I've read Lew Rockwell for years and used to subscribe to P J O'Rourke. (He died of lung cancer, according to Stansberry Research, who was publishing him when he died.) Have taken the quiz many times and always end up Libertarian. As for the rest, I have given up on the world realizing what is really going on. Thoughtful, as always. 👏❤️
turbo cancers are an adverse effect of the vaxxajabs
Thanks for your kind words and for reading my stuff.
I have recently changed, permanently, my view on the abortion question in the Advocates quiz. Abortion kills a living human being. Of course, Victor Koman has thoughts in his book _Solomon's Knife_ that are worth considering.
I am anti abortion and always have been. Yes I know about cancer. Either these new jabs or all the old ones, or inflammation, or parasites. Any of those would do it.
Yes, right-nationalism lingered on in Spain, which did not participate in World War II and has a somewhat different history as a result. But, after Franco, Spain became another liberal democracy like all the rest, and outside of Spain right-nationalism was dead in Europe, so the significance of this is a little hard for me to see.
As for Nolan and other political compasses, they seem to have a common conceptual problem, of treating 'economic' and 'personal' freedom as independent variables. In practice, 'economic freedom' is merely a subset of 'personal freedom' and regimes which intrude upon the latter will of necessity interfere with the former. Looking at the right and left quadrants of Nolan's graph, we therefore see serious problems. I do not know of any 'conservative' states that permit high degrees of economic freedom while restricting personal freedom; on the other side and in practice, 'socialist' states intervene in the personal lives of their citizens constantly. Progressive liberal governments, despite their own rhetoric, are also highly interventionist.
Thanks for your thoughtful comment, and for reading my stuff. God bless you. Amen.
I don't agree that Spain didn't participate in World War 2. They were the testing ground for German and Soviet methods, and were battlefields of the second world war in Europe from 1936 to 1939. I tend to date World War 2 from 1932 in China and from 1936 in Europe, but ymmv
I'm not confident that right nationalism was entirely dead after 1945 in the rest of Europe, nor after 1975 in Spain. But I will agree that it was reasonably well hidden in the rat lines for the SS, the cia "operation Gladio" stay behinds, and mi6. You can look at how the Dulles brothers supported Hitler before 1941 and ask questions about their role in the Eisenhower administration if you like, it would be an interesting discussion.
I'm also not confident that personal and economic variables are independent in the Nolan chart. The purpose is to map on two dimensions rather than just one, making them far superior to the "spectrum." No, not the autistic spectrum where people keep putting me, the other one. Jerry Pournelle liked "reason" and "state" as the two axes. The fact that they interact suggests that they aren't entirely independent. It's a philosophical mapping, not a mathematical one.
I know of quite a few states that restrict personal freedom, to the point of throwing communists out of helicopters, but permit high degrees of economic freedom. Or, I did until Chile went commie again. But I will agree that progressive liberal governments are not good for anything, and should not have the consent of the people.
In fact, generally, there are no governments of humans by humans which are good enough to be worthy of my consent. It's all a terrible mess. And a deadly plague if there ever were one.
Really, the greatest plague on mankind since 1848 is the tendency of governments to slaughter their own people generally to keep power for a small group of effete pseudo-intellectual self-styled aristocrats. It reminds me of a longstanding comic routine called "the aristocrats" but I probably shouldn't give too many details on that one. But you can see from RJ Rummel's work, shown above, that a lot of people are killed by governments. And he wasn't even counting combat deaths, which adds another 62 million or so in the 20th Century. Really grim.
I mean only that Spain was formally neutral in WWII and that its right-nationalist regime did not suffer defeat with the Axis powers in 1945. From that moment on, right-nationalism was just undeniably defeated in Europe beyond Spain and it's a dead letter now.
While there have been sporadic experiments in the right 'conservative' quadrant of Nolan's chart, the point I am trying to make is that liberalism and its insistence on individual freedoms is itself a very distinctive and historically peculiar ideological system. That's not a criticism, just an observation. This can be hard to see from inside the liberal ideological frame but I find this external, descriptive standpoint eminently useful. As you move away from liberal commitments, in practice, you tend to have greater state interventions both in the economy and in personal life (but I repeat myself), because liberalism is distinctive in trying to limit the state in these areas and politicians who are not liberal are not bothered by even pretending to care about individual freedoms.
Interesting thoughts, but I have not believed in limited governments in a very long time. It's actually crazy to imagine that you can delegate immense power to people and then wave a document at them and say, "and limit yourselves to only these trespasses and infringements, please" and expect it to work. Politicians who are classically liberal got us into this mess. None of them can be trusted. They are all grifters and parasites, with nephews and nieces who get cushy jobs indoors year 'round as bureau rats.
Our American hero Lysander Spooner wrote, in 1874, "But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain - that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case it is unfit to exist." But people didn't listen. And tyranny prevailed.
Again, I'm trying to be descriptive, not prescriptive; I'm not advocating for limited government, which I agree is illusory. While liberal democracies generally have constitutions that claim to circumscribe the powers of the state, over time their politicians find ways around these limits. Liberalism itself nevertheless seems to exert a recursive influence on the nature of politics in nominally liberal states, even after the limits on state power have been subverted. This is one reason why I think some attention to ideology is important.
The fundamental problem for all political ideologies, is that the political elite who advocate them must compete for power, and that the states they assume control of must compete with each other for control of territory. You get the kinds of ruling ideologies that can survive both of these tests, whether or not these ideologies are optimal for ordinary people.
Thank you again for your thoughtful comments. It is good to discuss these things. I think, as Henry David Thoreau said in 1848, that one step toward a better government would be for each of us to say what it is that would be pleasing. For me, it is "free the slaves, stop the wars, and end tyranny," which is part of a prayer that I've composed and posted in a few places.
I'm not confident that we've had any success with allowing "the political elite" to compete for power. It seems to me that all power derives from God, so we should stop pretending that an earthly king is going to do us any good. In the "liberalism itself" view of the matter, "all power is inherent in the people and all just government derives from their consent." I would suggest that my late friend L. Neil Smith was correct in his view that unless consent is unanimous, it isn't actually legitimate. But, anyway, this business of consenting to the effete or elite political class, a class of parasites, competing for power and then using their power to compete for control of territory has not been working well, "for ordinary people."
Since I feel as ordinary as any man, I feel that the best move is to refuse to delegate my power. I don't think the child rapists who visited Epstein Island or the baby torturers featured on the Anthony Wiener laptop are suitable people for governing. They are cretins imo. They can pretend to represent me, and I can deny that they represent me, and we shall see which of us is stronger. I believe God is not on their side, so we have more legions on our side, as God is the living God and the God of hosts.
So I pray: Eternal Father, please help us to free the slaves, stop the wars, and end tyranny. Please help with guidance, resources, ingenuity, endurance, fortitude, and patience. Please show us the little fires so we may pass by them. Please bring love into our lives so we remember what we have to live for. Amen.
God bless you sir. May your community find its way through the current mess. Amen.
I've read Lew Rockwell for years and used to subscribe to P J O'Rourke. (He died of lung cancer, according to Stansberry Research, who was publishing him when he died.) Have taken the quiz many times and always end up Libertarian. As for the rest, I have given up on the world realizing what is really going on. Thoughtful, as always. 👏❤️
turbo cancers are an adverse effect of the vaxxajabs
Thanks for your kind words and for reading my stuff.
I have recently changed, permanently, my view on the abortion question in the Advocates quiz. Abortion kills a living human being. Of course, Victor Koman has thoughts in his book _Solomon's Knife_ that are worth considering.
I am anti abortion and always have been. Yes I know about cancer. Either these new jabs or all the old ones, or inflammation, or parasites. Any of those would do it.
Yes, right-nationalism lingered on in Spain, which did not participate in World War II and has a somewhat different history as a result. But, after Franco, Spain became another liberal democracy like all the rest, and outside of Spain right-nationalism was dead in Europe, so the significance of this is a little hard for me to see.
As for Nolan and other political compasses, they seem to have a common conceptual problem, of treating 'economic' and 'personal' freedom as independent variables. In practice, 'economic freedom' is merely a subset of 'personal freedom' and regimes which intrude upon the latter will of necessity interfere with the former. Looking at the right and left quadrants of Nolan's graph, we therefore see serious problems. I do not know of any 'conservative' states that permit high degrees of economic freedom while restricting personal freedom; on the other side and in practice, 'socialist' states intervene in the personal lives of their citizens constantly. Progressive liberal governments, despite their own rhetoric, are also highly interventionist.
Thanks for your thoughtful comment, and for reading my stuff. God bless you. Amen.
I don't agree that Spain didn't participate in World War 2. They were the testing ground for German and Soviet methods, and were battlefields of the second world war in Europe from 1936 to 1939. I tend to date World War 2 from 1932 in China and from 1936 in Europe, but ymmv
I'm not confident that right nationalism was entirely dead after 1945 in the rest of Europe, nor after 1975 in Spain. But I will agree that it was reasonably well hidden in the rat lines for the SS, the cia "operation Gladio" stay behinds, and mi6. You can look at how the Dulles brothers supported Hitler before 1941 and ask questions about their role in the Eisenhower administration if you like, it would be an interesting discussion.
I'm also not confident that personal and economic variables are independent in the Nolan chart. The purpose is to map on two dimensions rather than just one, making them far superior to the "spectrum." No, not the autistic spectrum where people keep putting me, the other one. Jerry Pournelle liked "reason" and "state" as the two axes. The fact that they interact suggests that they aren't entirely independent. It's a philosophical mapping, not a mathematical one.
I know of quite a few states that restrict personal freedom, to the point of throwing communists out of helicopters, but permit high degrees of economic freedom. Or, I did until Chile went commie again. But I will agree that progressive liberal governments are not good for anything, and should not have the consent of the people.
In fact, generally, there are no governments of humans by humans which are good enough to be worthy of my consent. It's all a terrible mess. And a deadly plague if there ever were one.
Really, the greatest plague on mankind since 1848 is the tendency of governments to slaughter their own people generally to keep power for a small group of effete pseudo-intellectual self-styled aristocrats. It reminds me of a longstanding comic routine called "the aristocrats" but I probably shouldn't give too many details on that one. But you can see from RJ Rummel's work, shown above, that a lot of people are killed by governments. And he wasn't even counting combat deaths, which adds another 62 million or so in the 20th Century. Really grim.
I mean only that Spain was formally neutral in WWII and that its right-nationalist regime did not suffer defeat with the Axis powers in 1945. From that moment on, right-nationalism was just undeniably defeated in Europe beyond Spain and it's a dead letter now.
While there have been sporadic experiments in the right 'conservative' quadrant of Nolan's chart, the point I am trying to make is that liberalism and its insistence on individual freedoms is itself a very distinctive and historically peculiar ideological system. That's not a criticism, just an observation. This can be hard to see from inside the liberal ideological frame but I find this external, descriptive standpoint eminently useful. As you move away from liberal commitments, in practice, you tend to have greater state interventions both in the economy and in personal life (but I repeat myself), because liberalism is distinctive in trying to limit the state in these areas and politicians who are not liberal are not bothered by even pretending to care about individual freedoms.
Interesting thoughts, but I have not believed in limited governments in a very long time. It's actually crazy to imagine that you can delegate immense power to people and then wave a document at them and say, "and limit yourselves to only these trespasses and infringements, please" and expect it to work. Politicians who are classically liberal got us into this mess. None of them can be trusted. They are all grifters and parasites, with nephews and nieces who get cushy jobs indoors year 'round as bureau rats.
Our American hero Lysander Spooner wrote, in 1874, "But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain - that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case it is unfit to exist." But people didn't listen. And tyranny prevailed.
Again, I'm trying to be descriptive, not prescriptive; I'm not advocating for limited government, which I agree is illusory. While liberal democracies generally have constitutions that claim to circumscribe the powers of the state, over time their politicians find ways around these limits. Liberalism itself nevertheless seems to exert a recursive influence on the nature of politics in nominally liberal states, even after the limits on state power have been subverted. This is one reason why I think some attention to ideology is important.
The fundamental problem for all political ideologies, is that the political elite who advocate them must compete for power, and that the states they assume control of must compete with each other for control of territory. You get the kinds of ruling ideologies that can survive both of these tests, whether or not these ideologies are optimal for ordinary people.
Thank you again for your thoughtful comments. It is good to discuss these things. I think, as Henry David Thoreau said in 1848, that one step toward a better government would be for each of us to say what it is that would be pleasing. For me, it is "free the slaves, stop the wars, and end tyranny," which is part of a prayer that I've composed and posted in a few places.
I'm not confident that we've had any success with allowing "the political elite" to compete for power. It seems to me that all power derives from God, so we should stop pretending that an earthly king is going to do us any good. In the "liberalism itself" view of the matter, "all power is inherent in the people and all just government derives from their consent." I would suggest that my late friend L. Neil Smith was correct in his view that unless consent is unanimous, it isn't actually legitimate. But, anyway, this business of consenting to the effete or elite political class, a class of parasites, competing for power and then using their power to compete for control of territory has not been working well, "for ordinary people."
Since I feel as ordinary as any man, I feel that the best move is to refuse to delegate my power. I don't think the child rapists who visited Epstein Island or the baby torturers featured on the Anthony Wiener laptop are suitable people for governing. They are cretins imo. They can pretend to represent me, and I can deny that they represent me, and we shall see which of us is stronger. I believe God is not on their side, so we have more legions on our side, as God is the living God and the God of hosts.
So I pray: Eternal Father, please help us to free the slaves, stop the wars, and end tyranny. Please help with guidance, resources, ingenuity, endurance, fortitude, and patience. Please show us the little fires so we may pass by them. Please bring love into our lives so we remember what we have to live for. Amen.
God bless you sir. May your community find its way through the current mess. Amen.