Christianity built the West, liberalism is killing it.

I’m having second thoughts about allowing “conservative” Anglicans
to convert to Rome without some form of validation of their virility. Anyone who can put up with this madness for so long may only be coming over to secure a decent funeral, or to reinforce our own kumbaya choir.

The terrorists hate your freedom and to keep you safe you must give up that freedom.

And who has used this fear, terrorism, WMD, yellowcake, aluminum tubes, anthrax, terror, terror, terror, as an excuse to sneak peak in your home, to tap your phone, to datamine you?

The only thing you have to fear is fear itself. Fear is whats destroying western freedom.

I approve. Well done.

The Church of England was only virile when the scions of the landlords ran the show.  Now they import people from Nigeria to run it and no one with any wealth and authority really believes in the institution.  Even the royals have to bend their knee to multiculturalism because the lackeys of the City (British politicians) “encourage” them to do so.

The Aga Khans, leader of a branch of Islam, have had a hankering for white meat for the last few generations but they don’t feel obligated to make apologies for their religion.  In another generation Aga Khan might be blond and blue-eyed, but they will NEVER make statements like the one above.  Maybe Taki can enlighten us about these jetsetters who live amongst the infidels for generations, marry European socialites and send their children to European boarding schools.  Imagine an hereditary Pope who lived in Islamic countries for a few generations and had his children educated at Middle Eastern schools, married Middle Eastern women and was the religious leader of Christian Europe.

“The only thing you have to fear is fear itself. Fear is whats destroying western freedom. “

Noise. (With no disrespect to FDR.) Don’t believe everything ya’ read.

On the whole, the quantity and quality of freedoms in these here parts (USA) has increased. Overwhelmingly.

More info., more religion, more travel, more dialogue, more recreation, more reading, more debauchery, more TV, more vacation, more food, more sports, more education, more business, more music, more money and more sex. For more people.

Ok. You got us on the military tribunal liberties when and if we go Taliban.

Speaking of Suicide Of The West, here’s the money quote:

But modern liberalism does not offer ordinary men compelling motives for personal suffering, sacrifice, and death. There is no tragic dimension in its picture of the good life. Men become willing to endure, sacrifice, and die for God, family, king, honor, country, from a sense of absolute duty or an exalted vision of the meaning of history. It is such traditional ideals and the institutions slowly built around them that are in present fact the great bulwarks, spiritual as well as social, against the tidal advance of the world Communist enterprise. And it is precisely these ideals and institutions that liberalism has criticized, attacked, and in part overthrown as superstitious, archaic, reactionary, and irrational. In their place liberalism proposes a set of pale and bloodless abstractions--pale and bloodless for the very reason that they have no roots in the past, in deep feeling and in suffering. Except for mercenaries, saints, and neurotics, no one is willing to sacrifice and die for progressive education, Medicare, humanity in the abstract, the United Nations, and a 10 per cent rise in Social Security payments.

In truth much the same thing can be said of today’s (pseudo) conservatives, who can’t tell the difference between a nation and a corporation.

On the whole, the quantity and quality of freedoms in these here parts (USA) has increased. Overwhelmingly.

A government employee can come into your home with no warrant and take a sneak peak and you think your freedom is growing?

What you are speaking of, I say, is consumerism. And if you look at how things are going today with inflation people arent as able to consume or take vacations.

So yes, I wont believe everything I read, starting with your post.

When the conservatives kick the neo-con liberals out of their ranks and stop embracing liberalism, then maybe you could point fingers. Until then the conservatives are much to blame for whats happened to America during this pseudo-con party you helped to create.

“The only reason Europe did not become Moslem was because of the valor of such men as Richard, Charles Martel, Don John of Austria, and Jan Sobieski, each of whom would have been dumbfounded by Dr. Williams’ apology.”

This line of thinking assumes that the offensive Arab campaigns in the dark ages were because of Islam.  Is that true, or was it just simply the fact that these Arab armies happened to be Islamic?  In other words, would they probably have attacked regardless of their religion?  Also this line of thinking assumes that the Arab armies could have conquered an area as large as Europe, a ridiculous idea.  Ghengis Khans empire lasted, oh, a few months at it’s height.  Hitlers empire and Napoleons empire didn’t last very long either.  Moral of the story is that the more you spread out the weaker you become, and eventually your empire will collapse and formerly conquered areas will declare their independence.  The Roman empire just barely grew a little and sustained, but that took hundreds of years and the Romans were very generous towards the regions they conquered, allowing them certain self-rule, freedom of religion most the time, and improvement in public works.  None of these was or could have been offered by the Arab armies, and by the time they would have gotten to Sweden their army would have been 5 guys facing a legion of angry and pissed Vikings.

Who cares if the trinity is offensive! What kind of spineless masochist apologizes for the faith he devoted his whole adult life for? Insanity.

By the way, I don’t think we should talk about “liberalism” in this context. Say what you want about feminists and all their Cultural Marxist allies, but they don’t just bend over for everyone—they usually reserve their hate for white men. Which is, in my case, bad, but at least, they’ve got some fight in them. I appreciate their fighting spirit. They have a limit, a principle, an idea—no matter how degenerate it may be.

Masochists like Williams don’t even have that, they actually want to be blamed for all wrongs in the world and loudly claim responsibility for it. “Oh, take me! Take my life and honour, my conviction and redeem me!”

People like Williams are just bending over for everyone who comes along. They’re not liberals, they’re cowards. Not liberalism, but willfull cowardism. And, it sure as hell isn’t Christianity.

Tom,

Just curious - why do you use the term “Moslem” rather than the more common “Muslin?”

typo - “Muslim” of course

TM,

For the same reason I recently referred to the late Chinese dictator as Mao Tse-Tung, not Mao Zedong.

John Smith:

Thanks for the great quote from Burnham.  Yes, neoconservatism is merely a variant of the liberalism Burnham was writing about.

Archbishop Williams is attempting to confess “our” sins, expecting a good mannered Western response in which Muslims confess “theirs” and we all move forward.  This doesn’t recognize that Islam comes from a very different culture, in which such concessionary thinking is not in play.  All the Archbishop will get is a , “See?  You Christian crusaders abused us.  No give us more political and social entitlement to make up for it.”

“Moral of the story is that the more you spread out the weaker you become, and eventually your empire will collapse and formerly conquered areas will declare their independence.”

The not-to-terribly-distant future of the USA, methinks.

Kevin,

“I’m having second thoughts about allowing “conservative” Anglicans
to convert to Rome without some form of validation of their virility. Anyone who can put up with this madness for so long may only be coming over to secure a decent funeral, or to reinforce our own kumbaya choir.”

From my (continuing Anglican) perspective, any Anglican that didn’t leave the ECUSA/AC in the 70’s (including the “new continuing Anglicans” that have recently placed themsevles under the African dioceses) isn’t conservative.

As I began reading Tom’s excellent commentary, I had the sense that the archbishop was
an employee of my German Anabaptist college. One hears the same nonsense at my workplace
everyday, and particularly from the Protestant clergy.

“A government employee can come into your home with no warrant and take a sneak peak and you think your freedom is growing? “

Not in this country, pal-unless youre on parole or on the phone with some wild-eyed Pashtuns.

And, yes, our freedoms are at an all time high.

“From my (continuing Anglican) perspective, any Anglican that didn’t leave the
ECUSA/AC in the 70’s (including the “new continuing Anglicans” that have recently placed themsevles under the African dioceses) isn’t conservative.”

Not necessarily.  Some of us remain out of loyalty to our church and heritage and ignore the left-wing idiocies babbled my many of our leaders - just as I always was and remain loyal to my affirmative-action crazy college and law school.

Kudos to Mr. Piatak for this column telling it just like it is.  But I do think we have to draw a careful distinction with regards to liberalism.

The anti-religious love to prate on about how the churches are full of hypocrites and really bad people.  Of course they’re right.  But bad people always try to do bad things under the color of good things, such as religion.  The same is true of Left and Right.  Both have good points, which allows those with malevolent intent to use them for their own purposes.

Liberalism is two good things:  First, it is the reformist impulse.  As no culture is without flaws, some reform is needed, and when liberalism is at its best it reforms the worst aspects of our society.  For example, it’s the reason the eight-hour work day became standard.  Liberalism is also necessary for innovation.  A purely conservative society would be as unchanging as feudalism.  This is why so many liberals are able to portray conservatism as something neanderthal with approbation from many quarters of our societies.

Because the reformist impulse is basically a good thing, those people who hate our society for one reason or another are able to tear our culture apart under color of the good in liberalism.  This is particularly true of immigrants or their descendants who want to recreate our society in their own image.

This is more than an academic point.  Liberals who are fully aware of what I’ve described above are able to get away with feigning moral superiority because of liberalism’s reformist impulse.  And they are succeeding.  If paleoconservatism is to succeed, it must draw these distinctions between legitimate and illegitimate liberalism very starkly, for all the world to see.  If we can succeed in doing so, the gig will be up for those bent on destroying our societies.  And since moral oneupmanship is part and parcel of Western culture, I don’t see any alternative.

We must make the distinctions between legitimate and illegitimate liberalism clear for all the world to see.

Re Resh,
Ahhh the lovely irony of condoning the State’s abridgment of ones Civil Rights under the Constitution while simultaneously extolling the blessings of those rights. Faith is such an assiduous editor.

If you think the government will restrict its busy, Kafkaesque nosing about the citizen’s electronic premises to parolees or “Wild Eyed Pashtuns”, well ....I have the secret plans for a Cold Fusion Car to sell you for only $5.99 plus shipping.

“We must make the distinctions between legitimate and illegitimate liberalism clear for all the world to see.”

Hear, hear!

We should cut and kill the left-liberalism and save the good classical liberal principles which did the West much good, i.e. progressive reform compatible with our heritage.

The cowardist-liberalism of this Williams character should be completely delegitimized, disrepected, refuted and belittled. I loathe men who degrade themselves.

Fletcher wrote:

“Not necessarily.  Some of us remain out of loyalty to our church and heritage and ignore the left-wing idiocies babbled my many of our leaders - just as I always was and remain loyal to my affirmative-action crazy college and law school.”

Bruce is correct with his comment.  I will state that while you “remain” and “ignore,” you are a useful tool to the corrupt institution.  Loyalty to your “church and heritage” is a pitiful excuse for remaining in communion fellowship with open, unrepentant heretics.  The Anglican Church of 2008 is not the heritage of any true Anglican.  There needs to be some real soul searching among self-described conservatives who lend aid and comfort and legitimacy to the enemies of Christ.

I think this is one of the reasons the English Catholic historian Paul Johnson refers to the Church of England as the ‘Church of Sodomy’.

Dunnyveg, good points.  Allow me to share some thoughts about conservatism and liberalism. 

Burke himself explained the need for change, so long as the change was carried out in a gradual, organic and responsible manner, conformed to the moral law, cohered with other customs and traditions, and maintained basic continuity with the past.  This is basically refined common sense.  So, perhaps the difference between liberalism and conservatism has to do with loosening or ignoring these constraints on change.

Also, another way to think about so-called liberalism, at least in practice and over the last 100 years or so, is that it’s basically communism in slow motion and without the overt violence.  Everything the CPUSA used to push for and advocate is either the conventional wisdom, official policy or a campaign promise.  Indeed, a reasonable interpretation of the last several decades is that the entire communist manifesto has been all but implemented and right under our noses – albeit, in a sophisticated, subtle, rhetorically brilliant, gradual and uniquely American way.  Heck a bunch of Trotskyites, who long to fight wars and empower government in the name of abstract ideology, now represent “conservatism” in the public mind.  Maybe conservatives have misidentified the enemy ideology and that’s our problem; maybe we know what the enemy ideology is and refuse to talk frankly about it and that’s our problem; then again, maybe I’m way off base; just a few thoughts.

John Rutowicz,

I’ve thought of various unkind responses to your post, but I’ll just say that it’s more than a little presumptuous for you to proclaim that no conservative can, in good conscience, remain an Anglican.  That’s an awfully broad brush with which to tar the personal faiths and consciences of many, many people.

Joseph, good points.  I agree with you on Burke.  But conservatism and liberalism should be viewed as emotional and philosophical tendencies.  As such, nobody is a pure conservative or liberal.  They are only diametric tendencies.

But a word of caution on Burke:  Burke’s ideas were contingent upon great trust and honor towards the elite class.  Today we find ourselves having to oppose our elites, which in itself is inherently un-Burkean.  Sam Francis noted this paradox in his thoughts on Middle American Radicals.

There is yet another problem with this homage toward the elite class.  Just as there is reformist and pathological liberalism, the same is true of conservatism.  Healthy conservatism is about conserving and celebrating a particular culture and heritage.  This is good, and all peoples should do so.  The pathological part stems from Burke’s homage toward elites.  The good in conservatism can be used as color for the bad ends of favoring big money interests--something the Republican Party is justifiably criticized for.  Since it is in the interests of pathological liberals to pan all conservatism, they don’t make such distinctions.  We must if we’re to prevail in the game of moral oneupmanship.

For these reasons I discount Edmund Burke’s thought.  He was a genius without par.  But the circumstances he wrote to in many cases no longer exist.

Bolshevism is actually a case in point to illustrate pathological liberalism.  I don’t know enough about Chinese communism to comment on it, but both the Bolshevik and Khmer Rouge atrocities were more ethnic than ideological.

With the Khmer Rouge most of the victims were the ethnic Chinese minority.  Prior to WWII the Bolsheviks were considered by ethnic Russians to be an illegitimate government of foreign usurpers.  Most of Bolshevism’s victims were ethnic Russians (and some other despised groups), and most of the Bolshevist elites were non-Russian.

We can look forward to this sad, sordid history repeating itself here if we don’t succeed in controlling immigration and containing the more pathological elements of liberalism.

For the same reason I recently referred to the late Chinese dictator as Mao Tse-Tung, not Mao Zedong.

When I’m in a particularly nasty mood I might even use “Mahometean,” or “Mohammedean.” :)

Is it possible that xianity could enjoy some rebirth or
resurrection if what i consider, some of the blasphemy were
rooted out of it. christ was/is god. thus we are NOT to
mimic christ ‘as if’ we too can be Him (we can’t). But
rather hope and attempt to live our own mortal lives
as truly as he lived His.

Christ for me is the metaphysical construct which may
or may not be mythical (in terms of some of its historic
details not its religious truths). And Jesus was the Essene
holy man of History, who penned the Lord’s Prayer which back
then was called Every Son’s Prayer to the Father. And he also
penned, and delivered - the Sermon On the Mount - when the
Essenes regularly left their own highly disciplined,
religious communites in the desert. And went into the
surrounidng towns and ‘cities’ to minister/gift of their own
excess to the poor there, and give instruction to those who
were thristy for it.

Too many want to be ‘like’ Christ which to them means walk
on water and conquer death and do miracles and so on… ?

That may put them in the seats if they are encouraged to
continue to lust after that kind of jesus-christ super stardom
but that’s NOT who they are; and I would submit that’s blasphemy.

Jesus-Christ is/was in being a part of the trinity the son of God/God/
as is the Holy Ghost - three in One. We are not only NOT divine we’re
not even 1/2 divine as was Jesus-Christ. He and He alone was/is the
exception to the rule which proves it. I would call it the SIN of
blasphemy to teach or to believe that we can be ‘like’ Christ. Except
in our not being God, and not being the exception but rather the Rule,
we humbly accept that we can oly Hope to live our own Mortal lives
as truly as He lived his.

Am I wrong in this?

It is in my opinion the facile and bogus inclination toward what is
perceived to be the ‘transcendent’ in christianity. ‘As if’ it’s proper
and worse available to us of the Rule not the exception, that leads to
our inclination toward bogus and ultimately suicidal liberalism as well.

For which we later feel like oh gosh how silly and dumb of us; we need to
apologize to all - paradoxically - BOTH for suspecting there is in Fact
a spiritual dimension and side of life. AND, for not living Up to our
transcendent notions, which have given rise to the very liberalism we still
feel and believe we should live up to as a secular matter… That kind of a
paradox is a terminal lose - lose paradox. There’s the wounded paradox of:
one side of it is at least win while the other side of it lose.

And there’s also what I refer to as the enlivining paradox when both sides
of the apparent contradiction that is nonetheless happening is a win for
you or win - win. But currently the Christian paradox at large is a *terminal
one or lose - lose.

We blasphemed in believing - like Christ we are also capable of transcendence,
and in finding out not so we yet believe all of the bogus, misguided liberal
notions that blasphemy itself led us to. But that we yet feel, we now must nonetheless
fulfill as a secular matter. HOW crazy is that? Terminally crazy or LOSE - LOSE.

Most paradoxes as a matter of Fact are of the wounded variety - one side is
win and naturally enough the other side of it is lose. It’s normal.

I.e. Christ was God NOT you (sorry for that bad/Good news) ok, consider that
a lose side of it. HOWEVER stop beating yourself Up for what is only normal,
and just attempt to live your own limited, mortal life as truly as He lived
His. (If you don’t know your limitations you have one more.) Guess what you do
that and accept your own humanity, that side of it IS a win for you. You’ll at
least become happier vis a vis becoming adjusted and in sync with reality, your own
and everyone else’s humanity. And not *only what you ‘imagine’ that to be.

Absolute balance is never possible in a living and thus imperfect world; but
*approximate balance is Requisite. So you become more appropriately balanced.

That’s my sense of Christianity and I suspect it is Rome’s?

*copyright july 18, 2008

I was just reading through ‘the concept of the political’ by Carl Schmitt, and a quote from there is appropriate “A liberal is someone who, given the choice between Judas and Jesus, opts to a committee.”

Perhaps we could rephrase it “ A liberal is someone who, given the choice between western civilization, and eastern barbarity....”

Fletcher,
Have you considered trying to find a continuing Anglican parish in your area? We have zeroties to the Anglican communion and the ECUSA. Anglicanism doesn’t require a pope so I can believe that Rowan or Schori are the devil himself. I might have to endure an occasional white-guilt sermon (from our ex-Roman priest) but I don’t have to hear heresy (the papists belief that we’re heretics notwithstanding).

Well done!

When you knock Christian charity (humility, examination of conscience, confession of sin) off its foundation in Christian theology this is what you get.

Blog.

My only objection here is to Kevin’s swipe at the Romeward-bound Anglo-Catholics coming from the C of E.

Here are some FAQ from me to which I’ll add another answer to a misconception floating around: these people don’t use the Sarum Mass and are not asking Rome to do so.

Also as a libertarian I like the idea of the state backing off and religious groups policing themselves (as Dr Williams recently suggested about sharia) as long as they don’t harm others (so no more ‘no-go’ Muslim zones in parts of England).

I happen to live in France and recently picked up a newly published book called ‘Le Christ philosophe’ (Christ the Philosopher) by religious scholar Frederic Lenoir.  I hope it will soon be translated into English because it really is an excellent work that attempts to answer the question:  Why did democracy and human rights arise in the West rather than in India, in China, or in the Ottoman Empire? His answer after a detailed analysis is that this is because the West was Christian.  One doesn’t have to be a believer to be convinced that Christ’s teachings are the basis of an ethic with universal range: equality and dignity for all, justice, non-violence, emancipation of the individual from the group and (yes) women from men etc. In short the essential elements of western civilization that Dr. Williams might be wise to defend with more vigor.

I disagree with use of the word “liberalism” in this piece. The author may be from North America, however, and so he thinks he means “liberals” when he really means what we here call “socialists”, and kinds of other fascist leftists: these are actually are the enemies of Christendom, and its second cradle, western Civilisation. In England, what we (and I in particular) mean by “liberals” is what he would call “Libertarians”. To me and mine, “liberal” is what Margaret Thatcher was. That is why the English Conservative Party got rid of her. It was too “socialist”, still, even in 1990, to be able to tolerate her.

Resh, political, economic, and social freedoms diminish in this country year by year as the State grows.  Ak any gun owner, med pot user, aspiring new entrepeuner, or PC pariah.

DV, liberalism did not give us the 8 hour work day - increasing productivity did.  Liberalism is the johnnie-come-lately that claims all good, such as child labor and safety laws, are created out of thin air by liberals, rather than economic reality.  ST

ST-

Therefore...surely you can offer a few chilling cases or unnerving instances that reflect the loss of our fundamental rights? I remain unconvinced of the proposition.

In fact, let me make it easy for you to validate your point: could you detail for me just a couple of groups-whether gays, women, Latinos, blacks, et al(the usual suspects of oppression)-that have lost liberties today to a GREATER extent than they had and enjoyed “yesterday? “ I can’t think of any.

Or use whites, seniors, ACLU-ers, immigrants, bourgeoise, or mothers-in-law, if you like. Hell, last I
checked even the atheist horde was all agog with their ambient and self-sustaing SOCAS design. Exactly who is suffering? Surely, somebody out there, somewhere, must have a bill of rights bitch if it’s so rotten in Denmark.

Your particular example of diminished gun rights is especially hollow, re: District of Columbia v. Heller. My Glock pick-a-model now sits boldly atop my morning paper, anxious to greet the next Orwellian spectre. And Scalia rides shotgun, btw.

As to reconfigured and restricted(?) med pot smoking, I’d think even you would agree that an existential threat to ordered liberty does not arise when five joints per day are suddenly reduced, arguendo, to three and an accompanying doctor’s note.

You’ll need to do better if we’re all next in queue for the Trial of Joe K.

Gitmo, notwithstanding.

Resh,

I was going to write a longish reply to your post but, upon reflection, quickly realized that you are in need of far more intellectual assistance than I have the patience for.  Instead, I’d like to direct your attention to a couple of online resources that should help you see more clearly,

1. The writings of William Norman Grigg (Pro Libertate blog)
2. The writings of Paul Craig Roberts

Please take the time to study, with humility and over an extended period of time, the words of these fine men - both true lovers of liberty.  And in closing, allow me to give you a piece of advice: don’t mistake acquiescence, apparent wealth, technological gadgets, and immorality with the liberty our founders fought and died for.

Resh - Ruby Ridge, Waco, Patriot Act, Mil Comm Act, Padilla, No-Knock raids, Paramilitary police,Real ID, No Fly List, if the Glock you claim to have is in DC you are in deep kimchi if DC gov finds out, TIA, stepped up electronic surveillance, PC, asset seizures, for starters.  Don’t confuse group privileges with indidual rights.  Joseph as usual writes it as good or better than anyone else on this site. Grigg and Roberts are both top-notch.  ST

“I’m having second thoughts about allowing “conservative” Anglicans
to convert to Rome without some form of validation of their virility. Anyone who can put up with this madness for so long may only be coming over to secure a decent funeral, or to reinforce our own kumbaya choir.”

That’s right, Kevin.
Who needs more troops at the Alamo, right?

Funny how Kevin et al blame Protestants and liberals for all that ails our age.  But there’s deafening silence on this site on the current Pope’s apology for the worst scandal to rock the holy church.  I’d suggest someone read Leon Podles’s latest book on the sex abuse tragedy; it has nothing to do with liberalism, and everything to do with a deep mysogyny in the church going back to the middle ages.

An excellent article Tom.  It called to mind a scene I saw on television this week of the stations of the cross being performed by dancers in Australia where the narrator stressed more than once how the Romans crucified Jesus.  This must have been news to the Pope to hear that it was the Romans who bore the responsibility.

@anti=anti…

True, but the Pope was at least apologizing for something that actually happened.

@Resh,

See also the movie Freedom to Facism, for some other examples of government gone wild.  Numerous businesses and individuals are done in every day by the IRS.  Most of it unwarranted.  There are also numerous chilling accounts of police making erroneous drug arrests.  They rarely admit their mistakes.

Joe/S.T./M.Nucci-

(Somewhat respectively...hehe)

I read some comments of those two fellows whom you (Joe) selected as guardians of your especial enlightenment. The had some meaningful insights, and, taking your advice, they’ve been bookmarked for future review. Happy to learn. Sorry to say, though, most of what I did read is stock alarmist trope. I mean, you’re giving me a John Birch reject and some glorified economist who’s spinning 911 conspiracies for godsakes. I wouldn’t mind, as their credentials appear impressive enough (the latter in particular), except I’ve been hearing the doomsday, Orwellian-speak (initially, in reverse ideological fashion) since Hayden and SDS.

His crowd sought a progressive utopia, replete with the socialist tide, but battled the “sick habits of the bourgeoise,” the military industrial complex, and-surprise, surprise- that forever-invidious American political system. Sound familiar? SOS. Yes he pandered to the fringe left, as you do to the right, but the tocsin was the same. It always is-some spineless government creep lurking in the shadows, ruining the day, crafting our frozen hour.

Hayden then shapeshifted into the Weathermen who became the Chicago Seven who...let us move the cris de coeur to the right...beget Nixon’s henchmen et al and, now, surely, the constitution itself was in apodictic peril. Imagine a secret, systemic plot to peek into the opposing political party’s campaign cliffnotes and done so by the lords of Law and Order? It doesnt get any worse, but it did. They said so every day on TV. The FBI’s chief punk was bought and paid for, the AG was knee-deep in the cabal, and then the shit really hit the fan. Everybody was actually lying-caught on tape!- and using the very mechanisms of our government to consummate the inevitable oligarchy. The Goose-steppers really had arrived this time.

Except that didn’t happen, and the world didn’t end. Neither did due process nor any civil liberty. Not one. (Indeed, as bitter denouements go, the worst of it likely was the then-birth of new-wave (yet more first-amendment freedoms for) half-baked journalism. Talk about twisted irony. Still, an osmosis that is our evil precluded domestic disaster from totally slipping away. Fear not. Every generation gets to wax indignant over their own handy demons, real or imagined. Soon we had Janet Reno and Louis Freeh playing god and monster to the poor bastards in Waco and Ruby Ridge. Too many thoughtlessly dead, for sure. But to mildly digress...I went to Waco, twice. Have you been there? It’s a dismal locale with a barren landscape that portends isolationism, if not the endgame itself. One smells it. Who was the guy who said there’s no there, there? He must have been a Wacoite. Silent cacti and layered dust and what looks like over-cooked sagebrush get in the way of and become everything. There’s no ballast for collusion of any sort, save FBI illegality, and the place looks like what limited government in the organic sense might become. Few rules, few matters, fewer laws. But always snakes.

I’ll end by saying that FISA and GITMO and the Patriot Act now invite the new breed of men who, like those before, really do see...it all going away. Of course they do-as with their grandsons. But before the curtain is drawn, ask them and yourself a simple question.

Exactly when was it better?

PS S.T. I’m not in DC. Praise the lord.

Easy - we had more freedom before the centgov and its allies curtailed and eliminated them.  I am old enough to remember when you could purchase a firearm by mail without FFL.  You may or may not like such freedom, but citizens had it, nonetheless cits had the right.  You asked for examples of loss, you were provided.  You asked for trends and you were provided. The said examples showed you no trends and no important losses, at least nothing to warranting serious concern Interesting that you were at Waco - interesting, but not relevant.  I have never been to the moon, but I know it’s there.  Guess you’re waiting for a no-knock to happen to you, yours, or on Fifthe Avenue before you heed the seriousness of the freedom assault in USA.  You don’t like the ideologies of the people sounding the warnings- so be it.  If you go to http://www.lewrockwell.com or http://www.antiwar.com you will get the most eclectic group of ings of the political spectrum anywhere, most sounding the tocsin re: threats to American liberty.  But until you see the warnings coming from the MSM you won’t sweat it.  Well, good for you, and have fun - I hope you are right but believe otherwise. I hope you are a gunowner as you advertised about your Glock, but such posing makes you sound like Wilmer Cook from “The Maltese Falcon”, or Johnnie Too-Bad from “The Harder They Come”.

Wow. You drew a done of mysterious conclusions from my post. Not to worry. Enjoyed the exchange. My last word on this issue is to advise that I respect your comment about the FFL option via mail to one’s home as being a dispositive sign of extended liberty back then.

I think that was circa ‘68, yes? Was there a reason why you failed to point out, also, that still late into that year how many minorities were discriminated against from even financing or purchasing said homes?

Oh for the good old days.

Cya.

Opps. Drew a ton...sorry

Didn’t draw the conclusion because the two are unrelated.  Private discrimination is freedom and opportunity - if some yutz does not lend to qualified people of any race then it opens up chance for me to one up him financially.  To say that private lenders did not have the right to discriminate against anyone they chose is to say that you or someone else has a right to the lenders’ money. When you talk about discrimination, is it only against non-whites or also against whites - I believe that anti-white bigotry has risen greatly since ‘68, aand that the major culprit is the State. “Yeah, Sam, after we get back from the Klavern let’s not lend to them there black folks so we can pas up an opportunity to make some money - that’ll show them colored, since there are no other lending institutions available to them”.  People fail to note that “Jim Crow” were State laws that were often ignored by private parties to the betterment of all. Limited in what I can legally purchase where I live, but Glock is an excellent choice - no argument there. Liked our exchange.  ST

Kevin,

The flow of liberal Christians goes both ways. You guys inflicted a “social justice uber alles” liberal RC priest on us. I have to listen to his sermons now.

“ Was there a reason why you failed to point out, also, that still late into that year how many minorities were discriminated against from even financing or purchasing said homes?”

You mean when banks were free to deny loans to poor credit risks and people were free to associate or not associate with whom they wished?  You cannot equate government social engineering in the form of “civil rights” laws with individual liberty.  The former always requires a group on which the costs of the scheme are socialized and a group (the politically favored one) that is allowed to privatize the benefits of a scheme that would not exist but for the use of government force.

Hi Doug-

“You cannot equate government social engineering in the form of “civil rights” laws with individual liberty. “

I needn’t. Your argument was thoroughly debunked by the civil rights legislation post civil war, (ca. 1888) and SCOTUS rulings. You might start with Jones v. Mayer Co.

I would also note that the enabling clause of the 13th amendment looks to me more like a template for affirming individual liberty than a license to engineer social design. Welfare and social security speak to those concerns, not the removal of, say, black codes. Admittedly, the two abstracts can bisect since, at times, they seem identical twins born of separate mothers.

Anyway, if you allow that section2 speaks to individual liberty, then subsequent legislation-such as anti-discriminatory housing acts like those in 1968-become mere instantiations of liberty.

The law has no more right to interfere with my right to discriminate than Stalin did to sign the death warrants of thousands.  It’s not your property, business, or person.  Busybodydom hiding behind the gauze of ‘fairness is going to spark a conflagration in this country yet.