Worth of a Fetus

Prager notes:

The human fetus has no worth except for what the mother says it has. If she thinks it is worthwhile, it's infinitely precious. If she doesn't, it is infinitely worthless. It is a very odd moral scheme. It applies nowhere else in life, where one individual determines the complete worth of something else. We don't even allow that for dogs. We don't say dog owners determine the worth of dogs. But human fetus owners determine the worth of a fetus. It is a fascinating development in the degradation of our value system.

Bain Charlatans

This graphic and audio is making the circuit on Facebook. The post asks the reader to view the super secret tape to find out that Romney is trafficking slaves or some such.

What exactly is going on here? Romney observed that America is ridiculously wealthy compared to the world. True. He notes that Chinese life is so bad that working for a pittance is a vast improvement and highly desired. True. If you went over and saw this, wouldn't you too say largely the same thing? But giving women equal-pay-for-equal-work jobs that are highly sought after - so much so that fences are required to keep those who want the jobs out to maintain order - is called slavery by demagogues.

If the right demagogued like the left they would say that it is the Dems who don't want to improve the lives of anyone other than Americans and unionists in particular. Or that the left says "To hell with women and gays in Iraq," or "Too bad if girls get acid thrown on them if they dare to act like something more than a dog." Or, in this case, that Dems would rather have girls in China starve than have good paying jobs.

If somebody moved into a rural America and began building computers there because they could pay the workers less (but still great pay for the area) thereby driving down the cost for consumers, wouldn't that be a great thing? (Happened. Called Gateway.) Wouldn't that be great for the workers? And consumers? Not to those exercised by this video. That would be slavery.

And tell that same story outside the borders of America and you're a villainous cretin who hates. Isn't there something just a bit racist, nationalistic or xenophobic about that? Give Americans a manufacturing job and your are Jesus Christ come to earth. Give anyone else a manufacturing job and you are Satan the outsourcer. Dare not give Indians, Tibetans, Africans or Koreans a job. Screw them. Where is all the social responsibility and global community talk then?

But, thankfully we can just follow the money and that should reveal who is behind this horror show of slavery. (Follow the trail of tears here, here and here.) Oops. Apparently the left loves Bain when it makes their pensions larger and  when they are gambling with granny's retirement money on risky private investments that would never work for Social Security, even though government pensions typically don't pay into Social Security because they've got their money tied up in private investments because they don't want to rely on that dumb government Ponzi scheme that won't provide the retirement they desire.

Aren't these wealthy corporations that fund Chinese slavery everything that they accuse Romney of being? Wouldn't they have been pissed if Romney lost all their money by not being a good capitalist when he was at the helm? Does that make them hypocrites? Greedy? Outsourcers? Aren't they funding the work of the devil?

The beauty of being on the left is never having to say you're sorry. They get to demonize and accuse people of horrible things and then go do those things they demonize.

Gaffe-master

Klavan notes:

Romney is caught on tape saying that nearly half the country is on government assistance and will vote for Obama to keep the dole coming. In related news, a video is unearthed of Pythagoras saying that the square of the hypotenuse of the right triangle is equal to the sum of the square of the two adjacent sides.

Once again, the media goes blitheringly insane.

If everything said wasn’t gathered up and shoved into the gotcha grinder, many on the left would likely assent to this statement. They would make a few tweaks, but the equation would be the same. Stated another way, 'Obama caught on tape saying that nearly half the country is getting tax breaks/loopholes/kickbacks/corporate welfare/etc. and will vote for Romney to keep the dole coming.' I am certain that such a sneakily hustled quote from a clandestine meeting in dimly lit, smoke filled room that revealed such insider discussions would be almost too shocking to hear. But luckily, the media wouldn't go blitheringly insane over that.

Coulter also considers the crazy idea that net tax receivers might actually keep voting their wallets as Dems constantly tell us to do:

At a private gathering, Romney told donors that Obama had a lock on the 47 percent of voters "who pay no income tax" and "believe the government has a responsibility to care for them." This was deeply offensive to people who pay no income tax and believe the government has a responsibility to care for them.

Is what Romney said largely different than what has been attributed to Alexander Tytler?:

A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.

The average age of the worlds greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence:

From Bondage to spiritual faith;
From spiritual faith to great courage;
From courage to liberty;
From liberty to abundance;
From abundance to complacency;
From complacency to apathy;
From apathy to dependence;
From dependence back into bondage

The Bigotry of Low Expectations

Weren't we told that the unrest in the Muslim world was the fault of George W. Bush and his ham-fisted foreign policy?

Since America has now adopted a posture of "leading from behind", deference to world bodies, appeals to the "international community" to do what America used to do and foregoing public interaction with the Israeli Prime Minister, why hasn't resentment toward America abated? Could it be that non-Muslims are reviled because of their infidel status and cultural openness?

Is anyone walking on eggshells around other religious groups? If not, is this an admission of having a different moral expectation of Muslims than for Christians, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jews, Hindus, Confucians, etc., etc., etc.?

Is there any other religion/culture on the face of the earth for whom the response to violence and murder would be "We understand your pain and are sorry that it was caused" instead of "What the hell is wrong with your moral compass"? Doesn't this reveal that Muslims are not regarded as moral equivalents and therefore cannot be spoken to as moral peers?

Does anyone expect the autonomic response of American Christians to abortion to be rioting and murder? Does anyone expect the autonomic response of the black community to skinheads to be rioting and murder? Does anyone expect the autonomic response of the homosexual community to offenses to be rioting and murder? If the answer is anything approaching a no, doesn't this presuppose that their value system prevents this sort of behavior? Why doesn't this same moral expectation exist for those engaging in mayhem in the Middle East? Why is one group expected to act in a developed, advanced moral manner while the other is not?

Did culture and values (as opposed to politics and economics) have anything to do with informing a population that an appropriate response to a religious offense is to riot and commit murder? If yes, was the media wrong in its assessment of Mitt Romney's remarks vis-à-vis Israelis and Palestinians?

The left attempted to detach Nidal Hasan's rage from his values and culture and was left with blaming his actions on pre-post-traumatic disorder – yet another external influence that overwhelmed culture. No explanation was given for how yelling "Allahu Akbar" while committing murder may have played into the day's events or suggested a cultural mooring.

And yet, the media had no problem indicting culture - conservative culture - on behalf of Jared Loughner when they blamed his behavior on a culture of hate and provocative right-wing rhetoric. Of course, their premature musings were completely false, but hey, being in the media means never having to say you're sorry. Even if true, was Loughner somehow less responsible for his actions?

One wonders if the Uni-bomber, Code Pink, OWS, SEIU thugs who beat a conservative black, Bill Ayers, G20 protesters, Black Panthers and that guy who shot up the Family Research Council did what they did because of their personal culture and values. Or maybe they had a tummy ache or were externally provoked in some way. Would FRC be excused if they acted in riotous ways since they have been called a hate group? One supposes there would be excuses galore for Muslim violence if an American religious group called the Muslim extremists in the Middle East a hate group, and God forbid, posted it to the internet.

The left wants it both ways. Their darlings are relieved of personal responsibility for their actions and only do things as a reaction to some external stimuli. The left wants to pretend that certain behaviors are not informed by culture, values or even, as Jonah Goldberg has noted in his recent book, ideology. But when the right does anything, whether violent or not, it is from a culture of hate, corrupt values and warped ideology. The thing is, the right would agree – sans adjectives – that they operate from a learned culture that promotes certain values and leads to certain ideologies and that it is precisely that culture that elevates man above animals.

Does the left really believe that animalistic defensive response is equal to or better than culture? Do they believe that Muslims are cultureless animals that have not yet learned to control their reflexive impulses? Probably not, but the left gets to this tricky spot because they are unwilling to admit that some cultures are better than others. Calling Romney's comment about culture vis-à-vis Israel and Palestine a gaffe confirms their aversion to acknowledging western culture as better. So does their dismissal of the right's disciplined nationalism as xenophobia. (Although, listening to the Democratic Convention speeches, there was a lot of 'America is the best', 'no other country on the planet is as good as America' talk. Does that make them xenophobes too?)

The left treats Muslims like children – albeit violent children that can do great harm. Yes, we want to respect the beliefs of others and there is no reason to be overtly provocative or mean. (The Westboro Baptist jackasses come to mind.) But while disagreeing, everyone assumes that their opponents will act responsibly while battling over ideas. The left believes this about American Christians. They know without a shadow of a doubt that they can say anything about American Christians and not fear that their property, livelihoods or lives will be in danger. The left knows that the culture and values of the Christian community prevents them from acting in riotous and destructive ways.

However, the left does not maintain this set of assumptions about Muslims. Why? Because the left knows that Muslims either do not profess such a mitigating culture and/or do not act in ways that suggest they are constrained by a culture and values that eschews violent behaviors and respects the rights of their fellow man. The left's speech is stifled and they are constantly self-censoring in order to placate the hair trigger Muslim world.

But, to be fair, in certain areas the right also interacts with a particular group in the same manner that the left treats Muslims. Because of fear of financial destruction through boycotting (Chik-fil-A), losing their job (political correctness), poor grades in school (speech codes), character assassination and bullying (racist, bigot, sexist, homophobe, hater, etc.) physical occupation of parks and bridges and disruption of business (OWS), or being hauled off at midnight for a little, ahem, questioning (link) – just to name a few examples – the right often is bullied into not speaking freely for fear of retaliation from a group that seems to be unfettered by cultural and value driven ideology that would assure decent disagreement.

Embassy Attacks

I recall a media that mocked President Bush for not hysterically jumping up from the classroom of boys and girls to attend to the 9/11 attack. Measured response was dismissed as the chin drool of a man barely able to sound out the words contained within the pages of a children's book to the budding minds gathered at Emma E. Booker Elementary School. They mocked him when he decided to not play golf in deference to the soldiers. They told us why his actions in the aftermath of Katrina proved his racism, stupidity, avarice and lack of concern for his fellow man. Where are those seers of the heart today? Tink, tink, tink. Michael Moore? Are you there? Why haven't you provided the Farhenheit 411 on Las Vegas hob nobbing while an American Ambassador's body was drug through the streets in some far away land? Was the media too busy working other important stories?

The Obama camp was certainly busy... noting that Romney was being all political and stuff. Obama campaign Press Secretary Ben LaBolt wrote:

We are shocked that, at a time when the United States of America is confronting the tragic death of one of our diplomatic officers in Libya, Governor Romney would choose to launch a political attack.

No word on whether the Obama camp is equally as shocked about doing fundraisers of a political nature in such times. I guess what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

Steyn looks at the propriety of fundraising über alles here. He also commented on the spontaneity of the uprising and whether the Libyans were as helpful as we were lead to believe:

The 400-strong assault force in Benghazi showed up with RPGs and mortars: That’s not a spontaneous movie protest; that’s an act of war, and better planned and executed than the dying superpower’s response to it.

For whatever reason, Secretary Clinton chose to double down on misleading the American people. “Libyans carried Chris’s body to the hospital,” said Mrs. Clinton. That’s one way of putting it. The photographs at the Arab TV network al-Mayadeen show Chris Stevens’s body being dragged through the streets, while the locals take souvenir photographs on their cell phones. Even allowing for cultural differences, this looks less like “carrying Chris’s body to the hospital” and more like barbarians gleefully feasting on the spoils of savagery.

Existence of Israel

Lileks on Israel:

Okay then. Here’s something you might not hear; the BBC ran this a few days ago.

In post-occupation Iraq being gay, or even looking gay, can be a death sentence.

It's very difficult to determine how many homosexuals have died in so called "honour killings" by their own families or in the hands of the militias. But a BBC investigation has found that law enforcement agencies are involved in ongoing, systematic and organised violence against gay people, while the government refuses to acknowledge it.

Once targeted, most gay people in Iraq have nowhere to hide. There is only one safehouse in Baghdad which can house three people.

Aaaand I add that to the story about the Taliban killing a bunch of people because they danced, and think: forgive me if I add these anecdotes - isolated, non-representative, of course - to a large store of similar events, and draw some generalizations which may pop to mind when embassies are overrun. Again.

Forgive me if I note that one culture has a debate about allowing gays to marry, and another that seems to have concluded a debate about whether they should live.

And pardon the fargin’ hell out of me if I dare to note that the signature value of the West these days, Tolerance, is best exemplified in a tiny hangnail of a nation which stands apart in its neighborhood for letting gay people live lives, instead of gathering everyone else to watch their lives ended - and that this nation, according to a smart and cultured and Western-educated Huffington Post contributor who blithely tweeted disregard over the death of our ambassador, should just please STFU and die. She writes:

Israel has no right to exist. Break that mental barrier and just say it: “Israel has no right to exist.” Roll it around your tongue, tweet it, post it as your Facebook status update – do it before you think twice. Delegitimization is here – have no fear. Palestine will be less painful than Israel ever was.

Don’t worry about what will happen, though.

And no, nobody hates Jews. That is the fallback argument screeched in our ears – the one “firewall” remaining to protect this Israeli Frankenstein. I don’t even care enough to insert the caveats that are supposed to prove I don’t hate Jews. It is not a provable point, and frankly, it is a straw man of an argument.

She doesn’t hate Jews. How could she? Nobody hates Jews. She just wants their homeland dismantled and its residents scattered to - well, somewhere. Take it up with Germany, she notes. Fiddle-de-dee.

Read the comments, as the right-thinking folk of the West line up to applaud her. No doubt some of these people posted it as a Facebook update, leaned back from the keyboard, and felt that rush you get when you know you’ve finally shed some archaic inhibition that kept you from doing what you wanted to do.

It’s okay. You were fooled. You were misled. No one hates the Jews. As for the Yids, the Queers, the lower forms of life known as women - it'll all sort itself out once the millstone of Oppression is lifted from the breast of the Oppressed.

So that’s what we’re supposed to believe: good will abounds in the world. It flows from the human heart in unstanchable quantities, but now and then things happen. Bad things. Someone makes a movie. Someone dances in public. Someone sits with his wife in a Pakistan McDonald’s. The adults have to step in and make things clear. Calls have to be made. Speech has to be ceased; videos have to be blocked. If you don’t jazz the rabble they’ll come around. Any day now.

Any day.

Less Increase Than Dems = On Your Own

Jonah Goldberg notes:

Government grew massively under President Bush. He was a bigger spender than any previous president going back to Lyndon Johnson. He massively expanded entitlements, grew food-stamp enrollment (almost as much as Obama did) and nearly doubled “investments” in education. He created a new Cabinet agency -- Homeland Security -- and signed into law sweeping new regulations, like No Child Left Behind, Sarbanes-Oxley, and McCain-Feingold.

This, according to Democrats, amounts to telling Americans “you’re on your own.”

Marriage For All

Isn't this the inevitability of redefining marriage?

Hollywood director finds it acceptable for people to commit incest.

In an interview with The Wrap, director Nick Cassavetes believes no one should judge a brother and sister being with each other if they are in love.

“I’m not saying this is an absolute but in a way, if you’re not having kids – who gives a damn? Love who you want. Isn’t that what we say? Gay marriage – love who you want?” Cassavetes told The Wrap. “If it’s your brother or sister it’s super-weird, but if you look at it, you’re not hurting anybody except every single person who freaks out because you’re in love with one another.”

If procreation is the singular barrier, one supposes that an incestual gay couple is the ideal. And if, as we are told, love is the only criteria for redefining marriage, how is Cassavetes' conclusion wrong? Certainly incestual marriage does not threaten traditional marriage.

If those in favor of redefining marriage do not include Cassavetes' view or polygamous relationships, are they not telling certain groups who they can love? Everybody is defining societal customs by defining marriage - Democrats and Republicans alike.

We Accept Everybody, Except Those We Don't

The lack of self-awareness on the left is staggering.

Julian Castro

During the Democratic National Convention, Julian Castro gave the keynote address on Tuesday. At one point he went into a call and answer mode where he made proclamations and sought a "no" response from the audience. It went like this:

When it comes to getting the middle class back to work, Mitt Romney says, "No." When it comes to respecting women's rights, Mitt Romney says, "No." When it comes to letting people marry whomever they love, Mitt Romney says, "No." When it comes to expanding access to good health care, Mitt Romney says, "No."

Actually, Mitt Romney said, "Yes," and now he says, "No." Governor Romney has undergone an extreme makeover, and it ain't pretty. So here's what we're going to say to Mitt Romney. We're going to say, "No."

Even though assertions are a dime a dozen, these deserve a closer look. Most of his assertions fall flat when countered with "Based on what?". The first assertion devolves into a muddled mess when this question is asked. Keynesians and Austrians may disagree on the stimulative effects of their policy proposals, but on what basis does one conclude that one or the other doesn't want to 'get the middle class back to work'?

Moving right along, the second assertion is emblematic of the demagoguery of the left. The 'women's right' spoken of here was personalized by Sandra Fluke's presence at the convention. Apparently, all women's rights and healthcare issues are reduced to unlimited access to abortions and free birth control. Would anyone be taken seriously if they argued that the canary in the coal mine for men's health or men's rights is the availability of free condoms? So much for nuance.

The next call prompting a "no" response is a non sequitur ad absurdum. The left continually says that wanting to define what constitutes marriage in a society is equivalent to telling people who they can love. This is nonsense on stilts. Many people claim that they love multiple partners and would like the state to sanction this by legalizing polygamy. By not sanctioning this, is the state forbidding the love that underlies the desire to marry multiple partners? Why isn't the gay marriage crowd as vociferous on behalf of polygamists or incestualists? If two brothers claim love for each other and want their loving relationship acknowledged by the state, can't they similarly claim that the state says "no" to allowing people to marry whomever they love? Since many Democrats oppose sanctioning polygamy and incestual relationships, are they in the same boat that Castro puts Romney? Nobody is telling anybody who they can love. Everybody is defining custom for society by defining marriage - Democrats and Republicans alike.

Discussing the ability for a society to pay for all the medical care that individuals in that society may want could be described as saying "no" to expanding access to good health care. But so could everything that is limited by financial reality. If a person is not able to have not just a car, but the car of his desires, is this saying "no" to access to good transportation? By explaining that bankruptcy might be the result of providing every person the home of their desires at the expense of fellow taxpayers really saying "no" to access to good shelter?

And then Castro goes all in. He chides that Romney was for expanding access to good healthcare before he was against it. Is this really where he should go given the Democratic presidential nominee has only recently 'evolved' to support gay marriage only after he said "no" after previously saying "yes"? Does Castro feel that Obama has undergone an ugly extreme makeover?

Castro's speech ain't pretty.

Notable Quotable

The left is pro-choice on extinguishing nascent human life, but it is not pro-choice about where you can send your child to school.

~ Dennis Prager - 2012 09 05 - Hour 2 - 3:40

Demócratas Por La Raza

On Tuesday night Julián Castro spoke at the Democratic National Convention. His mother Maria del Rosario Castro was a member of the La Raza Unida. Of course, this doesn't mean he holds the same views, but his speech presented nothing to suggest otherwise. While musing about involvement with La Raza, Prager noted:

Many on the left are sympathetic to La Raza. Interesting that the left would support a group called "the race". The left is not opposed to racism. They are opposed to Americanism.

~ Dennis Prager - 2012 09 05 - Hour 1 - 13:45

The National Council of La Raza is often portrayed as nothing more than a Hispanic Rotary Club. (Source) Fine. Would this explanation hold if a group of high schoolers that gathered on behalf of shared Anglo heritage, called their group The National Party of the United Race, and replaced the American flag with a, say, confederate flag with the American flag inverted below?

Not likely.

This thought experiment reveals the truth of Prager's comments. Consistency might demand that all organizations based on race be eschewed. But that may be too much to expect from a party that supports an overtly, objectively and definitionally racist organization that operates in Congress, the Congressional Black Caucus.