Why hasn't Rockwell converted to Islam if he speaks so fanatically about Sharia? His mindset is revolved around that Muslims (at least in the middle east) are somehow always victims, they are never wrong, et al.
While I appalaud his book The left, the right, and the state, I wish he would stop whining so much and instead try to educate people about why they should be converted to the austrian school instead of basically saying that everybody who just happens not to know anything about the austrian school because no one told them be damned kind of mentality.
Do you have an example of sharia fanaticism? I would like to know what you mean by that.
What I mean is that since Lew Rockwell is an islamic apologist to the EXTREME DEGREE. His view as I have said before is that the muslim world is never wrong, superior to us, and islamic law is somehow superior to anglo saxon jurisprudence (ie stoning, harassing people because of their dress, waging war on people because they don't agree with certain verses). Link is here;
http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/79333.html
Oh, not to mention that if I criticize Islam in public (saudi arabia) then I get lashed. You call that freedom?
Posting the actual blog post for the record:
Worried About Muslims Practicing Their Faith? Then, notes Gawker, you may want to move to Tennessee, where state reps want to make it a felony to follow Sharia law. That legal system calls for, among other practices: giving money to the poor, not gambling, not eating pork or shellfish, staying sober, not charging interest on loans, and dressing modestly. I might add, on the next to the last point, that Islamic bankers seem far less dangerous to me than the fractional-reserve wild men of the West.
Then, notes Gawker, you may want to move to Tennessee, where state reps want to make it a felony to follow Sharia law. That legal system calls for, among other practices: giving money to the poor, not gambling, not eating pork or shellfish, staying sober, not charging interest on loans, and dressing modestly. I might add, on the next to the last point, that Islamic bankers seem far less dangerous to me than the fractional-reserve wild men of the West.
Now let's address your claims about Mr. Rockwell based on this one blog post.
Constittuionalist:His view as I have said before is that the muslim world is never wrong,
He does not say anything of that sort in the blog post. Please support this assertion or concede that it's baseless.
Constittuionalist:superior to us,
My previous response applies here as well.
Constittuionalist:and islamic law is somehow superior to anglo saxon jurisprudence (ie stoning, harassing people because of their dress, waging war on people because they don't agree with certain verses).
Where in the blog post does Mr. Rockwell say that he approves of stoning, harrassing people because of their dress, and/or waging war on people because they don't agree with certain verses? He referred to aspects of Sharia that he views positively. That's hardly the same as approving of all of Sharia without question - nor is it the same as saying that Sharia is superior to Anglo-Saxon jurisprudence. At best, I think you're reaching quite a bit in making that assertion.
The keyboard is mightier than the gun.
Non parit potestas ipsius auctoritatem.
Voluntaryism Forum
Thanks for saving me the trouble, Auto
hyperbole much?
It seems like he is just saying that sharia, which is the conduct or outer layer of islam, should be okay. If it is done voluntarily. And that there is more to it than government, which is the western understanding of that term. Since it is more than government, and to some not government at all, banning Sharia would extend into banning lifestyle choices. Many of which are benign.
Jews have 'halakha', which many associate with draconian rules in the Old Testament. But that isn't a perfect understanding of that. And as far as I know, no one has tried to ban it. Or run campaigns against Judaism.
We could say that it is irrational to follow these rules. But that is much different argument.
The West has become engulfed in anti-Muslim hysteria. It's as absurd as the anti-"Jap" hysteria of WWII. Us = good. Them = bad. It's all part of the same narrative that 9/11 belongs to. Sick games being played by sick people hell-bent on maintaining their iron grip on power. Every culture has messed-up stuff you can point to. I'm white and I was raised Christian but I'd hardly like to be painted in the light of Fred Phelps or Terry Jones. I think that a lot of the Western media portrayal of Muslim culture is really that irresponsible and childish, painting an entire culture in the light of its most bizarre and fanatical elements. Watch this. The Taliban was not popular in Afghanistan, nobody liked them... hell, most of them weren't even from Afghanistan. Taliban had (have?) strong ties to Pakistani ISI (equivalent of CIA) which suggests to me that they were acting as a proxy for someone else's ambitions.
Stop drinking the CNN/MSNBC/FOX Kool-Aid. Wake up and think for yourself.
Clayton -
There are people who have done independent research into al qaeda that conclude that it is a band of convicts and drug addicts/dealers that have been thrown out of the muslim countries. The US and UK and Israel organize the opposition to control it. England co opted the IRA, the moussad creadted Hezbolah to take power away from the PLO, the CIA organized al qaeda to proxy war with the soviets, just like they did with the Sandanistas and the contras.
Taliban is akin to if the US had a super orthodox religion running things. Most people know that the pope isn't the antichrist, but that is not what Bachmann says...
Reading Lew Rockwell's blog often, I always got the sense that he's just trying to go against the tide of the anti-muslim crowd that dominates the mainstream media in the US while at the same time sort of calling out the totalitarian neo-cons that hate Islamic law because of how oppressive it is yet they want to force their style of totalitarianism on the rest of us too. At least that's what I took from reading his blog.
"Most people know that the pope isn't the antichrist"
Just the Roman Catholic one (Benedict)? What about Pope Shenouda III and Pope Theodoros II?
Oh there are many antichrists? Are they antichrists?
To put it politely, I don't, even in the slightest, buy the claim that most mainstream media, even US media (make that especially US media, given they were the ones blocking and blurring the Muhammad cartoons. Just look at what Comedy Central did to the South Park episode with Muhammad), is biased against Islam. Most modern day fiction goes out of it's way to avoid portrayals of Islamic terrorism, replacing it with some bizarre variety of Eastern European ethnonationalism. Even 24 kowtowed to complaints regarding having a Muslim terrorist villain with a PSA from Kiefer Sutherland. Criticism of Islam and Muslim immigration is, regardless of any other political, social or economic stances (look at Jean Marie Le Penn's economic nationalism and unionism or Pim Fortuyn's hedonism) inevitably labeled "far-right" and "extremist" by the establishment-leftist European press.
This same tendency manifests itself often in the reporting of antisemitic attacks. Media outlets will often be deliberately vague about the identities or general description of the perpetrators, since a good deal of the time, it is not "rightwing" extremists (who aren't right wing in any case, but that's another subject) but second-generation radicalized Muslim immigrants behind them. And I have no doubt that the recent tragedy in Oslo will be used by the EU and it's Monitoring Center on Racism and Xenophobia to push for new Internet censorship regimens against independent bloggers as part of a new "battle against the right" in Scandinavia.
If pressed to acknowledge Islamic terror at all, the Western MSM will often qualify it by insisting that other religions (most often Christianity, though Hinduism occasionally gets the short end of the stick) are just as violent and anyone who believes otherwise is guilty of some imaginary mental disorder. I don't believe in crazy neoconservative "global democracy" nonsense, but I don't buy the multiculti line that it's all those poor innocent Muslims terrorised by those evil "right wing extremists" or whatever Brown Menace is being paraded around as the boogeyman of the time, though I don't blame the Muslims (given that most first-generation, Turkish and Indonesian Muslims seem perfectly fine by me) so much for this as much as I blame the overwhelmingly leftist Western media and political correctness.. Criticising Islam too loudly can even get you in a courtroom in some countries. Just look at Ezra Levant or Geert Wilders.
I don't think that religious freedom falls under the framework of natural rights. I do not mean the freedom to believe what you want. I mean that religious people should still be held responsible to the same natural rights as everyone else. If someone is brought up to believe that forcing their children in to marriage is correct then they should be held accountable for that under the law. Being brainwashed with religious culture does not give you additional rights over other people. Natural law does not allow for forcing of your own children in to marriage, one example. That would be against the rights of the child, of course if the child is so brainwashed that they go a long with it then there is nothing anyone can do in that instance. But if the child protests the forced marriage then they should be supported under natural rights.
I certainly agree with that, though you have to be careful in not throwing the baby out with the bathwater by falsely equivocating the kind of bile that comes out of a lot of madrassas with Christian/Jewish/etc. schools. Then again, I wouldn't want any of my hypothetical children within a thousand kilometres of the European Anglicans youth institutions, and it isn't because of sex abuse scandals or sectarianism...
There is a growing and highly troubling movement from the likes of Hitchens and Dawkins (the "Elder Brothers" of modern totalitarian atheism) to abolish religious and educational liberty so that all children are properly indoctrinated into the wonders of secular humanist social democracy and welfare statism. There's similar forms of it in the states against homeschoolers, but the decentralism and higher religiosity of the people has slowed it there somewhat.
But I have another question and that is referring to Walter Block's quote "libertarians are neither right nor left". If that is the case, then why is it that almost all the articles related to foreign affairs come from overwhelmingly leftist news sites? It should just be that you advocate a non interventionist foreign policy of peace, trade, commerce, no entangling alliances. But am I really to believe that these sites where Lew gets his news really advocate any of these ideals? NO! So even if I am exaggerating on the blogpost that I mentioned on lewrockwell.com, you can look at past articles where Lew's views are incredibly leftist.
Is Lew advocating that Sharia is a good thing, or is he advocating that it be voluntary and people who want to be a subject to it can do so without imposing it on others? If he is advocating this fine. But I would like Lew to stop this crap where somehow everyone is a victim and it is always the west? That is a half truth.
While my foreign policy views (which could probably be most succinctly described as Realist in methodology, Objectivist in approach minus the anti-China/Russia nonsense) differ significantly from probably just about everybody's, be they Raimondo, Clinton, Powell, Fukuyama or Peikoff, I don't think Lew is a leftist by any stretch of the imagination. There is a very strong anti-foreign intervention tradition in the Old Right, and the concept of classical liberalism minus this component is a quite recent one. AntiWar.com has some writers from the left, but Raimondo himself is a paleolibertarian and has strong associations with Pat Buchanan, the poster boy of American paleoconservatism. The Mises Institute and LRC often carries the writings of William Randolph Bourne (Progressive, basically Old Old Left with an individualist streak), Thomas Sowell (conservative, though I've seen some who think he's a neocon, of all things), Paul Gottfried (a paleoconservative nationalist who's also a Zionist and a German monarchist) and George Reisman (Objectivist with disagreements with Rothbard over anarchy and the Soviet Union). Having someone on your "show", so to speak, doesn't imply endorsement of their views. For instance, revisionist sites regarding the Second World War may have some of David Irving's older writings on the site, but that doesn't mean these sites endorse his positions on the Holocaust. Equally, LRC has it's Sheehans and Benders, as well as it's Buchanans, Sowell's and Gottfried's.
Excellent, Autolykos.
Constitutionalist, have you reconsidered the outlandish claims in your first two posts?
Constittuionalist:But I have another question and that is referring to Walter Block's quote "libertarians are neither right nor left". If that is the case, then why is it that almost all the articles related to foreign affairs come from overwhelmingly leftist news sites?
Before I can answer this question, I'd like to see evidence (preferably systematic) that supports the assertion contained in your question - namely, that "almost all of the articles related to foreign affairs [on LewRockwell.com] come from overwhelmingly leftist news sites".
Constittuionalist:It should just be that you advocate a non interventionist foreign policy of peace, trade, commerce, no entangling alliances. But am I really to believe that these sites where Lew gets his news really advocate any of these ideals? NO! So even if I am exaggerating on the blogpost that I mentioned on lewrockwell.com, you can look at past articles where Lew's views are incredibly leftist.
How about you provide some past articles that you think support the notion that "Lew's views are incredibly leftist"? We can go from there.
Otherwise, just because a site doesn't advocate the same ideals doesn't mean it has nothing useful or accurate to say whatsoever. Take Glenn Greenwald's blog, for example. He's an unabashed leftist (though of which kind I'm not so sure), so I certainly don't agree with him on the proper role of government, but I nevertheless find his analyses of current events to be highly insightful and penetrating. Would you say, then, that I'm "incredibly leftist"?
Constittuionalist:Is Lew advocating that Sharia is a good thing, or is he advocating that it be voluntary and people who want to be a subject to it can do so without imposing it on others? If he is advocating this fine. But I would like Lew to stop this crap where somehow everyone is a victim and it is always the west? That is a half truth.
I'd say it's obvious, given Lew's writings, that he's advocating the latter.
Can you explain in more detail what you mean by "this crap where somehow everyone is a victim and it is always the west"?
"There is a growing and highly troubling movement from the likes of Hitchens and Dawkins (the "Elder Brothers" of modern totalitarian atheism) to abolish religious and educational liberty so that all children are properly indoctrinated into the wonders of secular humanist social democracy and welfare statism. There's similar forms of it in the states against homeschoolers, but the decentralism and higher religiosity of the people has slowed it there somewhat."
Neither of them are proponents of a governmental system. Much less totalitarian; though, one could argue that religion -- lived with integrity -- is totalitarian. I think they are concerned about religious schooling, because there is a low quality of education. They and the home schoolers only support private schools and homeschooling in order to shield their children from science and ideas that they think conflict with Christianity. So they can go on believing in the 6000 year old Earth and that dinosaurs were on the ark. And to make matters worse, they tend to want to either remake public education or introduce these absurd theories into science classes under the banner of 'liberty'. (The discovery institute thinks that physics is against Jebus, because it doesn't EVEN consider the power of miracles!).
This in fact discrediting private schools and homeschooling. Because people think that these are tickets to ignorance, or an excuse to carefully control knowledge. Instead of a chance for an alternative way to learn. This is the fault of a large percentage of people in these movements being religious fanatics. It is a false slowing. It is just reaction, for ideological sake. And not for educations sake. These people don't want non-religious private institutions or parents who teach other religions or no religion. And we are no closer to private schools or homeschooling than in the past.
On the other hand, it seems like this is a certain branch of Christianity. And not Christianity itself. It is a Christianity which thinks it is speaking for the majority. That says that all Christians want to remain ignorant about science. There is also no proof that Christians are opposed to democracy or welfare statism. This seems to be a projection of one group's desires onto the whole. And a projection of hated methods and goals onto religious opposition. Because Hitchens and Dawkins are against religion, that means they definitely hold opposite political views down the line. In a manichean universe, there can be no other way.
What I think many atheists (And Dan Dennet has a TED talk about this) advocate is that all of the religions be taught to children, through public or private means. Including all of the beliefs held by all of them. So people can be knowledgeable about what is believed in our world. Not to say it is true, but the fact that it is believed. In that way, ironically, we can see the religions outside of a mystical or propagandized light. For Christianity, Islam, or any of the others.
Constittuionalist: But I have another question and that is referring to Walter Block's quote "libertarians are neither right nor left". If that is the case, then why is it that almost all the articles related to foreign affairs come from overwhelmingly leftist news sites? It should just be that you advocate a non interventionist foreign policy of peace, trade, commerce, no entangling alliances. But am I really to believe that these sites where Lew gets his news really advocate any of these ideals? NO! So even if I am exaggerating on the blogpost that I mentioned on lewrockwell.com, you can look at past articles where Lew's views are incredibly leftist. Is Lew advocating that Sharia is a good thing, or is he advocating that it be voluntary and people who want to be a subject to it can do so without imposing it on others? If he is advocating this fine. But I would like Lew to stop this crap where somehow everyone is a victim and it is always the west? That is a half truth.
So I take it by your complete neglect of the questions and requests for evidence of anything you've suggested, and your total change of tone and direction, that you actually have no basis for all the claims you made? You should see my big surprised face.
Praetyre: I see what you're talking about but it seems to me that the media - in its role as handmaiden of the State - is bipolar on this issue. On the one side, "Muslims did it" is treated as case-closed. If some government official says "Muslims did it" then anyone who challenges the official theory is a crazy, ranting-with-a-bullhorn conspiracy theorist. On the other hand, you're absolutely right about the kid glove treatment of clearly anti-human values within Islam, as if every religion is sacred in its own right and above criticism because we must be "tolerant." I don't think either sentiment reflects a "pro-Islam" or "anti-Islam" disposition on the part of the Power Elite... they are merely pro-whatever-serves-their-interests and anti-everything-else. Rather, I think there is a kind of schizophrenia in the media because, on the one hand, the mandate to merge all nations requires the desegregation of East and West in the long run (multi-culturalism) and, on the other hand, the short-term military goals of the imperialists require demonization of "Islamic Terrorists" so Muslims can be the universal scapegoat for all the murder and mayhem caused - directly or directly - by the agents provocateur in the intelligence agencies.
@Centinel: Actually, a private-property society, such as that advocated by LR, is not completely pacifistic. The use of violence is justifiable... but only in defense of legitimate property rights, which States - by definition - are never fighting for. Hence, all State-run wars are aggressive, regardless of the propaganda.
You are right that the history books are filled with the stories of those who murdered, raped and pillaged their way to wealth and power. However, this is less a sign of how glorious such individuals are than it is a sign that paying chroniclers was something that only the richest could afford to do - and chronicling the dirty deeds of the King was something that only another King dared to do and that from a long distance. Technology has made chronicling a lot less expensive and, despite the determined efforts of the State to thoroughly corrupt the historical record, the true face of the State is emerging in Blu-Ray hi-definition.
The irony of a state apologist calling Lew Rockwell a useful idiot is difficult to overstate.
Centinel:Constittuionalist, Don’t be too hard on lew. He doesn’t like sharia law or islam, he just hates the US government so much that he will use any excuse to attack it. They have a name for guys like this in the mosques, they are called useful idiots.
Don’t be too hard on lew. He doesn’t like sharia law or islam, he just hates the US government so much that he will use any excuse to attack it. They have a name for guys like this in the mosques, they are called useful idiots.
First off, how are you defining "hate" above?
Second, by your reference to "useful idiots" in mosques, am I to take this to mean you approve of the FBI's practice of domestic-terrorism sting operations?
Centinel:Lew is non-violent like most anarchists and it is obvious that the United States is not.
Do you see a difference between being non-aggressive and being non-violent? I'd say that Lew is certainly the former, but I doubt he's the latter. On the other hand, do you approve of the United States government's aggression?
Centinel:Check out this quote from lew: Lew: For the sake of freedom and human rights, we must say no to war. don’t worry about lew and other anarchists, they are harmless. I mean how do they expect to take and hold power if they say no to war?
Lew: For the sake of freedom and human rights, we must say no to war.
don’t worry about lew and other anarchists, they are harmless. I mean how do they expect to take and hold power if they say no to war?
Do you see "power" as a thing which exists regardless of whether anyone tries to take and hold it?
Also, if "Lew and other anarchists" are so "harmless", why are you bothering to rail against them at all?
Centinel:Just open any page on a history book and that pretty much shows that every society that lasted more than a day got and held its power by war. But lew and most anarchists are still in the non-violent [sic] camp. And I say good for them, they can stay there. The last thing we need is a group of folks like lew ‘kick me first’ rockwellrunning the show with Russia, china, political islam and teacher and public employee unions running around with access to guns.
And I say good for them, they can stay there. The last thing we need is a group of folks like lew ‘kick me first’ rockwellrunning the show with Russia, china, political islam and teacher and public employee unions running around with access to guns.
Ah, I was wondering when a bona fide neocon was going to arrive here. Tell me, are you an active member of the military, the intelligence community, or some branch of the domestic security apparatus? If not, what are you afraid of?
Regardless, please demonstrate how and why "Russia, china, political islam and teacher and public employee unions" pose an existential threat to Lew Rockwell - or to myself, for that matter.
Centinel:lew is crazy with hate for the US government and crazy with love or a fetish for non-violence [sic]. what do they call those guys that like to get spanked ? is it sadist or machochist ? i get them mixed up. maybe lew is one of those guys that would rather get hit, then hit. God bless him for that, someone has to take the first punch and lew and the anarchist have always stepped up to the plate to take the punch instead of dudes like us. Good for them.
Perhaps you'd like to back up these assertions with some, you know, actual substance. Or do you consider that beneath you?
Centinel:Keep an eye on him Constittuionalist, but at this point in time he and the anarchists are pretty much irrelevant and harmless.
Again, I can't help but wonder - if we're "pretty much irrelevant and harmless", then why pay any attention to us at all?
One other thing. Regardless of how you define "hate", why do you think that "hating" the US government is necessarily such a bad thing?
Centinel:Call him non-aggressive if you like but logic like Lew 'nuke me first' Rockwell aint going to last long in the real world. Hell even you anarchists admit that statists are violent. Do you think that got that way because of government ? No. they learned at a very young age that you can get what you want by smacking someone weaker than you. Dont you have any siblings ?
Hell even you anarchists admit that statists are violent. Do you think that got that way because of government ?
No. they learned at a very young age that you can get what you want by smacking someone weaker than you. Dont you have any siblings ?
So you believe that "might makes right", eh? How nice. By that logic (oops, there's that silly word again!), you won't complain when someone stronger than you smacks you and takes your shit. Oh wait, I imagine you'll complain then.
Centinel:This dude pretty much says it all “The direct use of physical force is so poor a solution to the problem of limited resources that it is commonly employed only by small children and great nations” I guess what this dude was trying to say was make love, not war but he really hit on the important fact that you only get strong (great nations) by using physical force and it is also natural to man (small children )
“The direct use of physical force is so poor a solution to the problem of limited resources that it is commonly employed only by small children and great nations”
I guess what this dude was trying to say was make love, not war but he really hit on the important fact that you only get strong (great nations) by using physical force and it is also natural to man (small children )
That's not what he was saying at all. Really, you have to be trolling to misinterpret that quote to such an extent.
Centinel:thats why anarchists like Lew are harmless. and dont get me wrong he is spot on about the economics stuff. it is just the dude is clearly living in a fantasy world when it comes to physical force.
If he's living in a fantasy world when it comes to physical force, then how can he be "spot on about the economics stuff". I mean, where is there any role for economics in a world where might makes right?
Centinel:btw, i am not a state apologist. the state is bad, capitalism good, waiting to get nuked before fighting back insane.
That of course raises the question of who you think is actually at risk of getting nuked right now, and why. Are you up to the challenge?
Centinel:hey, i should write a movie starring called the good, the bad, and the insane. starring ludwig von mises, obama, and Lew. remember hate the game, not the player
remember hate the game, not the player
Don't quit your day job.
Since when does anti-war equal pacifist?
To paraphrase Marc Faber: We're all doomed, but that doesn't mean that we can't make money in the process. Rabbi Lapin: "Let's make bricks!" Stephan Kinsella: "Say you and I both want to make a German chocolate cake."
[...] i never said that (arent you using a strawman ?)
Irony alert! Irony alert! Irony alert!
The idea of China nuking the United States is so bizarre that I think even Leonard Peikoff would balk at it. The last time China, in it's entire 5000 (though I think that's only a tiny fraction of it's true history) year history as a civilization, invaded *anybody*, was in the Qin Dynasty, and that was against the then-insignificant Korean civilization, not a major power like Persia or the Alexandrian Empire. China would not nuke it's biggest customer, nor would it be even remotely consistent with the mentality of any Chinese political leader since Qin Shi Huang.
The United States government is the only entity that has ever used a nuke. People outside the US definitely have good reason to worry, people inside the US have a lot less reason to worry... as bad as other governments may be, none of them have ever nuked anybody. What's funny is that the irony of the only government ever to nuke anybody being the self-appointed world policeman of nukes never strikes anybody as odd... even the supposedly super-smart people that constitute the brigades of political punditry, political journalism and political think-tankery.
"If pressed to acknowledge Islamic terror at all, the Western MSM will often qualify it by insisting that other religions (most often Christianity, though Hinduism occasionally gets the short end of the stick) are just as violent and anyone who believes otherwise is guilty of some imaginary mental disorder."
Are you kidding. Look at the events in Norway over the weekend. Within minutes of a reported bombing everyone from Reuters^1 to BBC^2 had created suspected profiles putting it all down to half a dozen of so crazed muslims.
1. Here is the Reuters article, they've pulled it from all but their India portal:
http://in.reuters.com/article/2011/07/22/idINIndia-58403920110722
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:5A-gucZestAJ:www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/22/us-europe-groups-idUSTRE76L3O920110722+reuters+norway+bombing+suspected+islamic&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=au&source=www.google.com.au
2. BBC has pulled a similar article I looked for.
Centinel:it dont make it right, i never said that (arent you using a strawman ?)
You certainly seemed to indicate (to me, at least) that you were in favor of "[getting] what you want by smacking someone weaker than you", to use your words. You also seem to look down on what you call "pacifism" or "non-violence". Hence I figure you're in the "might makes right" camp. Are you or aren't you? If you aren't, then what was your point with your earlier statements?
Centinel:no I mean it is probably wrong if your a pacifist or non-violent, but that is a subjective opinion. I mean you dont have a monopoly on what is right or wrong. are anarchists gods that they decide what is right or wrong ?
That's not the point. Of course "right" and "wrong" are subjective. My question for you was whether you think that might makes right. That is, I was asking about your subjective opinion.
Centinel:really though I think that if someone can kick my ass, take my dough, and get away with it there aint much I can do about it. and there are many instances in history in which the strong guy got the money and the girl. oops, i know, that is an argument from ignorance. sorry.
It's not even an argument, actually. While there may not be much you can do about it, that doesn't mean you can't complain or think it's wrong. So would you do that or not, in such a case?
Centinel:lets try this, if a group of highly motivated dudes with guns wants stuff, then the only way any one is going to stop them is by using physical force. the question is do you wait for them to start shooting first before you fire back ? btw, i am in the camp that shoots first, lew is evidently in the camp that favors getting shot first.
Presumably said group of "dudes" presents a direct threat against my property, if not also my person. In that case, I'd say they've already aggressed against me, so any force I use to stop them from getting my stuff is defensive. Now with that said, I don't see how Lew Rockwell would think any differently about it.
Centinel:sure dude, how do you think the good ole' USA got to be so secure ? you think it was by non-aggression ?
you think it was by non-aggression ?
That begs the question: is the "good ole' USA" so secure? If it's so secure, then why does the government apparently see enemies behind every corner? If it's so secure, then why does the government see its own subjects as enemies?
Centinel:the sad fact is that the better we get at security, the more shrill peaceniks like lew get and the bigger there audience. but I can assure you a few chinese nukes hitting some population centers, or your computers fizzing out for the next 3 months from a cyber attack will cut into lews audience of fans.
This doesn't answer my question. Please try again. Who do you think is actually at risk of getting nuked right now, and why? (Note: If you answer "the good ole' USA", then obviously said "good ole' USA" isn't so secure, now is it?)
Centinel:I wont respond to the rest of your stuff cuz i think you were just being funny. like your suggestion that I dont quit my day job
Actually, I want you to respond to this:
and this:
Or are you afraid to?
Taiwan is a cold-civil war, not an invasion of a foreign entity. China's claims to Tibet are far stronger than the US's to California's, and it didn't so much "invade" it as reclaim it from the British Empire. Attacking UN Forces in Korea was due to wishing to support the North Korean communist government of the time, not due to any Japanese-style colonial ambitions. It's border disputes with India are over tiny areas on their border where there is confusion regarding ethnicity and linguistics. Ditto for the USSR, though it should also be added that was fueled by the Sino-Soviet split over Maoism versus the "revisionism" of Khruschev. Vietnam is, again, a matter of backing a similar "team" to yours in a foreign context (not unlike the US backing the Shah...) rather than a desire to create a Co-Prosperity Sphere in Southeast Asia.
I don't deny China backs many of these regimes you mentioned, but none of them are anything other than garden variety isolationist authoritarian dictatorships, and I wouldn't be even remotely surprised if Russia and the US have backed twice as many of these tinpot nations for their own self interest. And Maoist China (which makes the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany look like pushovers, I agree) is a far cry from the post-Xiaoping, largely apolitical oligarchic China that exists today. Show me China invading and occupying a long established sovereign nation (like Nazi Germany with the French, or the USSR with East Germany) and I'll start to reconsider my position.
Moderator note:
Centinel, I've deleted your last post. I suggest you take a look at the forum rules. Broad-brush inflammatory attacks on forum users are not allowed. Repeated violations will result in a ban.
Firstly, I'm not an anarchist. Secondly, I acknowledged that China, by your definition of "invasion" (which I guess means Poland invaded Iraq when it sent troops there) had "invaded" several polities, and so I was requesting an invasion of the sort I was thinking of, unless you want me to bring up all the countless tribes the US has no doubt invaded in it's long history.
Secondly, what part of what I listed do you consider "revisionist"? Do you maintain China intended to conquer all of Korea and Vietnam? Do you deny that Tibet hasn't been an independent polity since the time of Kublai Khan and a single period from 1912-1951, which existing only in a de facto sense because the rest of China was off fighting against it's monarch, between various warlords and the Nationalists and Communists?
Do you deny that, for a long time, the Dalai Lama has been principally sponsored, as he himself admitted, by the CIA, and through an ex-Secret Service Colonel, George Soros? I don't blame the US at all for this (it was a Cold War, after all), but don't think he's just an Asian Gandhi financed out of the good of the people of India or America's hearts.
Thirdly, I highly doubt most Tibetans desire a return to the brutal theocracy that ruled under the aegis of the Chinese monarchy. And as for your Simpsons-point:
What does it matter how the crimes of the USA compare to those of China? What does it matter that Tibet has long been controlled by a Chinese state? I myself have been a subject of the State my entire life - if I throw off such bonds, is the State justified in enslaving me once again?
In any case, the agents of the Chinese state have violently invaded the private property of many millions of people within the geographical region of China. Do these invasions count less than those undertaken by the American state overseas?
Btw I'm not American (just to let you know I have no stake in defending the USA).
Clayton,
I know there is a whole seperate nuke thread - but i had to comment. I think I am as anti gov. as most on this site. but to me - cruicifying the US for using nukes to end WW2 and saving thousands of its soldiers ( of course we know there were other reasons as well) - to me is the same as using current mores to judge people 100 years ago. In 50 years we will all be considered barbarians for much of our current culture. WHich ever country had developed the bomb first would have used it. The US should not be tormented forever because they were fastest.
and as much as I respect Rockwell, sometimes his anti US bias is a bit over the top.
Be responsible, ease suffering; spay or neuter your pets.
We must get them to understand that government solutions are the problem!