Sunday, July 31, 2005

Coming US Policy: Ending Tyranny in Our World

I was looking around this site, which seems to be to be either leftish or Libertarian and came across this article about a part of the Foreign Relations Authorization Act.

The little-noticed legislation passed the House a week ago today as part of the Foreign Relations Authorization Act by a vote of 351-78. Mr. Lantos last week told the Sun that the bill "puts the meat on the bones of the president's second inaugural address." In that speech, President Bush said, "It is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world."

The bill would allow the State Department to "use all instruments of United States influence to support, promote, and strengthen democratic principles, practices, and values in foreign countries." It charges the CIA and Treasury Department with tracking the personal assets of dictators and their associates.
Note the vote. Better than 4 to 1 in favor. Also note that Tom Lantos is a Democrat and is the Ranking Democratic member of the House International Relations Committee. He was the founder in 1983 of the Congressional Human Rights Caucus, and is still its Co-Chairman. Not only that but he survived the Nazis. He is an American by choice.

I wonder if the Dems would consider running him for President? Did I mention that he was a Professor of Economics for 30 years? Too bad he has the Schwarzenegger problem: not born in this country.

In any case I can't wait to see the Kos guys howling at Bush for some failing in implimenting the policy. The universe is never good enough for them. I wonder if they will complain about Lantos. Not left enough probably.

The other interesting thing about this is that it is a national commitment by the Congress endorsing Bush's grand strategy for the war. This vote is equivalent to the time when containment of the Soviet Union as enunciated by George Keenan became American Policy endorsed by Democrats and Republicans and followed with varying degrees of fidelity by every President from the time the policy was adopted (around 1948) until the end of the Soviet Union in the 1988 to 1991 period.

This is a historic vote and almost unnoticed. The New York Sun did run a piece on this on the 27th of July. Otherwise I can't find much else on it except from the blogs. If you want to look deeper into it a helpful search term is "ADVANCE Democracy Act".

Update: 07:44z 31 Jul 2005

The Heritage Foundation says:
A Dose of Realism Needed
Well DUH. They want more nuance in the categories of nations: free, partially free, unfree. OK. Three categories or five, as long as it is not seven or fifteen. They have a few other complaints as well. Still, as an ambitious policy that can guide America for the next fifty or one hundred years, I like it.

The Heritage article from April 8 gives the following bill numbers: S. 516 and H.R. 1133 for the "ADVANCE Democracy Act". Things may have changed since then.

Update: 07:59z 31 Jul 2005

A good resource is this article by Ambassador Mark Palmer The Real Axis of Evil: Removing the World's Dictators Through Diplomacy
The 21st century, it seems to me, offers two scenarios to us as we stand here to-day. One of those is with dictators—either with the current crop that we have, or even more; and the other scenario is a world without dictators. The 20th century taught us very clearly what a world with dictators can be like. It was the bloodiest of all centuries, and it was the bloodiest of all centuries because of dictators—because of Hitler and Stalin and Mao. It was bloody not only because of the wars; it was bloody because of democide—because of the number of people that these dictators killed inside their own country—169 million. They killed more of their own citizens than foreigners.
There is much more. I don't agree with it all but it does represent a source document. Or you can read his book on the subject: "Breaking the Real Axis of Evil".


Update: 09:13z 31 Jul 2005

The great Claudia Rosett reviews "Breaking the Real Axis of Evil" in the Wall Street Journal of 16 Dec 2003.

Friday, July 29, 2005

What Iraq Needs Next

Donald Sensing has a fine piece [pdf] on the origins of the current war. His take is that what the Islamic Nazis fear most is democracy. Which is why what is happening in Iraq is such a threat.

However I see a strategy in the Islamic Nazi movement to subvert democracy by making the Iraqi government subservient to Islamic Law as the Islamic Nazis concieve it. I think this is a very bad sign. Very bad.

Since the American government has seemingly taken a pretty hands off approach to the drafting of the Iraqi Constitution I think we are seeing a very wrong turn in American policy.

What can be done.

I see two approaches. One is simple although I'm not sure it can be implimented. That approach would allow a vote on each individual section of the Iraqi Constitutioin. Thus the people themselves (say ratification was contingent on a 60% vote) could strike out clauses they dislike.

The second possibility is a competing democracy in the neighborhood. I propose Iran as the best candidate. They are well acquainted with living under Islamic Naziism. They don't like it. Thus Iraqi tendencies towards Islamic Nazism would be checked by competition in the neighborhood. As Michael Ledeen says - much faster please.

Tuesday, July 26, 2005

We Will Make You Buy the Bullet

Thug states have nasty habits. If they have to kill one of your relatives for political reasons they will come to your home after the deed is done and hand you a bill for the bullet that they used to kill your relative. There will be one choice. Pay.

Well our esteemed Secratary of State is doing much better than that. She has a plan. The Israelis will be asked to buy the bullet in order that their relatives may be killed. The specific relatives to be named at a later date.

Meryl Yourish quotes from Haaretz

Israel, she said, must supply the Palestinian Authority with weapons and ammunition. It must speed up the lines at checkpoints. It must be nice to Abu Mazen's buddies and allow them to operate. As if the missiles and the Qassam rockets fired at Israeli towns every day were our doing.
American foreign policy has sunk to new lows. If they want to kill Jews they ought to at least have the decency to pay for the bullets. What are we? Some kind of thug state?

I wrote a more temperate bit about Rice's visit to Israel a few days ago. When I learned about the requirement for Israel to arm the Palistinians (again!) I just blew my top. A lot of Jews who voted Republican are beginning to lose it. Me too.

via Instapundit

Update: 21:10z 26 July 2005

The Captain has more to say about arming the Palestinians.

Monday, July 25, 2005

The Buggy Professor

The Buggy Professor has an outstanding series of articles on politics and economics explaining why the anglosphere is doing so much better economically than the EU and Japan. You should read them all starting with the first. Let me just quoute an outstanding bit explaining what is wrong with the American left:

....no one can deny that another left-wing has emerged, centered in universities and the media, with support among grass-roots Democratic activists even if not much enthusiasm among the voting public.

Its name? As just mentioned, the familiar pc-left --- Aka The School of Resentment and Grudge, a term originally directed at them by Harold Bloom, formerly one of Yale’s most prominent deconstructionist critics before he moved on in disgust; and subsequently adopted and elaborated on by Richard Rorty, the only original thinker of import to associate with the tenured left- radicals before he too decamped and among other things agreed in print that they’re “creeps”. . . "semi-literate, politically useless, and odiously self-righteous and self-congratulatory.”

Who Are They?

Generously put, little more than a mishmash of aging mouth-eaten Marxists, their eyes still straining to find a decent Marxist state anywhere; that’s what; plus . . . lots of cloud-chasing Pacifists and Globalists, likewise creaky at the hinges and ardent chanters of Noam Chomsky crackpot tirades on the evils of American Neo Paleo-Imperialism, responsible for all the world's ills right down to explaining why your girlfriend or boyfriend --- or husband or wife --- are all lousy lovers who are as skilled in bed as a Water Buffalo, and as exciting to the same degree. Then, too, there're all the bustling hordes of Post-Modernist Space-Cadets and Critical Theorists who admire the writings of Nietzsche, the Nazi Heidegger, several windbag French irrationalists, and Theodore Adorno, the icon of the early Frankfurt School of Critical Theory . . . a very in-guy now who saw jazz as portending the imminent triumph of Fascism in America. For all of them, obscurantism counts a great deal; clear arguments and concerns for evidence --- a bourgeois fetish, a hangover from what Derrida calls logocentric fallacies --- are brushed aside as superficial. And don’t overlook all the anal-compulsive deconstructionists stumbling around in the PC-mists too . . . men and women in literary studies of no less tangled thought and style who spout cryptic mumbo-jumbo even in their sleep; never mind whenever they’re perched high up on their lecterns and rap and jive their recondite gibberish amid all the blackouts and loud hallucinating outcries that their heavily snoring, zonked-out students emit now and then in their nightmarish captivity. None of which is meant to short-change the hyperkinectic swarms of Outer Space Queer-theorists, likewise flipped out and monomanically meschuga . . . and all but lacking their Buck Rogers helmets and ray-guns to complement their daily climb into their mental spaceships and subsequent lift-off into their Inter-Galactic skyhootings.

And finally, to end a catalogue of obscurantist and dogmatic pedants that could run on and on --- not enough mental hospitals in the world to house them all --- we have to mention the multitudes of monomanical feminist scholars down with a life-long case of antsy indignation and utopian longings. To a person, convinced that the human mind is a total blank at birth and hence not just wholly malleable, but malleable in ways that fully accord with their own pious hopes . . . at any rate, with non-stop socialization and an occasional beating with whips and knees-to-the-groin administered by you-know-who. (Not admittedly a new doctrine; rather, one pioneered by Lenin and Stalin as well as Mao, Pol Pot, and Fidel Castro and all the other heroes of the mothballed Marxists around the world, all equally convinced that the mind’s a complete blank and in need of revolutionary change and brainwashing before the New Communist Man emerged, able to appreciate just how much their revolutionary forebears had done for them.)
When the professor is on a roll he cuts deep. Not all his prose is this good but the ideas he develops are worth a read because he shows how economics and politics intertwine to produce the world today and the world of tomorrow.

The essence of the EU/Japan problem is state capitalism. The professor doesn't cover it but I believe that that model will also hobble China once its explosive growth phase is over. These countries have bought domestic peace at the cost of stagnation. Not stagnation in the absolute sense but relative to the dynamic economies of the anglosphere. In addition demographics may lead in the next twenty years not just to stagnation in relative terms but an actual slide backwards.

As I said. Go read the whole thing. The professor reprises his arguments in each section making for some redundancy but also making understanding easy if you start in typical blog order - last article first.

Coventry

I am reading Anthony C. Brown's wonderful bok on the Second World War called "Bodyguard of Lies". The book deals with code breaking, secret agents, and the conduct of war mainly from the British perspective.

The chapter "Coventry" deals with a particular heart breaking incident where Churchill decided that to prevent the Germans from learning the British had broken the German code system he gave the city of Coventry no early warning of a German attack that he knew was coming. It states that he had at least 48 hours warning. The city and many of its ancient buildings were all but destroyed. All to keep an advantage in the war. An advantage that many think was crucial in the defeat of Germany.

And then I get this news report about the latest bombs going off in Britain and the response of the British police. As you know the police shot and killed a Brazilian man that was thought might be carrying a bomb onto an underground train. The fact that five bullets were put into his head at close range and that he was not carrying a bomb has outraged many members of the British public and put the fear of God into the British Muslim community. The rules have changed.

LONDON (Reuters) - British police say more members of the public could be shot in error as they escalate their battle against terrorism and hunt for four men who tried to set off explosions on London's transport system last week.

The warning comes after police, who are engaged in one of the biggest manhunts in British history, mistakenly shot dead a Brazilian man on Friday, thinking he was a suicide bomber.

Britain's most senior policeman, Ian Blair, defended the shoot-to-kill policy for dealing with suspected suicide bombers and said police were in a race against time to find those behind last Thursday's attempted bombings of three underground trains and a bus, the second attack on the capital in two weeks.

"This is a terrifying set of circumstances for individuals to make decisions," Blair told Sky News television. "Somebody else could be shot."
I'd say this means the Brits are in this war for keeps. No quarter.

As with WW2 I do believe there will be many mistakes and errors of judgement. Innocents will die.

And yet I feel sorry for those who started this war. They will be shown no mercy, and they will not win. Every time the Brits have shown this kind of determination they have prevailed. As the saying goes they are in it up to their eyebrows, playing for keeps.

We are with you mates.

Saturday, July 23, 2005

Going Wobbly On Israel

Condi Rice announced that the United States policy is an open border between Israel and Gaza.

"When the Israelis withdraw from Gaza, it cannot be sealed or isolated ... with the Palestinian people closed in after the withdrawal," Rice told a news conference.

"We are committed to connectivity between Gaza and the West Bank and we are committed to openness and freedom of movement for the Palestinian people," she said.
What kind of crazyness is this? The Palis are attacking Israelis every day with rockets and mortars and American policy is that they ought to be allowed free passage to co-ordinate and recruit from the Western territories? This is madness.

What is the purpose of making the Israelis more vulnerable than they are to more attacks?

I supported the withdrawal with the proviso that its purpose was to isolate the murderers from their intended victims. What Rice is asking that the Israelis open themselves to murder. Why?

What possible purpose can be accomplished by such requests?

It is my firm opinion that the murderers should be isolated from Israel until they give up their goal of destroying the Israeli State.

If you believe as I do now is the time to write the President and give him a piece of your mind. Israel should be encouraged to seal its borders to isolate the terrorists not open its borders to them.

Well what about the Load of Crap (translation:Road Map)?
The United States hopes that the withdrawal will help revive negotiations on a "road map" for a Palestinian state alongside a secure Israel.

Rice reiterated that the United States was committed to making sure there was a stop to Israeli "settlement activity."
Israel should do what it wants with its borders including annexing territory until the Arabs come to the peace table. So far Hizbullah and other armed factions have promised to move from various locations around the world (Lebanon to start) to Gaza to intensify the war against the Jews.

Why the bloody hell is it American policy that Israel should keep its borders open to this crap? What is secure about opening Israel to the free flow of terrorists. If the borders are to be secure they MUST be closed.

Isolated Incidents

Since 9/11 the war on Islamic terrorism has been in the minds of many a series of isolated incidents. Bali, Beslan, Spain, Britain. Of couse in the telling one must discount Israel, Iraq, Afghanistan. Not so hard to do. Those countries had it coming. Iraq because of American occupation. Afghanistan because of the occupation there. Israel, well they had it coming. The Jews are Nazis don't you know.

Well, this past week the Islamic terrorists struck Britain again. Hundreds killed in Iraq in various bombings. And now Egypt.

Egypt has been a rather friendly place for the incubation of terrorists. Their TV has been a font of Jew hatred and radical clerics have free reign to preach hate. As long as that hate did not extend to acts against Egypt.

This week has been an eye opener. Egypt has made the difference. Egypt has no troops in Iraq or Afghanistan. Why were they chosen? Because a tourist resort open to the world allows modern western people contact with Islam. The Islam of the terrorists fear such contact. Democracy, whiskey, sexy is seductive.

As long as the attacks were isolated in space and time the enemies of fanatic I slam could assume it was "their" problem. Isolated attacks could allow the general public to assume that duck and cover, it is not so bad, it didn't happen here, were viable attitudes.

The attacks of the past week are weakening those attitudes. If they keep up (as I expect they will) they will unite governments against the fascists. Why would al Queda and the rest do such a thing? Why would they attack in such a way as to unite countries who have a natural antipathy towards each other? Why would they act to prove that what is going on is not a series of isolated incidents, but a world war?

My guess is that they are weakening. The spasm of violence in Iraq over the past few weeks is to my way of thinking is an announcement of defeat. They are going out with a bang, but they are going out. A last spasm.

Does this mean that things will get easier. No. al Queda after two years of hard fighting is no longer attracted to the fly paper. Iraq for them is a dead end. Their only hope for victory is to bring down Muslim oriented governments and to change western policy not by defeat on the battle field but by striking fear into the West. So far such fear tactics have only worked in Spain.

With Iraq declining in immediate importance the open West and its enclaves (such as tourist areas in the Moslem world) are going to be targets for some time to come.

Stiff upper lip. Carry on. Even fear is allowed as long as it adds to the determination to defeat these scum.

Thursday, July 21, 2005

First They Came for the Jews....

Yesterday at Little Green Footballs Charles posted a piece on Muslim attacks on gays in the UK.

It is surprising to me that gays support the Palestinian cause ove Israel. They kill queers in Palestine and have gay pride parades in Israel. Well there are a lot of self loathing Jews BTW. So I understand.

There is a long discussion at Footballs about whether gays in America who are for the most part anti-war and pro Palestinian will wake up to the threat.

It is surprising to me that gays support the Palestinian cause ove Israel. They kill queers in Palestine and have gay pride parades in Israel. Well there are a lot of self loathing Jews BTW. So I understand.

I can tell you that the wake up will happen but it will be slow. Strongly held opinions do not change in an instant. Even with news of the worst kind. What will help unfortunately is a steady stream of attacks. They are coming.

(London) A British LGBT civil rights group says its leaders have received death threats from Muslim fundamentalists and warns that gay clubs could be targets for terrorist bombers.

"Gay venues could be bombed by Islamic terrorists," OutRage said Monday. "All gay bars and clubs should introduce bag and body searches. Muslim fundamentalists have a violent hatred of lesbians and gay men. They believe we should be killed. Our community could be their next target. This is no time for complacency."
I expect that as more gay Americans visit London and actually experience getting their bags checked will begin to turn a few heads.

In other news from the UK, Irshad Manji a lipstick lesbian confronting radical imams in the UK is profiled by the London Times:
Irshad Manji has already been dubbed ‘Osama’s worst nightmare’ for her criticisms of Islam. Now she wants Britain’s Muslims to stand more firmly on the side of freedom.

No wonder Irshad Manji has received death threats since appearing on British television: she is a lipstick lesbian, a Muslim and scourge of Islamic leaders, whom she accuses of making excuses about the terror attacks on London. Oh, and she tells ordinary Muslims to “crawl out of their narcissistic shell”. Ouch.

Manji is a glamorous Canadian television presenter whose book, The Trouble with Islam, has made her so famous in America that she won something called the Oprah Winfrey Chutzpah award. Even at a conference in Oxford last week she felt unsafe — despite extra security — with police sifting through “disgusting e-mails” and threats after her appearance on Newsnight.
Word is getting out. Time is not on the side of the fascists. A truly odius bunch.

It will also sterngthen the hand of the right in America. Fortunes of war.

Wednesday, July 20, 2005

Take the Ninth

Today I e-mailed my Senator, Dick Durbin, to ask Bush's pick for the Supreme Court, John Roberts, what his view of the Ninth Amendment is.

I think this ought to be a standard question for any future nominees.

Joe Katzman of Winds of Change asks in the comments: what is the Ninth?

My reply:

You can read the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, The Federalist Papers, and the Magna Carta here.

The Ninth:

Amendment IX

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Randy Barnett has some interesting things to say. via Instapundit.

Saturday, July 16, 2005

The Slave Trade Continues

Slavery is a very old human institution. Its end in the west was spearheaded by William Wilberforce of Britain. This is a very interesting article on the subject:The Scourge of Slavery.Now naturally we think of a cruel and inhuman institution that was mainly American. This due in no small part to our civil war. And then I began reading. Of all the slaves shipped to the western hemisphere less tha 5% went to North America (mainly the American Slave States).

I found out that the slave trade to the west comprised about 10% of the trade. The vast majority went to the countries of Islam. In transporting the slaves to the Americas about 10% died in transit. In transporting slaves to Muslim countries 80% died in transit.

Although the slave trade has ended in the west it still continues in Islam. Here is a recent (June 10, 2005) reminder close to home:

A Saudi Arabian couple is charged in federal court with keeping an Indonesian woman in her early 20s as a virtual slave in their Aurora home for four years while the husband regularly raped her.

A federal grand jury in Denver returned an indictment Thursday against Homaidan Al-Turki, 36, and his wife, Sarah Khonaizan, 35. Both were living legally in the United States and are now in custody.
Welcome Roger Simon readers.

Many thanks also to Freedom's friend whose work I have greatly admired.

Joe Katzman at Winds of Change has linked. Check out the discussion!

update 22:06z 19 July 05

Mike Huggins of Irvine, CA sends a couple of links

USDOJ

Immigration and Customs Enforcement

The Psychology of the Suicide Bomber

I was reading an interesting article on suicide bombers and why they do it. I think James Hamilton gets to the heart of the problem here:

In the case of suicide bombing, we are looking at a combination of ideology, youth and reward:

1. The comparative dehumanisation of the enemy - Jew or infidel, to the point where their continued existence is of relatively little importance and a source of significant antagonism.
2. The difficulty of truly comprehending one's own death, and the reality of the death/injury of the bystanders who will be harmed - to say nothing of the pain they, their friends, their relatives, other witnesses, will endure. Awareness of these things is muffled during adolescence and early adulthood, which is demonstrated in reckless, inconsiderate behaviour.
3. The prospect of martyr status on earth and sainthood in Paradise, genuinely held and believed in.

Two principles can be derived from this:

1. The specific context in which the suicide bomber acts is created by someone - a leader- within the bomber's own community - it does not emerge automatically from outside forces - it has to be deliberately created.
2. The politico-religious context that is presented to the suicide bomber and used to motivate them is different from the context that the leaders operate within. The bombers see themselves as martyrs to a cause: the leaders see them, in part, as props to their power. Were it the same context, it would be the leaders themselves who would carry out suicide bombings. But this is not the case.
So how do you stop it? Start by taking out the leaders and enablers. The second and harder part is changing the culture. Well, killing and imprisoning the leaders is a start.

Hat tip: Drink-soaked Trotskyite Popinjays for WAR

The Sharon Plan: My Take

I read a very interesting novel in thr Dorsai series by Gordon Dickson about a battle fought passively by women, children, and old folks.

The plan of the battle was to oppose the troops garrisoning the conqered planet by poisoning them. The poison was nickel monoxide if I recall correctly. Its properties were that is an odorless tasteless gas that destroys the lungs. All the citizens who wished to avoid the poisoning left for the hills. A remnant stayed. The old, the sick, and the seriously disabled. When the natives started getting sick at the same time as the troops in the garrison the problem was thought to be a germ or virus. A natural disaster rather than an attack. Some of the citizens chose to die to defeat the enemy. It was a great read. Unfortunately I don't remember the title. Perhaps some one can enlighten me.

In a way I think that is what Sharon is doing.

War today is what it has been since the invention of communications. Media war. As the media gets faster what happens on the battle field is less and less decisive. Vietnamese General Giap was forced to admit that the North never won a major battle against the Americans. However, he said that in the end it didn't matter. The center of gravity of American power was not its army but public opinion.That is where the war was won.

My belief is that Sharon is willing to sacrifice the lives of some Israelis for a strategic advantage in the field of battle that means the most in this war: world public opinion. To fight and strike a serious blow to the terrorists Israel must have public opinion on its side.Why? Because Israel, with very few natural resources, is a trading country. It needs at least somewhat favorable world public opinion to prosper.

I fully believe that in the short term the pull out from Gaza will be a disaster. The Palis will not be able to restrain themselves. Innocents will be killed. There will be at least two major gains from the withdrawal. First, militarily the gloves can come off. Second, the Pali civil war for control of Gaza will intensify.

Long term a Pali civil war would be most advantageous. It will weaken Pali offensive power and discredit them further in world public opinion.

To gain this Sharon must risk the lives of thousands of Israelis. A sad day. A very sad day indeed. If Sharon has any heart it must be breaking. Mine is. And yet I belive thre General has made the right choice. It sucks.

=============================

Here is some corroboration:

The disorders of this week in and around the Gaza Strip make talk of truce and Israeli pull-backs sound surreal.

From Thursday, July 14, Palestinian terrorists have kept up a steady missile and mortar bombardment of Sderot and the moshavim and kibbutzim of southwestern Israel while challenging Palestinian security forces in bloody clashes. The violence surged with the arrival in Gaza of Mahmoud Abbas for a hopeless effort to assert control and revive the shattered truce he guaranteed last February in Sharm al Sheikh.
via WarTrash

Update: 10:54z 16 July 2005

Casualties in Gaza violence: 2 teens
Palestinian security forces and Hamas members exchanged fire in a crowded Gaza City neighborhood on Friday, leaving a 17-year-old boy and a 13-year-old dead and wounding 25 people - including six policemen.

It was not clear whether Hamas gunmen were also hurt in the clash. Hamas members were not expected to take their activists to hospitals, for fear of arrest.

Friday's clashes erupted in Gaza City's Zeitoun neighborhood, after security forces searched for militants suspected of firing rockets at Israeli targets. Hamas members torched a police station, and set a police armored personnel carrier and three jeeps on fire.
Hoots links and adds some interesting points.

The Move is Over

My move across town is done.

The unpacking has commenced.

Monday, July 04, 2005

Happy Birthday America

My family is in the middle of a move to a new house. The move should be done by the end of next week. In the mean time here is a bit for America's Birthday.

And a big thanks to T.J. whose house was once up the hill from where I lived.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the Powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends,
it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.


Updated thanks to Randy Barnett of the Volokh Conspiracy.

Friday, July 01, 2005

The Democrats understand Marines

"The Marines I have seen around the world have the cleanest bodies, the filthiest minds, the highest morale, and the lowest morals of any group of animals I have ever seen. Thank God for the United States Marine Corps!" Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt

There is more from Sgt Grit