cells - see
http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN18296064. Yet the first paragraph of this Reuters article talks misleadingly about cells from "tiny embryos". The key word is "can"; embryonic stem cells have not worked yet and it seems to be an article of faith that they will. There is no evidence for their success, which good science is supposed to be all about. A closer read of the article shows that it the stem cells are from bone marrow, not embryos.
Under the authorship of Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor for Reuters, a supposedly factual article is suborned to the PR agenda of the embryo experimenters, who appeal to the pseudo-pro-science lobby entrenched within supposedly enlightened liberal opinion. Promotion of embryonic stem cell research is all about ideology, not science. Instead of looking at scientific evidence, they are influenced by the positivism that informs progressive movements through the 19th and 20th centuries. This conceives a false opposition between "science", "objectivity", "progress" on the one hand and "religion", "morality", "tradition" on the other.
Embryonic science is bad science, morally but also in terms of its scientific viability. Those who promote the myth that embryonic stem cells have medical uses display poor knowledge of science and a lack of ability (or willingness) to objectively weigh the evidence, whether they are trained scientists or ill-informed journalists replicating misinformation for respected news agencies, a respect which isn't deserved in the case of this Reuters misarticle.
http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN18296064. Yet the first paragraph of this Reuters article talks misleadingly about cells from "tiny embryos". The key word is "can"; embryonic stem cells have not worked yet and it seems to be an article of faith that they will. There is no evidence for their success, which good science is supposed to be all about. A closer read of the article shows that it the stem cells are from bone marrow, not embryos.
Under the authorship of Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor for Reuters, a supposedly factual article is suborned to the PR agenda of the embryo experimenters, who appeal to the pseudo-pro-science lobby entrenched within supposedly enlightened liberal opinion. Promotion of embryonic stem cell research is all about ideology, not science. Instead of looking at scientific evidence, they are influenced by the positivism that informs progressive movements through the 19th and 20th centuries. This conceives a false opposition between "science", "objectivity", "progress" on the one hand and "religion", "morality", "tradition" on the other.
Embryonic science is bad science, morally but also in terms of its scientific viability. Those who promote the myth that embryonic stem cells have medical uses display poor knowledge of science and a lack of ability (or willingness) to objectively weigh the evidence, whether they are trained scientists or ill-informed journalists replicating misinformation for respected news agencies, a respect which isn't deserved in the case of this Reuters misarticle.
IMF Ministers Meeting In Washington Fails To Address Undervalued Chinese Currency
So much for the beneficial effects of World Government. See http://www.manufacturingnews.com/news/08/1017/preeg.html
Security depends on manufacturing
There is a contradiction between 1) being the world's policeman fighting multiple foreign wars; and 2) taking an ideologically rigid free trade/laissez-faire approach to manufacturing. Without a home-based manufacturing sector, we lose the ability to pay for a military capacity - except by adopting massive and unsustainable state subsidies (see the demise of the Soviet Union); even more damaging is the fact that manufacturing provides a stimulus to scientific development. It is no accident that the greatest military powers in the modern age have been great manufacturing powers. For an example of how a globalised or flat-earth production chain directly impacts on security, read the Manufacturing News article concerning foreign-made electronic components used by the American military at: http://www.manufacturingnews.com/news/08/1117/counterfeitelectronics.html.
Yet the neo-conservatives/liberal imperialists have supported these contradictory policies since the fall of the Soviet Union. There were strong tendencies towards this in the 1980's, but the impact was not so obvious then; and Reagan at least imposed tariffs to protect vital industries.
Even if your foreign policy ambitions are not so grandiose as the neo-cons, you must still consider that we need to defend ourselves. With an imploding demographic structure and a de-industrialised economy, we are likely to be very vulnerable over the next 50 years. This is especially alarming given the high population growth in areas bordering Europe.
Yet the neo-conservatives/liberal imperialists have supported these contradictory policies since the fall of the Soviet Union. There were strong tendencies towards this in the 1980's, but the impact was not so obvious then; and Reagan at least imposed tariffs to protect vital industries.
Even if your foreign policy ambitions are not so grandiose as the neo-cons, you must still consider that we need to defend ourselves. With an imploding demographic structure and a de-industrialised economy, we are likely to be very vulnerable over the next 50 years. This is especially alarming given the high population growth in areas bordering Europe.
Wednesday 19 November 2008
Medical discovery due to Adult Stem Cell research
As you might not have gathered from the coverage by headlines yesterday and BBC Radio this morning, the great medical advance resulting from stem cells has come from Adult stem cells, not embryonic stem cells. See Bristol University's news page (19 November 2008) for this, or go direct to: http://www.bristol.ac.uk/news/2008/6010.html.
Bristol make it clear what kind of research it is, but the media usually doesn't. This is at best lazy, and at worst a silent conspiracy not to inform the public. By talking about "stem cells", most people will assume this means embryonic stem cells, and then support this morally dubious, if not downright evil, form of research.
To their credit, the Times have made it clear on their website today: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article5183686.ece
Bristol make it clear what kind of research it is, but the media usually doesn't. This is at best lazy, and at worst a silent conspiracy not to inform the public. By talking about "stem cells", most people will assume this means embryonic stem cells, and then support this morally dubious, if not downright evil, form of research.
To their credit, the Times have made it clear on their website today: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article5183686.ece
Stem cell research: confusion about adult stem cells and embryo stem cells
BBC Today programme 12 november – and many newspapers on 11 November
Surgeons hail stunning breakthrought for “stem cell research” [link] in Bristol. Now there are medical uses for stem cells. A key question, given the recent embryology bill, is whether it is adult stem cells or embryonic stem cells. Why do they omit to say?
We know that so far all of the successful applications of stem cells have come from adult stem cells and that embryo cell applications have not gone beyond their “tremendous promise”. The embryo research issue revealed little understanding of the detail by its supporters; when the fact was noted that embryonic cell research had not as yet brought any medical advances, they told us of the potential for embryonic cell research. This apparently is not seen by private investors, who are putting their money into adult stem cell research; hence the need for scientists working in the field to lobby for state funding.
Supporters of stem cell research tend to be on the liberal side of politics (including supposed “conservatives”). Their take on personal identity which informs the politics is shared by behaviourists of the 20th century and communists in Russia and Eastern Europe. It eschews talk of the soul and fails to find any unifying property that defines an individual. Identity is contingent, incremental, determined by the material. It follows that an embryo is a lot less than human. The opposing view that the embryo is human is associated very much with the catholic church, who have led the struggle against abortion; but their views seem to be held by many non-catholic and non-Christian conservatives, whose political views arise from the fact that they are not believers in the rationalist, materialist paradigm subscribed to by the left.
The embryo research debate has always been a totemic issue. It has been characterised as religion vs science, but the battle is really about a positivist conception of science, which takes the view that science is outside the realm of “morality” as they conceive it; its supporters tend to accept the Voltaire's wrong-headed critique of Christianity and the Catholic church as the enemy of progress and scientific endeavour. This is spite of the fact that the church sponsored research in the medieval and early modern period, that monasteries were hotbeds of technological innovation, that Copernicus was a catholic priest, that Galileo was initially supported by the Pope. Mud sticks, and accumulates if thrown often enough. On the BBC and virtually all mainstream media outlets in Britain, this view is repeated ad nauseam, so the supporters of this world view can take its acceptance for granted.
The supporters of embryo research say that they are supporting science. Well, they should do more to instill discipline into the school system; they should do more to promote manufacturing which needs science to innovate; then scientists would be paid more; while not discouraging girls to do science, maybe they should accept that there is likely to be more men than women in mathemtics and physics and that this is not a bad thing – and is in fact unimportant compared to whether we have qualified people. Embyro research is insignificant in relation to the above issues; yet it gains so much overt support. the conclusion I have reached is that their motivation is ideological, that this is another form of gesture politics. They are not supporting science so much as a liberal view of the world which sees objective science in opposition to conventional morality, as represented especially “religion”, the archetype of which is the liberal bete noire, the catholic church; they are fighting the battle of Galileo against the church all over again. They are not responding to the issue, but have instead laid aside any empirically based decision in favour of ideologically motivated gesture politics.
Surgeons hail stunning breakthrought for “stem cell research” [link] in Bristol. Now there are medical uses for stem cells. A key question, given the recent embryology bill, is whether it is adult stem cells or embryonic stem cells. Why do they omit to say?
We know that so far all of the successful applications of stem cells have come from adult stem cells and that embryo cell applications have not gone beyond their “tremendous promise”. The embryo research issue revealed little understanding of the detail by its supporters; when the fact was noted that embryonic cell research had not as yet brought any medical advances, they told us of the potential for embryonic cell research. This apparently is not seen by private investors, who are putting their money into adult stem cell research; hence the need for scientists working in the field to lobby for state funding.
Supporters of stem cell research tend to be on the liberal side of politics (including supposed “conservatives”). Their take on personal identity which informs the politics is shared by behaviourists of the 20th century and communists in Russia and Eastern Europe. It eschews talk of the soul and fails to find any unifying property that defines an individual. Identity is contingent, incremental, determined by the material. It follows that an embryo is a lot less than human. The opposing view that the embryo is human is associated very much with the catholic church, who have led the struggle against abortion; but their views seem to be held by many non-catholic and non-Christian conservatives, whose political views arise from the fact that they are not believers in the rationalist, materialist paradigm subscribed to by the left.
The embryo research debate has always been a totemic issue. It has been characterised as religion vs science, but the battle is really about a positivist conception of science, which takes the view that science is outside the realm of “morality” as they conceive it; its supporters tend to accept the Voltaire's wrong-headed critique of Christianity and the Catholic church as the enemy of progress and scientific endeavour. This is spite of the fact that the church sponsored research in the medieval and early modern period, that monasteries were hotbeds of technological innovation, that Copernicus was a catholic priest, that Galileo was initially supported by the Pope. Mud sticks, and accumulates if thrown often enough. On the BBC and virtually all mainstream media outlets in Britain, this view is repeated ad nauseam, so the supporters of this world view can take its acceptance for granted.
The supporters of embryo research say that they are supporting science. Well, they should do more to instill discipline into the school system; they should do more to promote manufacturing which needs science to innovate; then scientists would be paid more; while not discouraging girls to do science, maybe they should accept that there is likely to be more men than women in mathemtics and physics and that this is not a bad thing – and is in fact unimportant compared to whether we have qualified people. Embyro research is insignificant in relation to the above issues; yet it gains so much overt support. the conclusion I have reached is that their motivation is ideological, that this is another form of gesture politics. They are not supporting science so much as a liberal view of the world which sees objective science in opposition to conventional morality, as represented especially “religion”, the archetype of which is the liberal bete noire, the catholic church; they are fighting the battle of Galileo against the church all over again. They are not responding to the issue, but have instead laid aside any empirically based decision in favour of ideologically motivated gesture politics.
Manufacturing is the priority
An apparent sub-plot to the financial crisis, the future of the american ar industry is of greater importance in the long term than the economic impact of the current recession. The financial crisis is a wake up call – because it is better to stop now before the debt situation gets even worse. Refreshingly, it sweeps away much of the vapid optimism about liberal progress, free trade etc. The agenda of world government is partly revealed in Gordon Brown's calls for governance of the financial and economic sphere. We get down to brass tacks.
Yet a short-term consequence of this crisis is the meltdown in the US car industry, All three US manufacturers could close with a loss of 300,000 direct jobs and apparently 2.5 million indirect jobs. Whole states will be decimated in economic terms and national employment would rise to 10%. The future of the US as a manufacturing country hangs in the balance: this impacts on the viability of the US as a great power because scientific and technological advances are stimulated by a healthy manufacturing sector. America is a country where the ideology of internationalism is not as dominant as here and popular feeling is voiced more strongly than in Britain, where there are not the political and media diffusion of power to challenge the established view that manufacturing is not necessary. That this is the establishment view is evidenced by the Rover crisis, where no major party would dare raise the issue of saving the company by British finance. Instead, we practically gave it to the Chinese, who fleeced it for its research and development portfolio, so hastening their march to industrial and technological supremacy. I am not blaming the Chinese; they are simply advancing their own interests by legitimate means; however, we are allowing ourselves to become weak. The ideology of facile internationalism is the the opiate that makes industrial suicide palatable.
Yet a short-term consequence of this crisis is the meltdown in the US car industry, All three US manufacturers could close with a loss of 300,000 direct jobs and apparently 2.5 million indirect jobs. Whole states will be decimated in economic terms and national employment would rise to 10%. The future of the US as a manufacturing country hangs in the balance: this impacts on the viability of the US as a great power because scientific and technological advances are stimulated by a healthy manufacturing sector. America is a country where the ideology of internationalism is not as dominant as here and popular feeling is voiced more strongly than in Britain, where there are not the political and media diffusion of power to challenge the established view that manufacturing is not necessary. That this is the establishment view is evidenced by the Rover crisis, where no major party would dare raise the issue of saving the company by British finance. Instead, we practically gave it to the Chinese, who fleeced it for its research and development portfolio, so hastening their march to industrial and technological supremacy. I am not blaming the Chinese; they are simply advancing their own interests by legitimate means; however, we are allowing ourselves to become weak. The ideology of facile internationalism is the the opiate that makes industrial suicide palatable.
Tuesday 18 November 2008
Bernardos demonises adults
Bernardos video on adults' attitudes to children paints a supposedly damning picture of adult's humanity to child. I can't help but be suspicious however as to the questions asked. It sounds like there a conflation between children in general and children involved in social disorder and/or criminality. The real comments made by adults are taken out of context. For example, “More than a third of the adults they questioned agreed with the statement that the streets were "infested" with children”, suggest Bernardos. I note here that the only word in quotes is “infested”. So what was the original question? Other quotes offered by the Bernardos film: “they wander in packs”; “vermin”; “to hell with their human rights”. Well, many people may vent their feelings in relation to violent or anti-social children; did they actually say this about children as a class? The advertisement is very ambiguous. It uses real quotations, but is a dramatization of a fictional incident where adults, indulging in these comments, work themselves up to go about shooting children.
http://www.barnardos.org.uk/ for the video.
The dramatisation bears no relation to what is happening in Britain today; there are no shooting gangs. That I have to say this is itself incredible but here we have a major, state-funded charity, in all seriousness and moral indignation, peddling this ridiculous picture of the world. Not only is it ridiculous but it is quite vicious in that it seems to suggest that all adults who complain about children are about to murder them; it is sentimental in that children are portrayed uniformly as victims of adults.
The Today programme took it seriously; maybe they felt that they had to be objective. They conducted an interview with teenagers who were shown the video. Surprise, surprise, the youngsters felt victimised and misunderstood; as one said, “just because some children misbehave, it doesn’t mean we should all be shot”. Of course it doesn’t but these impressionable children were swayed by the video; they felt they were victimized by malicious adulthood because they were young people. This is the picture Bernardos wanted to paint and why wouldn't the more naïve among us be taken in by it? The Barnardos video is close to an incitement to misbehave in that it reinforces the impression among those sections of sociey who refuse to accept that they are answerable to anyone of any age that none of it is their fault or responsibility; it is the fault of society, of adults. Responsible, moral children meanwhile are left unprotected. Bernardos is supposed to be a respectable national charity, whose brief is to “protect children”? Most people in this country believe that charities have a neutral agenda, but a look at the Bernardos website betrays its leftist bias.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_7732000/7732723.stm. The excerpt is from 8.45am.
This is an example of a charity with an agenda manufacturing a problem by grossly distorting reality.
Many “children” being referred to will in fact be teenagers who if not wise enough to be seen as adults are closer to adulthood than childhood. Many children will have the rights of adults in that you can't handle or restrain them when they misbehave; and if you say boo to them, they are liable to threaten you in return. Not all children, Bernardos would say; well, of course not, but clearly some of them. This is Bernardos' trap.
The most prevalent assumption seems to be that there is an absolute divide between adults and children; on the contrary many adults have children, and most children live with parents. This absolute divide that Benardos posits mirrors the marxist divide between bourgeois oppressors and oppressed proletariat, which itself became the template for radical feminism and black rights: for bourgeois and proletariat, read men and women, black and white. It is the assumption behind political correctness, which is why the rules of political correctness are so selective and unfair. Now we have oppressor adults and oppressed children – and never the twain shall meet, except in inter-generational revolutionary conflict.
This is false since most children are brought up by adults who love them, provide for their material well-being and formation. Youngsters need guidance from adults; they take their cues from the attitudes and behaviour of their parents. Empirically, something not covered by the Bernardo's visits, problem families lead to problem children. Let us not forget that the usual victims of youth violence are young people themselves: playground bullying, stealing mobile phones. I remember one incident a few years ago at a bus stop when a number of youths surrounded another youth for his mobile phone: no adult at this crowded bus stop was doing anything to help the young teenager,who was frightened; I asked them if everything was alright, because I was unsure if this was not just pranks among friends; one of the perpretrators said don'be a hero; as they were all about 12, I was courageous enough to look him in the eye and say “I wasn't talking to you”, which shocked him into silence. The victim then begged me, “leave it, don't interfere”; he was clearly frightened, but it was enough to confuse me: would I make it worse for him the next day? did they all know each other? The bus came and the gang of children got on the bus, as did I; they were jumping up and down laughing and in their hands was the other teenager's mobile phone. They got off the bus the next stop. None of us adults managed to prevent a mugging and a humiliated child. They were all about 12 or 13, I would estimate; had they been 15/16, would I have interfered?
This incident demonstrates the fallacy of Bernardo's portrayal. I suspect that in general, we should conceive of young people less as a class separated from older people; more as putative adults, whose closest ties are to their parents, teachers, older and younger siblings. Rather than emphasing horizontal stratification based on supposed alienation and oppression, we should encourage vertical integration among the generations. This makes sense because, rather than being an homogenous group with common interests, children often pray on children. They need protecting and adults are meant to protect them: to allow children to push the boundaries but keep them broadly inside the pale of good behaviour. The real inhumanity is when we adults step aside.
Bernardos is state funded and as state aid always ends up as state control, we must suspect that the perspective of Bernardos is left-learning liberal in orientaton. One of the major mistakes of the left this century is the belief that if someone commits a crime, it is because he is alienated by society, that the responsibility lies with someone else, probably the victim or the class/race/sex/age group to which he belongs.
http://www.barnardos.org.uk/ for the video.
The dramatisation bears no relation to what is happening in Britain today; there are no shooting gangs. That I have to say this is itself incredible but here we have a major, state-funded charity, in all seriousness and moral indignation, peddling this ridiculous picture of the world. Not only is it ridiculous but it is quite vicious in that it seems to suggest that all adults who complain about children are about to murder them; it is sentimental in that children are portrayed uniformly as victims of adults.
The Today programme took it seriously; maybe they felt that they had to be objective. They conducted an interview with teenagers who were shown the video. Surprise, surprise, the youngsters felt victimised and misunderstood; as one said, “just because some children misbehave, it doesn’t mean we should all be shot”. Of course it doesn’t but these impressionable children were swayed by the video; they felt they were victimized by malicious adulthood because they were young people. This is the picture Bernardos wanted to paint and why wouldn't the more naïve among us be taken in by it? The Barnardos video is close to an incitement to misbehave in that it reinforces the impression among those sections of sociey who refuse to accept that they are answerable to anyone of any age that none of it is their fault or responsibility; it is the fault of society, of adults. Responsible, moral children meanwhile are left unprotected. Bernardos is supposed to be a respectable national charity, whose brief is to “protect children”? Most people in this country believe that charities have a neutral agenda, but a look at the Bernardos website betrays its leftist bias.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_7732000/7732723.stm. The excerpt is from 8.45am.
This is an example of a charity with an agenda manufacturing a problem by grossly distorting reality.
Many “children” being referred to will in fact be teenagers who if not wise enough to be seen as adults are closer to adulthood than childhood. Many children will have the rights of adults in that you can't handle or restrain them when they misbehave; and if you say boo to them, they are liable to threaten you in return. Not all children, Bernardos would say; well, of course not, but clearly some of them. This is Bernardos' trap.
The most prevalent assumption seems to be that there is an absolute divide between adults and children; on the contrary many adults have children, and most children live with parents. This absolute divide that Benardos posits mirrors the marxist divide between bourgeois oppressors and oppressed proletariat, which itself became the template for radical feminism and black rights: for bourgeois and proletariat, read men and women, black and white. It is the assumption behind political correctness, which is why the rules of political correctness are so selective and unfair. Now we have oppressor adults and oppressed children – and never the twain shall meet, except in inter-generational revolutionary conflict.
This is false since most children are brought up by adults who love them, provide for their material well-being and formation. Youngsters need guidance from adults; they take their cues from the attitudes and behaviour of their parents. Empirically, something not covered by the Bernardo's visits, problem families lead to problem children. Let us not forget that the usual victims of youth violence are young people themselves: playground bullying, stealing mobile phones. I remember one incident a few years ago at a bus stop when a number of youths surrounded another youth for his mobile phone: no adult at this crowded bus stop was doing anything to help the young teenager,who was frightened; I asked them if everything was alright, because I was unsure if this was not just pranks among friends; one of the perpretrators said don'be a hero; as they were all about 12, I was courageous enough to look him in the eye and say “I wasn't talking to you”, which shocked him into silence. The victim then begged me, “leave it, don't interfere”; he was clearly frightened, but it was enough to confuse me: would I make it worse for him the next day? did they all know each other? The bus came and the gang of children got on the bus, as did I; they were jumping up and down laughing and in their hands was the other teenager's mobile phone. They got off the bus the next stop. None of us adults managed to prevent a mugging and a humiliated child. They were all about 12 or 13, I would estimate; had they been 15/16, would I have interfered?
This incident demonstrates the fallacy of Bernardo's portrayal. I suspect that in general, we should conceive of young people less as a class separated from older people; more as putative adults, whose closest ties are to their parents, teachers, older and younger siblings. Rather than emphasing horizontal stratification based on supposed alienation and oppression, we should encourage vertical integration among the generations. This makes sense because, rather than being an homogenous group with common interests, children often pray on children. They need protecting and adults are meant to protect them: to allow children to push the boundaries but keep them broadly inside the pale of good behaviour. The real inhumanity is when we adults step aside.
Bernardos is state funded and as state aid always ends up as state control, we must suspect that the perspective of Bernardos is left-learning liberal in orientaton. One of the major mistakes of the left this century is the belief that if someone commits a crime, it is because he is alienated by society, that the responsibility lies with someone else, probably the victim or the class/race/sex/age group to which he belongs.
Friday 14 November 2008
The failure of our capitalism, not theirs
13/11/08
As announced on the BBC Today programme, Bush will defend free-market capitalism today. Nothing wrong with this economically as long as it pays its way; but our capitalism (i.e., in the west except Germany) is consumption-driven and debt-led; to keep ourselves in the race militarily and scientifically, a manufacturing base is needed. That is the inconvenient fact. As ever, our leaders defend this discredited form of Capitalism by saying “it increases growth and pulls more people out of poverty” – these are the justifications Bush has used. Compared to Socialism, I’m sure he is right; but Socialism is the straw man, the defeated enemy of the 20th century; the real question is what form of Capitalism we will have in the future.
“It increases growth and pulls more people out of poverty”. Well, let’s look at this: we have seen Gordon Brown increase growth by allowing unrestricted immigration and boasting about GDP growth more people means a bigger economy unless per capita wealth goes down; per capita income hasn’t increased so people are not better off. As for “lifting people out of poverty”, well it is the Chinese form of Capitalism which is lifting their people out of poverty, albeit perhaps more quickly than if the West were less profligate in spending more than we earn; meanwhile, it is our form of Capitalism which is slowly impoverishing us. There is nothing wrong with us buying Chinese goods in moderation; it is the scale of the trade balance which is so destructive on the balance of power in the world, our ability to pay our way and, ultimately, to maintain our military capacity.
I would also question how the vast surpluses held by China are helping Chinese peasantry given the practical difficulties that generally obtain when large amounts of money are channelled quickly into development projects. We know that a lot of the Chinese surplus is in Sovereign Wealth funds and invested in the West. The sheer scale and speed of wealth transfer from west to east, I suspect, leads to diminishing returns in the battle against poverty.
Lastly, we see that defenders of an unconditional pure-free trade policy (in a world where import tariffs are very common) gloss over how we disadvantage ourselves in relation to our competitors; in the final analysis their justification for it is based not on how it benefits their own societies, but how it benefits others. The Bush presidency created a lot of jobs in China; what about jobs for Americans? That is, jobs that pay well because they create wealth for their society rather than channel it around. We are lifting other people out of poverty, supposedly, but a smaller deficit would probably have a similar effect; what is certain is that we have been gradually impoverishing ourselves. The financial crisis is payback for our profligacy and debt-fuelled optimism.
As announced on the BBC Today programme, Bush will defend free-market capitalism today. Nothing wrong with this economically as long as it pays its way; but our capitalism (i.e., in the west except Germany) is consumption-driven and debt-led; to keep ourselves in the race militarily and scientifically, a manufacturing base is needed. That is the inconvenient fact. As ever, our leaders defend this discredited form of Capitalism by saying “it increases growth and pulls more people out of poverty” – these are the justifications Bush has used. Compared to Socialism, I’m sure he is right; but Socialism is the straw man, the defeated enemy of the 20th century; the real question is what form of Capitalism we will have in the future.
“It increases growth and pulls more people out of poverty”. Well, let’s look at this: we have seen Gordon Brown increase growth by allowing unrestricted immigration and boasting about GDP growth more people means a bigger economy unless per capita wealth goes down; per capita income hasn’t increased so people are not better off. As for “lifting people out of poverty”, well it is the Chinese form of Capitalism which is lifting their people out of poverty, albeit perhaps more quickly than if the West were less profligate in spending more than we earn; meanwhile, it is our form of Capitalism which is slowly impoverishing us. There is nothing wrong with us buying Chinese goods in moderation; it is the scale of the trade balance which is so destructive on the balance of power in the world, our ability to pay our way and, ultimately, to maintain our military capacity.
I would also question how the vast surpluses held by China are helping Chinese peasantry given the practical difficulties that generally obtain when large amounts of money are channelled quickly into development projects. We know that a lot of the Chinese surplus is in Sovereign Wealth funds and invested in the West. The sheer scale and speed of wealth transfer from west to east, I suspect, leads to diminishing returns in the battle against poverty.
Lastly, we see that defenders of an unconditional pure-free trade policy (in a world where import tariffs are very common) gloss over how we disadvantage ourselves in relation to our competitors; in the final analysis their justification for it is based not on how it benefits their own societies, but how it benefits others. The Bush presidency created a lot of jobs in China; what about jobs for Americans? That is, jobs that pay well because they create wealth for their society rather than channel it around. We are lifting other people out of poverty, supposedly, but a smaller deficit would probably have a similar effect; what is certain is that we have been gradually impoverishing ourselves. The financial crisis is payback for our profligacy and debt-fuelled optimism.
Michael Gove and Barrack Obama: liberal progressives
One of the most depressing articles I have read in a paper recently was Michael Gove’s in the Telegraph on Sat 8 November [link], expressing ideological solidarity with Obama. Depressing because the conservatives are meant to be the opposition to the liberal consensus. Gove is in charge of the education remit and the conservatives’ plans on vouchers for schools is one of their few reasons they have given so far to support them; the alarm bells started ringing when he talked about McCain fitting in with the moder conservative party because of e.g., liberal immigration policy and being an unabashed neo-conservative. Ironic that a policy of violating the sovereignty of others is seen as consistent with failing to defend your own; how bringing democracy to others means holding the views of your own people in contempt; immigration has been the top concern of British people in polls, with 70% saying there is too much; but enough, I digress …
The wider point to consider is how readily Neo-Conservatism sits with left-leaning liberalism; though Neo-Conservatism is often seen as an ideology of the right, do not forget that many conservatives opposed the war; and much of the left supported it. Think of Neil Ferguson and his half-baked arguments in “Colossus” (history, supposedly); Tony Blair and his doctrine of liberal interventionism, Christopher Hitchens; Thomas Friedman, with his flat-earth liberal optimism about the effects of globalisation and free trade. Be aware that David Frum is arguing that the Republicans should move away, Cameron-like, from social conservatism.
“Neo-conservatism” is really a progressive philosophy, version of internationalism whose proponents, unlike the traditional left, find the rest of the world lacking in its capacity to organise the path of progress to liberal utopia, in which they and their left-wing opponents have placed their faith. They therefore seek to reform the world by extraordinary means. The stated objectives of the neo-cons are much the same as those of the liberal-left: having gained control of the west, they seek to export their internationalist ideology to overthrow traditional structures of problem societies and create a new modern order based on rational virtues. This is the same project ultimately that was pursued by the Jacobins of the French Revolution. Remember that “Liberty” (as they conceived it) was part of the revolutionary agenda – it wasn’t just Equality and Fraternity.
The wider point to consider is how readily Neo-Conservatism sits with left-leaning liberalism; though Neo-Conservatism is often seen as an ideology of the right, do not forget that many conservatives opposed the war; and much of the left supported it. Think of Neil Ferguson and his half-baked arguments in “Colossus” (history, supposedly); Tony Blair and his doctrine of liberal interventionism, Christopher Hitchens; Thomas Friedman, with his flat-earth liberal optimism about the effects of globalisation and free trade. Be aware that David Frum is arguing that the Republicans should move away, Cameron-like, from social conservatism.
“Neo-conservatism” is really a progressive philosophy, version of internationalism whose proponents, unlike the traditional left, find the rest of the world lacking in its capacity to organise the path of progress to liberal utopia, in which they and their left-wing opponents have placed their faith. They therefore seek to reform the world by extraordinary means. The stated objectives of the neo-cons are much the same as those of the liberal-left: having gained control of the west, they seek to export their internationalist ideology to overthrow traditional structures of problem societies and create a new modern order based on rational virtues. This is the same project ultimately that was pursued by the Jacobins of the French Revolution. Remember that “Liberty” (as they conceived it) was part of the revolutionary agenda – it wasn’t just Equality and Fraternity.
BBC Empire: don't discuss the birth rate
Today Programme, Friday 7 November 2008
Edward Stourton ws interviewing an economist on the effects of an aging population on our society over the next 20 years. He was saying that they would be immense. Intriguingly, Stourton offered two solutions: 1) more immigration; and 2) a change in work practices. Bravely, the economist said that the scale of immigration needed to solve the problem would be so great as to be unrealistic and that even at current levels it was causing social problems. They then concentrated on work practices, which seems to have some mileage.
The elephant in the room here is the declining birth rate and the proposal that we try to increase it. Why is this rather obvious alternative not even mentioned? This is not a left/right issue as the right have tended to ignore it; and in spite of 80’s feminism, many on the left admit that it would be beneficial to increase the birth rate. Polly Toynbee said that many women would like to have more children; a minister implied that we had a duty to have more children; left-of-centre think-tank noted that women in their 20’s were not having children.
The BBC as far as I am aware did not pick up on the pro-natalist report published by the Sky broadcaster, Colin Brazier for Civitas http://www.civitas.org.uk/pdf/CivitasReviewAug08.pdf. So why we are so afraid of promoting something that many see as beneficial for the women of our society and good for society in the round?
Edward Stourton ws interviewing an economist on the effects of an aging population on our society over the next 20 years. He was saying that they would be immense. Intriguingly, Stourton offered two solutions: 1) more immigration; and 2) a change in work practices. Bravely, the economist said that the scale of immigration needed to solve the problem would be so great as to be unrealistic and that even at current levels it was causing social problems. They then concentrated on work practices, which seems to have some mileage.
The elephant in the room here is the declining birth rate and the proposal that we try to increase it. Why is this rather obvious alternative not even mentioned? This is not a left/right issue as the right have tended to ignore it; and in spite of 80’s feminism, many on the left admit that it would be beneficial to increase the birth rate. Polly Toynbee said that many women would like to have more children; a minister implied that we had a duty to have more children; left-of-centre think-tank noted that women in their 20’s were not having children.
The BBC as far as I am aware did not pick up on the pro-natalist report published by the Sky broadcaster, Colin Brazier for Civitas http://www.civitas.org.uk/pdf/CivitasReviewAug08.pdf. So why we are so afraid of promoting something that many see as beneficial for the women of our society and good for society in the round?
Tuesday 11 November 2008
tax cuts to help the middle classes
On the subject of tax cuts, helping small businesses is a good idea - I agree with Cameron for that, but, given the fiscal circumstances, a rise in the top rate of taxt to 42%-45% would be part of a new just dispensation after the years of neo-liberalism; it would also be prudent politically, because you cannot keep expecting ordinary people to take the hit in the name of freedom or or capitalism. Let the rich take on some of the burden, which at the moment is taken by the middle classes. We live in a society where the underclass can live happily on benefits, the elite are cushioned from the disfunctionality of the welfare society, but the ordinary, hard working people are being squeezed. An increase in top rate of tax will help our borrowing requirement and redistribute the burden at this time of trouble.
The conservatives need to get on the right side of this issue. Drip-down economics is part of the ideology of doctrinaire economic (neo)-liberalism. If Brown raises taxes, it will deal a heavy blow to the tories.
The conservatives need to get on the right side of this issue. Drip-down economics is part of the ideology of doctrinaire economic (neo)-liberalism. If Brown raises taxes, it will deal a heavy blow to the tories.
Tuesday 21 October 2008
Conservative cowardice
There is much talk of a snap election in Spring 09 with the tories having the jitters and labour given new hope. First thing to say is that four years is long enough for any government to carry out their policies for which they were elected, as shown by the fact that successful governments go to the people after this period; the five year gap is for governments who are seen as past their prime, whose failures are reflected in their poll ratings, who hang on for that very reason, that they know they have lost their popular mandate. We saw this with the Major government and until the financial crisis, it was as equally apparent in the labour government. How long, we opined, will this tedious business continue: failed policies, discredited ideology, the endless waiting for a change of government. Now we are not so sure. We all thought 2010, but no. The seeming success of the financial crisis has given the tired ideologues of the Gordon Brown regime fresh impetus. The spin and downright mendacity continues with wilder abandon, the odious Yvette Cooper, virtually unchallenged, filling every Radio 4 programme (the BBC supports you, Prime Minister) with the mantra that the banks got themselves into a mess, and it is the benign Gordon Brown government that is getting them out of it.
Meanwhile the Tories, previously coasting so uncontroversially to victory, are now afraid they will lose. No wonder, because on nearly all the fundamental ideological issues where clearly the government has been on the wrong side, the conservatives deliberately refused to distance themselves: the green debate and energy supply (currently being sabotaged by the government), immigration, debt, the over-reliance on the finance sector. Where has the opposition been? Such cowardice deserves another labour victory, even if the country does not.
Meanwhile the Tories, previously coasting so uncontroversially to victory, are now afraid they will lose. No wonder, because on nearly all the fundamental ideological issues where clearly the government has been on the wrong side, the conservatives deliberately refused to distance themselves: the green debate and energy supply (currently being sabotaged by the government), immigration, debt, the over-reliance on the finance sector. Where has the opposition been? Such cowardice deserves another labour victory, even if the country does not.
Tuesday 30 September 2008
BBC bias on America - index of banned books
I listened to the AM slot 9-9.45, 22nd September, to hear a discussion about the United States, which concentrated on America's Achilles heel, race. It was inspired by the current presidential race and the issues separating the candidates - but don't expect to hear both sides of the story. Moderated by Justin Webb, leftist America correspondent for the BBC, the world's premier left-wing News organisation (funded by the British Taxpayer, but never mind), had invited onto the programme as guests three Americans: a socialist sympathiser, a woman called Castillo and Sidney Shelby, who was black. For much of the programme there was the usual unanimity of opinion between the participants, all of whom seemed to have been invited on in order to be critical of the United States, its institutions and its history. In fact, the tone of the debate was unremittingly negative, concentrating on Racism and exploitation, the exception being the occasional comment from the African American Shelby, such as that the US eventually got round to facing these issues and deserved some credit for having faced them, unlike other countries.
At one stage, about 40 minutes in of a 45 minute programme, when Shelby started talking up America - "but the problem for Black people is within their own culture" or words to that effect, and that there was something about the US to be admired, Webb jumped in and calmly remonstrated with him for departing from the script. Shelby was black and alone amongst the participants in showing a belief in the virtues of hard work and wealth creation. At the end, the socialist said that wealth was "given disproportionately to the rich" and Shelby heatedly disagreed saying they worked for it. At last an argument after 45 minutes of typical BBC discussion show group think. Then Justin Webb wrapped it up, with Shelby the only dissenting voice from the enlightened message that Justin wanted to dispense. Presumably he was only invited on because he was black and it was assumed that he would follow the opinions of the white liberals and leftists on the show. When he didn't play the part written for him, Webb, supposed objective, gently reminded him of the error of his ways. In spite of Shelby being off-message, Shelby was similar to the others in being distrustful of religion and seemed to dislike social conservatism. So the republicans had no friends in this debate.
What is the point of discussing Evangelicals or Social conservatism if you don't get one of these evangelicals or social conservatives on board? Are they some exotic tribe that can't represent themselves? Presumably Webb put the programme together with a view to promoting a certain message and he chose people whom he thought could be relied on to promote it. What an abuse of the taxpayer's money by the so-called National Broadcaster. What a charade. Well done to Shelby for not playing along.
The BBC has an index of banned books, I'm sure. Top of the list is "Can we trust the BBC?" by Robin Aitken, which has never been mentioned once on the airways of the Nation's broadcaster. Too bad for free debate because the BBC controls 87% of the broadcast media. "State of Emergency" by Pat Buchanan on the immigrant invasion of the United States is no doubt another. Clash of civilisations another. The term appears only as a cardboard charactature argument to be refuted by leftist commentators.
At one stage, about 40 minutes in of a 45 minute programme, when Shelby started talking up America - "but the problem for Black people is within their own culture" or words to that effect, and that there was something about the US to be admired, Webb jumped in and calmly remonstrated with him for departing from the script. Shelby was black and alone amongst the participants in showing a belief in the virtues of hard work and wealth creation. At the end, the socialist said that wealth was "given disproportionately to the rich" and Shelby heatedly disagreed saying they worked for it. At last an argument after 45 minutes of typical BBC discussion show group think. Then Justin Webb wrapped it up, with Shelby the only dissenting voice from the enlightened message that Justin wanted to dispense. Presumably he was only invited on because he was black and it was assumed that he would follow the opinions of the white liberals and leftists on the show. When he didn't play the part written for him, Webb, supposed objective, gently reminded him of the error of his ways. In spite of Shelby being off-message, Shelby was similar to the others in being distrustful of religion and seemed to dislike social conservatism. So the republicans had no friends in this debate.
What is the point of discussing Evangelicals or Social conservatism if you don't get one of these evangelicals or social conservatives on board? Are they some exotic tribe that can't represent themselves? Presumably Webb put the programme together with a view to promoting a certain message and he chose people whom he thought could be relied on to promote it. What an abuse of the taxpayer's money by the so-called National Broadcaster. What a charade. Well done to Shelby for not playing along.
The BBC has an index of banned books, I'm sure. Top of the list is "Can we trust the BBC?" by Robin Aitken, which has never been mentioned once on the airways of the Nation's broadcaster. Too bad for free debate because the BBC controls 87% of the broadcast media. "State of Emergency" by Pat Buchanan on the immigrant invasion of the United States is no doubt another. Clash of civilisations another. The term appears only as a cardboard charactature argument to be refuted by leftist commentators.
One type of capitalism has failed: ours
We hear a lot of talk at the moment of the failure of capitalism. Certainly, this is the failure of a version of capitalism, the one that, in an environment of world-wide transfers of capital, emphasises consumption as the engine of growth rather than production. The idea was that if you have easy credit, low interest rates and low income taxes, especially for the rich, this stimulates growth. It stimulates spending, but unlike in the 50’s, the money does not stimulate industrial production at home to anything like the same degree. In an era of untrammelled free trade with global movements of capital and people, the extra money in peoples’ pockets goes in large proportion on foreign goods, rather than supporting home-grown industrial jobs; low interest rates have stimulated a housing bubble an incentive to borrow; cheap borrowing with weak credit controls have encouraged a culture of debt, much of the spending siphoned off to an overpriced asset, the housing market or to increasing the balance of payment surpluses of other (non-western) countries. Laissez-faire economists will say that it is the best of all possible worlds for everyone – well, it is good for those countries who are selling to us: they make money, which enables their companies and their governments (SWFs) to invest in their own countries and to buy up large chunks of ours. We are lifting millions of people out of poverty, they say. Yes, but we cannot keep spending more money than we earn: that is a recipe for impoverishment of the West, and for a decline in our power and prestige, even our ability to defend ourselves. Military capacity needs money and an industrial base.
Just as the political and social project of exporting liberal democracy floundered in Iraq, so the economic liberalism of Bush, McCain, Blair and Brown has struck aground on bad debt and over-reliance on the benefits of globalisation, not enough care for its dangers.
As for those who say Capitalism itself has failed, well look at China's more nationalistic, state-controlled, production-based version.
Just as the political and social project of exporting liberal democracy floundered in Iraq, so the economic liberalism of Bush, McCain, Blair and Brown has struck aground on bad debt and over-reliance on the benefits of globalisation, not enough care for its dangers.
As for those who say Capitalism itself has failed, well look at China's more nationalistic, state-controlled, production-based version.
Saturday 27 September 2008
nation first - ditch the religion of free trade
I believe in trade, I believe in free trade where appropriate; but I do not believe in the religion of Free Trade, no matter what the consequences may be to our national standing. The imperative of any government should be the security of our citizens, their prosperity and their freedom. Free Trade policies as pursued today threaten all of these.
In our political climate, it is dangerous heresy to say this: both Labour, Liberal Democrat and Conservatives support the orthodoxy that liberal economics was the one way, eventually to be adopted by the world. Only it is not being adopted: the most successful economies, China and Japan, have high tariffs; China does not allow its currency to float free on the exchange markets, they keep it low in order to promote exports and increase their industrial capacity. They are not adopting free trade because they don’t need it; they leave it for us to make it easier for them. True believers in Free Trade say that this is the best of all possible worlds, that it pulls millions out of poverty; they neglect to say that it is impoverishing the western world and putting our people into poverty instead. The economy has boomed over the last 15 years, but it has been accompanied by an unparalled increase in debt; the consumer boom is paid for by borrowing, not by wealth production. See how many companies are being bought by Far Eastern and Middle Eastern funds, many of them, Sovereign Wealth Funds, owned by foreign governments. The western world is strapped for cash; why because we have no commodities and our production is overseas.
In the 19th century USA and Germany pursued policies based on production, not consumption. By the early 20th century, these were the economic powerhouses of the world; Britain, which believed in Free Trade unconditionally was in industrial decline. For all its communism, Stalin succeeded in finishing the industrialisation of the USSR; and it is the constraints imposed on African Governments by the west, which prevent African economies, flooded with goods from outside, from increasing production.
Though not in a particularly healthy state, the best performing western country in terms of balance of payments is Germany, a far cry from the moribund economy characterised by liberal “flat-earth” ideologues at the start of the Iraq War, when neo-con/liberal hubris was at its height. Its export-led recovery from 2005 was based on not anticipated by those who promoted debt in Britain and America.
Free trade at any cost is part of the ideology of western suicide. As we lose our industrial base, we lose our capacity to influence events in the world, as well as our ability to control our own affairs. Without an industrial capacity, we will lose our military capacity as well; a de-industrialised nation cannot defend itself against armies backed by advanced industrial economies. Coupled with the demographic decline caused by low birth rates, this spells disaster for the West.
How have we accepted this? Part of the answer is the facile internationalism that passes for enlightened policy amongst the liberal elites and the left. Before the fall of the Soviet Union, socialism was seen as the means to bring the world together, to eliminate conflict, to encourage all countries to buy into the values of progress and prosperity. With the fall of Communism, those same socialists became capitalists but they kept their internationalist ideology. Now free trade is the way to eliminate national and ethnic conflict; now free trade would redistribute wealth; now free trade would make people abandon their regressive cultures and adopt the ways of the enlightened west.
It hasn’t happened: the west has become more impoverished, a not very creditable role model. The rest of the world ignore us because they see how we are failing.
One of the features of life under new labour has been the increase in inequality – not between the oppressed poor and the rest, as the left would have had us believe; but between the elites and the rest. Investment bankers have made millions and have bought the best houses, outpricing professional families; non-domicile millionaires live in Britain, used our public services, put up house prices, without being taxed. Those who didn’t work get benefits to pay for drugs and idleness; they get a council house; any immigrant who rolls up with a torn-up passport and a family gets a council house too – as well as other benefits. The deserving poor can’t get a council house and they can’t buy a house as well; house prices have gone up while immigrants have driven down wages.
If you are very rich it is OK; if you very poor you get benefits. The people who are suffering are the hard-working ordinary people. They pay for the excesses of the bankers and finance the drugs culture of the underclass. Brown and livingstone say this is OK, as long as they can finance their welfare policies.
solution
We have to pursue policies that benefit our own people. It calls for a major change of strategic direction: abandon unlimited free trade, promote our own industrial base, eliminate the culture of debt, stop taxing the ordinary people, help them have more children. Stop benefits for the underclass and for the elites.
In our political climate, it is dangerous heresy to say this: both Labour, Liberal Democrat and Conservatives support the orthodoxy that liberal economics was the one way, eventually to be adopted by the world. Only it is not being adopted: the most successful economies, China and Japan, have high tariffs; China does not allow its currency to float free on the exchange markets, they keep it low in order to promote exports and increase their industrial capacity. They are not adopting free trade because they don’t need it; they leave it for us to make it easier for them. True believers in Free Trade say that this is the best of all possible worlds, that it pulls millions out of poverty; they neglect to say that it is impoverishing the western world and putting our people into poverty instead. The economy has boomed over the last 15 years, but it has been accompanied by an unparalled increase in debt; the consumer boom is paid for by borrowing, not by wealth production. See how many companies are being bought by Far Eastern and Middle Eastern funds, many of them, Sovereign Wealth Funds, owned by foreign governments. The western world is strapped for cash; why because we have no commodities and our production is overseas.
In the 19th century USA and Germany pursued policies based on production, not consumption. By the early 20th century, these were the economic powerhouses of the world; Britain, which believed in Free Trade unconditionally was in industrial decline. For all its communism, Stalin succeeded in finishing the industrialisation of the USSR; and it is the constraints imposed on African Governments by the west, which prevent African economies, flooded with goods from outside, from increasing production.
Though not in a particularly healthy state, the best performing western country in terms of balance of payments is Germany, a far cry from the moribund economy characterised by liberal “flat-earth” ideologues at the start of the Iraq War, when neo-con/liberal hubris was at its height. Its export-led recovery from 2005 was based on not anticipated by those who promoted debt in Britain and America.
Free trade at any cost is part of the ideology of western suicide. As we lose our industrial base, we lose our capacity to influence events in the world, as well as our ability to control our own affairs. Without an industrial capacity, we will lose our military capacity as well; a de-industrialised nation cannot defend itself against armies backed by advanced industrial economies. Coupled with the demographic decline caused by low birth rates, this spells disaster for the West.
How have we accepted this? Part of the answer is the facile internationalism that passes for enlightened policy amongst the liberal elites and the left. Before the fall of the Soviet Union, socialism was seen as the means to bring the world together, to eliminate conflict, to encourage all countries to buy into the values of progress and prosperity. With the fall of Communism, those same socialists became capitalists but they kept their internationalist ideology. Now free trade is the way to eliminate national and ethnic conflict; now free trade would redistribute wealth; now free trade would make people abandon their regressive cultures and adopt the ways of the enlightened west.
It hasn’t happened: the west has become more impoverished, a not very creditable role model. The rest of the world ignore us because they see how we are failing.
One of the features of life under new labour has been the increase in inequality – not between the oppressed poor and the rest, as the left would have had us believe; but between the elites and the rest. Investment bankers have made millions and have bought the best houses, outpricing professional families; non-domicile millionaires live in Britain, used our public services, put up house prices, without being taxed. Those who didn’t work get benefits to pay for drugs and idleness; they get a council house; any immigrant who rolls up with a torn-up passport and a family gets a council house too – as well as other benefits. The deserving poor can’t get a council house and they can’t buy a house as well; house prices have gone up while immigrants have driven down wages.
If you are very rich it is OK; if you very poor you get benefits. The people who are suffering are the hard-working ordinary people. They pay for the excesses of the bankers and finance the drugs culture of the underclass. Brown and livingstone say this is OK, as long as they can finance their welfare policies.
solution
We have to pursue policies that benefit our own people. It calls for a major change of strategic direction: abandon unlimited free trade, promote our own industrial base, eliminate the culture of debt, stop taxing the ordinary people, help them have more children. Stop benefits for the underclass and for the elites.
Monday 15 September 2008
The damage done by abortion to women
Contrary to the euphemistic reassurances of the abortion industry, including feminists, who are supposedly on the side of women, it is clear that abortion damages the mental well-being of the women who undergo it; that these millions of women – something of 1/3 of woman in our society are likely to have an abortion – suffer a deep sense of loss and shame for their destroyed child. The justification for it, that she can have another child later to replace the other, that she can, without the burden of a baby, get on with her career or life are undermined by the moral truth of the act of abortion; instead, she looks into the eyes of her other children and wonders what the aborted child would have been like; grief undermines the mental equilibrium needed to enjoy or accomplish the goals for which she has sacrificed the milk of human kindness.
They tell us that human autonomy is paramount, but we know that young girls are pressurised into having an abortion because it is the only responsible choice; that boyfriends refuse to support the mother-to-be because abortion is available; we know that many pregnancy advice centres automatically advise abortion. Clearly autonomy is under pressure when there is so much pressure not to have the baby. They tell us that abortion is the rational choice, that the child is just a foetus, a collection of cells, pre-human, therefore not human at all; they tell us that we are autonomous units, that we have a right to live our lives the way we want, that we should put ourselves above the needs of others; that rationality dictates we see the foetus as a collection of cells. That is the model of the human that they provide for us. But humans are not like that, they feel guilt and horror at what they are told is rational, non-problematic and responsible; they feel shame when the model tells them they should feel relief or nothing; they feel shame when the logic of the pro-abortion lobby tells them they should feel proud; they promise the preservation of an autonomous rational self uncompromised by the burden of a child; but for many women, abortion brings a dimunition of the self, a disintegration of the self. Part of us is moral and when we wrong ourselves and pretend we have done the right thing, we leave a part of ourselves behind. We are not like the model they provide, we are better than that; that is why abortion causes so much suffering to all those involved in it.
They tell us that human autonomy is paramount, but we know that young girls are pressurised into having an abortion because it is the only responsible choice; that boyfriends refuse to support the mother-to-be because abortion is available; we know that many pregnancy advice centres automatically advise abortion. Clearly autonomy is under pressure when there is so much pressure not to have the baby. They tell us that abortion is the rational choice, that the child is just a foetus, a collection of cells, pre-human, therefore not human at all; they tell us that we are autonomous units, that we have a right to live our lives the way we want, that we should put ourselves above the needs of others; that rationality dictates we see the foetus as a collection of cells. That is the model of the human that they provide for us. But humans are not like that, they feel guilt and horror at what they are told is rational, non-problematic and responsible; they feel shame when the model tells them they should feel relief or nothing; they feel shame when the logic of the pro-abortion lobby tells them they should feel proud; they promise the preservation of an autonomous rational self uncompromised by the burden of a child; but for many women, abortion brings a dimunition of the self, a disintegration of the self. Part of us is moral and when we wrong ourselves and pretend we have done the right thing, we leave a part of ourselves behind. We are not like the model they provide, we are better than that; that is why abortion causes so much suffering to all those involved in it.
treatment of the old and abortion
When we think about the hundreds of thousands of older people in care homes, half of whom apparently are given chemical coshes to make them easier to handle, we should remember that he best way to help the old is to protect the young. The aborted children of the past generations would have paid the pensions and insurance contributions of their parents and grandparents; they would have helped staff the care homes. See how the end of life and the beginning of life are linked.
Sunday 7 September 2008
Sarah Palin marginalised by republican elite; the BBC reaction
Exciting to see Sarah Palin as McCain's choice for VP. Energises the base, yes; causes debate, yes; emphasises that being a woman and being pro-life are not mutually exclusive, that in fact woman are generally more pro-life than men. What worries me is that Bush was elected by Christian Conservatives, but his presidency was suborned to the Neo-Con and big business agenda; Palin will get social conservatives to vote Republican again, but she will be marginalised by McCain - the socially conservative agenda will be shelved after the Christian right has done its job as voting fodder. The compensatiion for this wory has been the horror of politically correct types on the BBC; Palin is an affront to all those who want to colonise women's issues for the left, and to paint social conservatives as irrational and ill-informed; both agendas the BBC supports wholeheartedly; however, highlighting the many flaws and biases of the BBC doesn't mean that the republican insiders will not betray social conservatives. Apparently Karl Rove was one of the insiders advising McCain to pick a pro-life candidate instead of McCain's preferred candidate, Joe Liebermann, the pro-Iraq War democrat; Karl Rove referred to evangelical leaders as "the nuts". Will we see the same when (as looks likely) McCain wins? after wooing the Christian right and social conservative movement in the election, the new administration will treat their views with contempt when making policy.
Incidentally James Naughty has been rather complementary about Palin - her personal impact at least if not her policies. The BBC will still not take social conservatism seriously as a set of political, social and ethical viewpoints. They either ignore it completely, so starving it of the oxygen of publicity or they charactiture it. Justin Webb, the America correspondent for the BBC characterised social conservatives as people whose foreign policy opinions amount to thinking that Al-Qaida is a bad thing and that Mexicans should stay in Mexico; what a trivialisation, if not distortion of an important political set of views. The BBC has a mandate to report objectively.
Note that on Friday's Today program, after the sympathetic but humorous sketch on America's rednecks, the two "serious" commentators were Simon Schama and Bonnie Greer, both on the liberal left. On Sunday's Broadcasting house, the commentators on Sarah Palin are both negative; they invite a comedian, Charlie Higson on who expresses his worry about Palin's environmental views; would they invite a right-of-centre comedian on? Rory Bremnar ia sketch on the Andrew Marr show trashes the conservative party by saying something like the Republican are an unevolved species; fair enough, if he were to say something similar about the democrats. To be fair James Naughty on Today during the week has been relatively sympathetic to her - at least in reacting to her personality - but there is no objective considerations of socially and morally conservative views. The very fact that Sarah Palin exists and is candidate for US VP may help to change that.
Incidentally James Naughty has been rather complementary about Palin - her personal impact at least if not her policies. The BBC will still not take social conservatism seriously as a set of political, social and ethical viewpoints. They either ignore it completely, so starving it of the oxygen of publicity or they charactiture it. Justin Webb, the America correspondent for the BBC characterised social conservatives as people whose foreign policy opinions amount to thinking that Al-Qaida is a bad thing and that Mexicans should stay in Mexico; what a trivialisation, if not distortion of an important political set of views. The BBC has a mandate to report objectively.
Note that on Friday's Today program, after the sympathetic but humorous sketch on America's rednecks, the two "serious" commentators were Simon Schama and Bonnie Greer, both on the liberal left. On Sunday's Broadcasting house, the commentators on Sarah Palin are both negative; they invite a comedian, Charlie Higson on who expresses his worry about Palin's environmental views; would they invite a right-of-centre comedian on? Rory Bremnar ia sketch on the Andrew Marr show trashes the conservative party by saying something like the Republican are an unevolved species; fair enough, if he were to say something similar about the democrats. To be fair James Naughty on Today during the week has been relatively sympathetic to her - at least in reacting to her personality - but there is no objective considerations of socially and morally conservative views. The very fact that Sarah Palin exists and is candidate for US VP may help to change that.
Saturday 6 September 2008
"liberal conservative not neo-conservative"
Reported yesterday on the BBC Today program that Cameron is at the Republican congress calling himself a "liberal conservative not neo-conservative"; sounds good to progressive types, but it is not often realised that neo-conservatism is a progressive ideology, dedicated to destroying traditional structures in order to impose a new order based on an absolute conception of Liberty. In this it differs from Bolshevism in that the bolsheviks wanted a new order based on Equality. There is another conception of liberty which is based on the idea of civic society rooted in traditional values, a diffusion of power through institutions and a less powerful state: this is classical liberty.
The Iraq War was a liberal war - or more properly a liberal progressive war: an alliance between democratic fundamentalists on the right (neo-cons) and liberal humanitarians on the left.
This is the question about Cameron. Is he a progressive liberal or a classical liberal?
The Iraq War was a liberal war - or more properly a liberal progressive war: an alliance between democratic fundamentalists on the right (neo-cons) and liberal humanitarians on the left.
This is the question about Cameron. Is he a progressive liberal or a classical liberal?
Not like '68
People compare Russia and Georgia to 1968; a better comparison is 1938 and Germanys demands on Czechoslovakia, followed by the collapse of the Czech state and Hitler's creation of a protectorate. As yet, Russia have not annexed Georgia and even the neo-cons don't expect them to do so.
The problem with giving guarantees to small nations against our strategic rivals is that we go beyond defending their integrity and give them a blank cheque to be intransigent and aggressive themselves.
Look at our guarantee to Beck's poland and Beck's subsequent (consequent) intransigence against what were in fact Hitler's reasonable demand for the incorporation of German speaking Danzig into the third reich; the poles had illusions of being a great power (Taylor) but reality demanded that they ally with Germany and Russia; the same is true of Georgia just as we were on the wrong side of Germany to defend Poland, so we are on the wrong side of Russia to be able to defend Georgia; it is the fate of small nations to ally themselves with larger ones in order to protect their security and a glance at the map of the Caucases tells us that they have to choose between Turkey, Iran and Russia. The obvious choice is Russia given culture and history. Georgia cannot use the west as a means to gain complete independence from the power politics of the region; we can't allow ourselves to be used in that way. Yet there are those who want to
When taking decisions of geo-political consequence we would do well to know why we do what we do. Is there a moral imperative to defend small nations? Well, who is the small nation here? Georgia defending itself against Russia or S. Ossetia (not to mention Akarzia) defending itself against Georgia? or do we aim to clip the claws of the russian bear in order to defend our own self-interest? - to make a stand in Georgia so that the Russians know we will defend Ukraine, Poland and the Baltics. If Russia made a move on eastern Ukraine and the Crimea, would we seriously intervene? given that the population there see themselves as Russians?
The problem with giving guarantees to small nations against our strategic rivals is that we go beyond defending their integrity and give them a blank cheque to be intransigent and aggressive themselves.
Look at our guarantee to Beck's poland and Beck's subsequent (consequent) intransigence against what were in fact Hitler's reasonable demand for the incorporation of German speaking Danzig into the third reich; the poles had illusions of being a great power (Taylor) but reality demanded that they ally with Germany and Russia; the same is true of Georgia just as we were on the wrong side of Germany to defend Poland, so we are on the wrong side of Russia to be able to defend Georgia; it is the fate of small nations to ally themselves with larger ones in order to protect their security and a glance at the map of the Caucases tells us that they have to choose between Turkey, Iran and Russia. The obvious choice is Russia given culture and history. Georgia cannot use the west as a means to gain complete independence from the power politics of the region; we can't allow ourselves to be used in that way. Yet there are those who want to
When taking decisions of geo-political consequence we would do well to know why we do what we do. Is there a moral imperative to defend small nations? Well, who is the small nation here? Georgia defending itself against Russia or S. Ossetia (not to mention Akarzia) defending itself against Georgia? or do we aim to clip the claws of the russian bear in order to defend our own self-interest? - to make a stand in Georgia so that the Russians know we will defend Ukraine, Poland and the Baltics. If Russia made a move on eastern Ukraine and the Crimea, would we seriously intervene? given that the population there see themselves as Russians?
Cameron's views on abortion have a certain logic if you are pro-abortion (pro-choice). that is if you accept the empirical assumption that easier abortion at an early stage leads to less late abortions – the flaw in this reasoning is that you assume a fixed number of abortions, irrespective of abortion laws,whereas evidence from the US is that more liberal abortion leads to more abortion overall.
The logic of personal identity as conceived today also supports the avoidance of late abortions since an early foetus can be seen as less human than a more developed one. It is interesting that this conception of personal identity shows the similar philosophical underpinnings of progressive liberalism and old-style soviet communism; there was no sense of a unified personality continuing over time, a person being merely the totality of his behaviours and therefore infinitely mutable. this conception is needed for pro-abortion too; as I understand it the western legal system depends on the continuity of the person over time.
Cameron is also for abortion of disabled children up to birth; he cited his own experience of bringing up a severely disabled child. This argument has some plausibility until you consider how under the same provisons of the act, children are aborted for cleft palates and webbed feet – 40 in 200? according tothecatholicherald.
The logic of personal identity as conceived today also supports the avoidance of late abortions since an early foetus can be seen as less human than a more developed one. It is interesting that this conception of personal identity shows the similar philosophical underpinnings of progressive liberalism and old-style soviet communism; there was no sense of a unified personality continuing over time, a person being merely the totality of his behaviours and therefore infinitely mutable. this conception is needed for pro-abortion too; as I understand it the western legal system depends on the continuity of the person over time.
Cameron is also for abortion of disabled children up to birth; he cited his own experience of bringing up a severely disabled child. This argument has some plausibility until you consider how under the same provisons of the act, children are aborted for cleft palates and webbed feet – 40 in 200? according tothecatholicherald.
Monday 18 August 2008
Russia and Western hubris
Why are we picking a fight with Russia when the West has far more worrying enemies at home and abroad.
It is frightening that so-called mainstream right and left agree.
See http://www.buchanan.org/blog/ for some sanity. So-called neo-conservatives are progressive liberals, not conservatives.
It is frightening that so-called mainstream right and left agree.
See http://www.buchanan.org/blog/ for some sanity. So-called neo-conservatives are progressive liberals, not conservatives.
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