Quote of the Day – necessity, tyrants, and repealing Obamacare
Is Obama facilitating change or forcing it? Here's today's quote.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves. ~ William Pitt
In our recent political history, this might be applied to some of the actions of GW Bush, such as the war on Iraq, wiretapping, suspending habeas corpus for Gitmo detainees, etc.
It could also be applied to the Obama Administration, in the way that they forced through their various enormous spending bills, as well as their upcoming "carbon offsets" (a.k.a as 'cap and trade') legislation. Trust me, it will be urgent and necessary.
As we have seen in the Obama administration, you don't need time to read or openly debate legislation, you just need time to manipulate a majority vote.
Anti-incumbent or Anti-liberal?
BTW, if you really want to get a feel for how abusive the powers that be is, you can look at the currents in the current election and political cycle.
I am amazed, but not surprised, at how the liberal media is slow to see the current primary results as a judgement on Obama's far left liberalism. Instead, the look for and find (minor) evidence for anti-incumbency - they think that people are primarily fed up with Washington DC corruption and pork-barrel spending.
But part of the confusion arises from the fact that the 'attacks' are occuring from two sides. On the right, both conservatives and moderates are joining the Tea Party movement, and are essentially removing moderates and replacing them with conservatives and libertarians.
From the far left, however, libs are also aiming at removing moderates, mostly moderate Democrats who are not 'liberal enough.'
While there may be some anti-incumbent sentiment due to the economy and the general negative mood towards Washington, I believe that the liberal media is really missing the anti-liberal core of the current electorate changes. Just like they initially dismissed the Tea Party as inconsequential (as did the GOP when it put forward RHINOs who have been pretty much universally defeated by Tea Party candidates), they really can't read the writing on the wall – most Americans are waking up to the bankruptcy, both fiscally and intellectually, of the liberal tax and spend legislation pushed through with panic politics.
Repealing Obamacare
If you still don't believe me, watch not only the November elections, but the subsequent push for repealing much of Obama's legislation. While the libertarian Reason.com doesn't think this will happen, I think they are again underestimating the groundswell of discontent with Obama and the growing conviction that conservative economics are more common sense. See:
- Repeal: Obamacare as the New Prohibition (American Spectator)
- The Senate Conservatives Fund's Repeal ObamaCare Pledge
- National Bankruptcy will Repeal Obamacare (ronpaul.com)
- Nearly two-thirds of Americans want Obamacare repealed. (firstthings.com)
So necessity is the plea for infringements of human freedom like warrantless wiretaps, suspending habeas corpus, extraterritorial torture gulags, and… economic incentives for reducing pollution.
One of these things is not like the others.
Yep, they are both similar and different. One deals with terrorism, the other economy. Yet I would contend that Obama and the liberals are abusing power in a more egregious fashion and with less warrant.
So, not only are you comparing cap-and-trade to wiretapping reporters and torture gulags, you're contending the cap-and-trade is worse because it's "more egregious" and "with less warrant"?
That's insane, danielg.
No, I'm not contending that, but you'd like to think so!
But if you're curious about what I *am* saying, try this experiment – put my comment in the best possible light, and try to think of a way that Obama's abuse of power might be quantified as worse than Bush's. Can your brain undertake such an exercise in free thinking? :D
"Seek first to understand, then to be understood." – Stephen Covey
Hm, another lost comment.
The best possible light I imagined was:
Obama’s administration is defending Bush’s warrantless wiretapping and immunity for the telecomms that implemented it, both of which Obama voted for. So you might presume Obama is engaging in those same acts of illegal surveillance, and worse, defending those criminal acts in court.
Although Bush knew a majority of prisoners at Guantánamo Bay were innocent, he held them indefinitely and authorized their torture regardless. You might rate Obama worse since, though aware of these war crimes, he has not kept his promise to close Gitmo, and continues to operate our other extraterritorial torture gulags, ex. Bagram.
You might presume people who voted Republican to support police state tactics, and that people who voted Democrat would regard Obama’s defense of Bush’s abuses as a betrayal.
Therefore, you may deem Obama “more egregious”, “with less warrant” (or mandate), and more hypocritical when he replicates Bush’s crimes while pretending to restore honor to the White House.
However, my best possible light doesn’t sound much like your politics.
Thank you very much for this article!
For a long time I have done exactly what you warn against. This article was a slap in the face – but a needed one.
That being said, what is the value of an intuitive explanation? Is it to give a lay person an "ah-ha" moment? Is it good to have SOME understanding, even if it is "vague and mush?"
Hi Daniel:
A couple of points.
1. While necessity CAN be an excuse for something, it can also be a legitimate reason. It all boils down to whether or not the claimed necessity really IS necessary.
2. About cap and trade. Back in the olden days, cap and trade used to be a conservative, market based solution to pollution, contrasted with the mandated emission standards approach. The idea is standard market economics, pure Adam Smith. The market works (so say free marketeers)when the costs of something are reflected in the price; when producers have to pay the cost of production they have to add that cost into the price they charge and there is an incentive to reduce costs so producers make more profit. Pollution imposes a cost that producers DON'T have to pay because (absent government intervention) they just dump the pollution into the environment and society as a whole pays the price in a damaged ecosystem. In cap and trade, producers have to pay a price to pollute by paying for pollution permits, but they can sell those permits to others if they produce less pollution than they were permitted. This provides a market incentive to reduce pollution, utilizing the "invisible hand" to bring about change instead of just the (free marketeers claim) heavy hand of government mandates. Making people pay for the damage they cause is NOT tyrannical, not in the least.
>>KEITH: While necessity CAN be an excuse for something, it can also be a legitimate reason. It all boils down to whether or not the claimed necessity really IS necessary.
Agreed.
>>KEITH: Back in the olden days, cap and trade used to be a conservative, market based solution to pollution, contrasted with the mandated emission standards approach.
That may be so, I'm not sure. However, what I am sure of is that human-caused global warming is bogus, and taxing our system for fake science is bad for business, science, and the economy. We have to get away from panic-based pseudoscience driving public policy.
And although I am a governmental minimalist, I do think that the govt does have some responsibilities, and this type of regulation should fall into it's arena. I think all of the profiteering by having private parties involved makes it ripe for abuse.
Hi D: I don't want this to be a debate about global warming, so I'll not bother to mention that the vast majority of climate scientists agree that (a) the climate is warming and (b) human actions are involved (in fact it has to be because it is undeniable that the green house gases we are releasing into the atmosphere are a net absorber of solar energy). MY beef was with the suggestion that the President was exploiting an false claim of necessity to impose his nefarious policies on the nation. There is no evidence that Democratic support for government action to reduce green house emission is based on anything other than an honest belief that green house emissions pose a serious threat to humanity. Since things like cap and trade are legitimate way to address the costs that the unregulated market doesn't account for, there is nothing inherently tyrannical about implementing C & T. The only question is how much cost does green house emission impose, which is a technical scientific question, not a political one.
What I am sure of is that human-caused global warming is bogus
What makes you so sure, danielg? Do you know something the experts don't?
I ask because 97% of climatology researchers disagree with you. A poll of researchers listed in the American Geological Institute's Directory of Geoscience Departments "found that climatologists who are active in research showed the strongest consensus on the causes of global warming, with 97 percent agreeing humans play a role".
Hi Robin: It does seem surprising to me when people who are not experts in a field seem so confident that the vast majority in that field are wrong. Certainly experts can BE wrong, but I wouldn't go into a convention of heart surgeons and tell them they are wrong about by-pass surgery.
your friend
Keith