- Hate Speech
- Rollback
- Reason, Optimism, and Prosperity
- Going Galt
- State-Owned Media
- Ice Is Always Slippery
Top News Stories
Commentary by Robert Tracinski
1. Hate Speech
When the left talks about "hate speech," I've always thought the phrase carries an unintended but revealing double meaning.
Many people are not good at introspection or at identifying the real meaning of their emotions; it's an acquired skill that requires a lot of work, practice, and honesty. So people will often correctly identify which emotions and objects are involved—but not the correct relationships between them.
For example, when a leftist hears someone on the right speak, he is able to correctly identify the emotion, hatred, and the object, speech. But he gets their relationship backward. The real relationship is: he hates our speech. It is the left that is convulsed with hatred whenever anyone speaks in defense of liberty.
That's why, for example, the left responds to the Tea Party movement—which has engaged in such violent activities as holding up signs, giving speeches, asking questions of congressmen at town hall meetings, sponsoring forums on the health care bill, and organizing congressional debates—by threatening to infiltrate the movement in order to fabricate incidents that they will then use to discredit us.
As one tea party organizer responds to that threat, "They can't actually debate our message, and that's their problem."
Confirming that judgment, the left is busy working themselves up into a campaign to suppress our speech by depicting us as a violent threat that has to be suppressed. The latest to jump on that bandwagon is AFL-CIO chief Richard Trumka, who gave a speech describing the tea party movement as the equivalent of Nazism. So much for the claim that the left stands for "civility" in the public debate.
See Michael Graham's excellent response to Trumka below. He captures the absurdity of a thick-necked union goon denouncing violence. (If you follow the link, you'll see a photo of Trumka, who I recognize as da kind of guy we used to see a lot of in da Chicago Machine.) And he reveals Trumka's laughable claim that the right was behind the Kennedy assassinations—which were actually committed by a Communist and a Palestinian nationalist.
But that's not the end of the story. Trumka was speaking at Harvard, and Andrew Breitbart happened to be there, so he confronted Trumka, in the Q&A, about the violence of the left. In his answer, Trumka claims that he witnessed the alleged use of racial epithets against black congressmen by tea partiers.
It is, to put it mildly, a suspicious claim, when you consider the source and the way in which he suddenly produced his eyewitness testimony when it became convenient. If you watch the video, Breitbart seems somewhat taken aback. But I expect that he quickly recovered and has begun investigating Trumka's new claim. Where was Trumka when the events he supposedly witnessed occurred? What exactly does he say he saw, and where does he say it happened—and how does that square with the hard evidence?
The results should be interesting.
"Hate Speech, Hypocrisy from AFL-CIO Chief," Michael Graham, Boston Herald, April 9
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka was at Harvard Wednesday night, denouncing talk show hosts like yours truly as "apostles of hatred." He accused Glenn Beck (the only host he called out by name) and the rest of us supporting the Tea Party crowd of being a "similar movement" to the "Nazi-style" fascism of the 1930s with its "racial hatred and political violence."A labor leader disturbed by possible "political violence"? That's a switch. When I think of "kindler, gentler labor action," I assume that means being told to "watch your head" as they close the trunk of the Caddy.
After all, this is the same Richard Trumka who, while with the United Mine Workers, was notorious for his fiery rhetoric. In fact, Trumka and other UMW officials were charged in a $27 million wrongful death suit by the widow of a non-union contractor shot in the back of the head while leaving a worksite in 1993. The UMW settled that suit.
There's been a lot of talk lately about threats and potential violence allegedly on the rise from opponents of Obamacare. What there hasn't been much of is reporting of actual violence. Take, for example, a news story from the morning of Trumka's speech:
"Union protester attacks Tea Partier at Fort Lauderdale Townhall Meeting."
2. Rollback
I've been covering the radicalization of the right in general and the Republicans in particular in response to President Obama's onslaught against liberty. A prime example of this is the reversal of fortune for Florida's Charlie Crist, a charismatic and popular governor who is now badly losing a Senate primary battle against a previously little-known opponent.
Crist's main crime in the eyes of Florida Republicans is his brief expression of support, early last year, for the trillion-dollar Obama stimulus. But I also wonder if part of this is a reaction to Crist's role in the 2008 Republican primary, when his endorsement threw the Florida primary, and thus the nomination, to John McCain.
At a time when we needed a defender of capitalism, Crist saddled us with a big-government Republican whose appeasing, me-too response to the financial crisis got Obama elected. And that's one reason why he has to pay the price in his Senate run.
Meanwhile, a new Rasmussen poll shows support for a repeal of the Obama health care bill surging to 58%. That's why you don't pass a law the public hates, even if you have the votes in Congress to ram it through. One tea partier's sign put it nicely, if not delicately: "Shove it down our throats in 2009, and we'll shove it up your"—and here there is a little outline of a donkey—"in 2010."
TIA Daily reader Tom Wright also sent me a link to a poll on the public's "generic" preference for one party over the other. Tom points out: "Scroll down for the part I thought was even more interesting. There is a plot of the Democratic advantage or disadvantage in the generic ballot from the 1960s until today. Not even in 2008 did they come close to their 1970s numbers; 2007-08 is more of a short-lived spike in a long term downward trend."
What will drive them down even farther is new items like this one in the New York Times:
In a new report, the Congressional Research Service says the law may have significant unintended consequences for the "personal health insurance coverage" of senators, representatives, and their staff members.For example, it says, the law may "remove members of Congress and Congressional staff" from their current coverage, in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, before any alternatives are available.
The confusion raises the inevitable question: If they did not know exactly what they were doing to themselves, did lawmakers who wrote and passed the bill fully grasp the details of how it would influence the lives of other Americans?
And that's the New York Times writing, for crying out loud.
Cue the maniacal laughter here, as we contemplate the delicious irony of the Democratic Congress becoming the victims of their own power grab. But the wider story of the health care bill is not amusing at all.
Jack Wakeland brought my attention to the item below, along with the following comments:
"In response to draconian price controls on health insurance coverage for small-groups, all six companies providing that financial service stopped issuing new policies in Massachusetts pending the outcome of their lawsuit seeking an injunction against the controls.
"Yesterday they lost the lawsuit.
"It is unclear if any firms will ever new provide small-group coverage plans in Massachusetts again.
"The Massachusetts personal health insurance mandate went into effect in January 2008. All residents of Massachusetts are required by law to buy health insurance, but independent contractors and small business employers who relied on small-group plans may no longer be able to do so.
"So only 39 months after RomneyCare went into effect, a broad segment of the private health insurance market has been destroyed.
"Does that mean that whole segments of the private health insurance market will be destroyed within four years of ObamaCare going fully into effect, after 2013?
"Yes, of course."
"The Massachusetts Insurance Blackout," Wall Street Journal, April 9
This week it became impossible in Massachusetts for small businesses and individuals to buy health-care coverage after Governor Deval Patrick imposed price controls on premiums. Read on, because under ObamaCare this kind of political showdown will soon be coming to an insurance market near you.The Massachusetts small-group market that serves about 800,000 residents shut down after Mr. Patrick kicked off his re-election campaign by presumptively rejecting about 90% of the premium increases the state's insurers had asked regulators to approve. Health costs have run off the rails since former GOP Governor Mitt Romney and Beacon Hill passed universal coverage in 2006, and Mr. Patrick now claims price controls are the sensible response to this ostensibly industry greed.
Yet all of the major Massachusetts insurers are nonprofits. Three of largest four—Blue Cross Blue Shield, Tufts Health Plan, and Fallon Community Health—posted operating losses in 2009. In an emergency suit heard in Boston superior court yesterday, they argued that the arbitrary rate cap will result in another $100 million in collective losses this year and make it impossible to pay the anticipated cost of claims. It may even threaten the near-term solvency of some companies. So until the matter is resolved, the insurers have simply stopped selling new policies.…
Mr. Patrick has made the health insurance business so painful the government actually has to order private companies to sell their products.
3. Reason, Optimism, and Prosperity
Glenn Beck has emerged in the past year or so as one of the most prominent new voices in defense of liberty. Yet as this year begins, Beck shows signs of disintegrating intellectually as he seemingly tries to divert the energy of the tea party movement into support for the religious right.
This is something that the religious right has not generally tried to do, by the way. That's one of the things that has made the tea party movement possible. While it has a significant number of religious supporters, they have agreed that the real emergency today is the loss of economic freedom. They haven't tried to take the tea party events and turn them into rallies against abortion, or gay marriage, or any other part of the religious "social agenda."
This has made it possible for all of us in the tea party movement to forget our other differences and march arm-in-arm, shoulder-to-shoulder against socialism. My attitude has been: let's beat the left, so we can safely fight each other later.
Yet Beck's newest crusade is to replace the secular, Enlightenment-era American creed of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" with the Christian virtues of "faith, hope, and charity," as described by Beck below, who dragoons the Founding Fathers into service as religious icons.
Jack Wakeland brought this to my attention and had more to say on it, which I will share tomorrow. But Tom Minchin also chimed in with a very good suggestion for the answer to Beck: "He is also wrong at the level of trying to lay out a blueprint for the revival of the American spirit. We have to offer a better base, and that's reason, optimism, and prosperity." More on that later, too.
"Faith, Hope, and Charity," Glenn Beck, GlennBeck.com, March 16
We've never been a nation that jams it through. We've never been a nation that believes in a free lunch. We've never been a nation that asks for a handout instead of a hand up.This is who we are:
Hope:… You've heard it a million times: They are coming for the hope of a better life. They know that in America all you need is a dream and anything's possible. Last I checked no one is floating their way just at the chance to get into Cuba. Hope has always come from America.
How did it provide it?
Faith: Samuel Adams felt America was put together by divine providence—all of them did. They relied on it. God played an instrumental role; He was the one we had to have faith in. George Washington said: "It is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor."…
Charity: When there is an earthquake or tsunami, when there is hunger and poverty, there is no other country in history that has been more charitable than America. Name the country more giving and more generous than America. France? Spain? Germany?
Faith, hope and charity: They are the essential teachings of Christ….
They [the left] are asking you to have faith in them, not God. Faith in government to be the grantor of rights….
We're going to keep on fighting this thing [the health care bill]. We know what this bill means and that it seeks to fundamentally transform America. We will fight it with everything in us—not with bullets, not with guns, but with faith, hope and charity.
4. Going Galt
As an opposite source of intellectual inspiration from Glenn Beck's appeal to faith, hope, and charity, TIA Daily has been following the increasing influence of Ayn Rand in the media.
Some have taken to using the term "going Galt" to refer to the idea—taken from the hero of Ayn Rand's novel "Atlas Shrugged"—of productive people "going on strike" rather than supporting a bloated and oppressive state. I use the term "going Galt" to refer to the commentators on the right who have been picking up on these references to Ayn Rand's work and ideas.
Here's a new example, but one that's indirect. It doesn't mention Ayn Rand by name—but it is clearly influence by the question she raised: what would happen if the productive people whose looted wealth supports the welfare state were suddenly to disappear?
"What Do We Do If the Rich Start to Leave?" Bill Frezza, RealClearMarkets, April 12
500 American citizens and green card holders in the last quarter of 2009 said goodbye to America forever. Not many, but double the number of expatriations in all of 2008. Good riddance, other millionaires will take their place.But what if more of them start to leave?…
1% of US income tax filers pay 40% of our nation's income taxes. It's only fair given how much money they make. So what if 40% of filers actually get handouts from the IRS? Didn't our President come out on the campaign trail and promise he was going to spread the wealth around? He won the election didn't he? Everybody knew what the deal was.
But what if more of them start to leave?
When the Bush tax cuts expire top marginal tax rates are going to shoot up. Add in city, state and local taxes the rich are going to have to fork over 50 cents of every last dollar earned. Inheritance taxes are scheduled to soar when death tax reform expires—all on money that was already taxed. An extra 3.8% Medicare tax got slapped on dividends and capital gains courtesy of healthcare reform. Blah, blah, let the rich squawk. We outnumber them and somebody has to pay the bills.
But what if more of them start to leave?…
How dare they leave after all we did for them! If expatriations keep growing Congress should triple the exit tax. In fact, why should we let deserters take any money with them at all? They should be thankful we let them out with the clothes on their backs. Didn't they enjoy the benefits of this great country while the getting was good?
But what if more of them start to leave?
p
5. State-Owned Media
The flip side of suppressing the speech of those you disagree with (see item #1 above) is subsidizing the speech of those who agree with you. Hence the idea that is increasingly being floated and seriously discussed by a shameful breed of hack journalist: federal subsidies for the newspapers. Below is an article by one of the hacks, a writer for the St. Petersburg Times in Florida.
Note that this whole article is written as if the First Amendment does not exist and need not be considered.
The leftist political establishment knows by now that they can't win an honest argument, so they have to rig the debate so they are the only participants. And this is their next step: the establishment of a state-owned media.
"How Bad Must Media Decline Before Federal Support Looks Like a Good Idea?" Eric Deggans, TampaBay.com, April 12
Is it time for the government to help preserve newspaper journalism with financial support?That's the topic of a panel discussion I'll be leading at the ASNE national convention in Washington DC on Tuesday….
The bottom line: there's ways to support the news industry beyond handing failing newspapers a bag of money, and it may be time for lawmakers, industry leaders and media analysts to start contemplating alternatives.
Even among those who advocate federal help to preserve journalism, few like the term "bailout" or are comfortable with the notion of handing media companies big checks in the way some Wall Street banks were saved last year….
The great fear is that the economic formula which has funded newspapers for so long is breaking down before a new model can arise to ensure regional and local journalism continues in communities across the country. If the industry waits until the model is in serious peril before seriously considering federal help, will it be making the same mistake it made with the Internet?...
Is there a way government can help preserve journalism's economic future without corrupting it?
6. Ice Is Always Slippery
During the Winter Olympics in 1994, speed skater Dan Jansen wiped out during a turn in a crucial race, denying him a gold medal he had long sought. (He would finally win the gold later in the same games.) As Jansen was marching out of the rink, clearly upset over the loss, a stupid, insensitive reporter shoved a microphone in his face and asked whether the ice in that turn had been "slippery." Through clenched teeth, with contempt dripping from his voice, Jansen replied: "Ice is always slippery."
I feel the same way about people who ask, "Is climate change real?" And that's pretty much how MIT scientist Richard Lindzen replied when asked that question by a newspaper. His teeth may not be clenched, but there is a distinct note of contempt for the environmentalists as Lindzen reminds us that climate is always changing.
This piece is strong for the reason that Ian Plimer's similar arguments have been strong: it reminds us why the whole global warming theory is an assault on science and should never have even gotten off the ground. It should have been dismissed at the very beginning because it begins by ignoring the entire history of the earth's climate. And Lindzen is very good at identifying the motive behind this rejection of science: a new religion in which we must submit to "punishment for sinful levels of consumption."
"Earth Is Never in Equilibrium," Richard Lindzen, Janesville Gazette, April 8
To a significant extent, the issue of climate change revolves around the elevation of the commonplace to the ancient level of ominous omen. In a world where climate change has always been the norm, climate change is now taken as punishment for sinful levels of consumption. In a world where we experience temperature changes of tens of degrees in a single day, we treat changes of a few tenths of a degree in some statistical residue, known as the global mean temperature anomaly (GATA), as portents of disaster.Earth has had ice ages and warmer periods when alligators were found in Spitzbergen. Ice ages have occurred in a 100,000-year cycle for the last 700,000 years, and there have been previous interglacials that appear to have been warmer than the present despite lower carbon-dioxide levels. More recently, we have had the medieval warm period and the little ice age. During the latter, alpine glaciers advanced to the chagrin of overrun villages. Since the beginning of the 19th century, these glaciers have been retreating. Frankly, we don't fully understand either the advance or the retreat, and, indeed, some alpine glaciers are advancing again.
For small changes in GATA, there is no need for any external cause. Earth is never exactly in equilibrium. The motions of the massive oceans where heat is moved between deep layers and the surface provides variability on time scales from years to centuries. Examples include El Nino, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, the Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation, etc. Recent work suggests that this variability is enough to account for all change in the globally averaged temperature anomaly since the 19th century….
One may ask why there has been the astounding upsurge in alarmism in the past four years. When an issue like global warming is around for more than 20 years, numerous agendas are developed to exploit the issue. The interests of the environmental movement in acquiring more power, influence, and donations are reasonably clear. So, too, are the interests of bureaucrats for whom control of carbon dioxide is a dream come true. After all, carbon dioxide is a product of breathing itself.
Robert Tracinski writes daily commentary at TIADaily.com. He is the editor of "The Intellectual Activist (TIA)" and contributor to "The Freedom Fighter's Journal."
0 comments:
Post a Comment