SONG AND DANCE MAN

WHEN I WAS GROWING UP IN THE SEVENTIES, I (and most of my peers) thought of Bob Dylan as someone our parents listened to, along with others like Jefferson Airplane, The Grateful Dead, and the hundreds of bands popular in the 1960's. That in itself was enough to relegate Dylan to the "uncool" list, as far as we were concerned. Besides, most of us were busy listening to bands like Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, Foreigner, AC/DC, et al...and Dylan had an air of being highbrow, of being "relevant" and "meaningful", which alone was enough to make that fabled teen-age list of the uncool.

Elian Gonzalez Revisited

It seems like so long ago now, but I remember when I first became really interested in politics. It was the Elian Gonzalez affair, about twenty or so years ago now, that caught my attention.

Individual Human Rights

by John Russell Turner

For Erich Ferger

THERE ARE ONLY THREE RIGHTS which every man, woman, and child possess, regardless of their gender, skin color, age, sexual orientation, ethnicity, nationality, or political orientation:

We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

-United States Declaration of Independence

Let's recap: the three rights are: 1. the right to life, to live; 2. the right to liberty; and 3. the right, i.e., the liberty or the freedom, to pursue that which makes one happy, as long as in so doing, you do not kill, do physical harm, nor steal from anyone. These rights can not, must not, be taken away from any person without legal due process (they are inalienable), and for violation of clearly defined, morally objective laws. 

Furthermore, these rights are not granted by man, by the state, nor by any human group or society, nor by any individual. They are granted by the Creator,  by God. And if you don't believe in God, these rights are intrinsic in our nature as human beings. We are literally born with these rights. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Period.

All the other so-called "rights" we hear about, the alleged right to a job, housing, medical care, et al, are not given to us by God, nor by our nature as human beings. These are not rights, they are entitlements, usually given to people by a government agency. Such entitlements require the transfer of economic goods (jobs, services, money, and stuff) from the producer of those goods to the taker of those goods. If citizen A is told he has a right to a job, and so decides to collect on this right, citizen B must give it to him. If citizen B refuses, then by any number of methods (threat of imprisonment, fines, and ultimately, death if he refuses hard enough), the government will force him to do so. This is clearly immoral, because it violates citizen B's rights to hold property, his right to pursue his happiness without being literally robbed in order to supply someone else's "right" to his property. The right to own, and to freely dispose of property is a necessary corollary to the right to live, and to pursue happiness. This is because of man's nature, of his means of survival. He or she builds a house, buys a car and clothes, and plants, raises, or buys food. These things are his, for him to dispose of as she, or he sees fit, so that he might live a reasonably happy life.

Socialism, in essence, is parasitism, but of a weird, bizarre kind because it is human parasitism upon other humans. Cannibalism. Furthermore, it offers the hideous spectacle of evil masquerading as good, since it all depends not on the moral and just, but on violence and death. Such is the moral sewer underneath the concept of socialistic, man- granted rights.

On a personal note, this is why I believe in God, why I believe that all of my rights come from Him, and not from the state. When rights come from the state, hell ensues, and we get rivers of blood and corpses stacked on top of each other in ditches.

On Abortion

by John Russell Turner

The human right to life begins at conception. At the very instant of conception, human life begins, and so the basic human right to life begins. That is why I say: abortion is murder.

To say that life begins at any other point besides conception is arbitrary and ultimately, self serving. For if you can say that life and the right to live begins at birth, then you could also say life and the right to live begins at any age. Just because an individual is physically under-developed does not disqualify that individual from his or her right to live. Pro-abortionists see the line drawn when the child travels through the birth canal and into the outside world. Before that, the child was living inside his mother' body, just a clump of cells with the potential to become human, but not actually human. Why? Under what criteria, then, do we objectively define when this "clump of cells" is actually human? Furthermore, abortion is a hideous act of evil, not only because the baby is defenseless, totally dependent upon his or her mother, but because most people (but not all, and this is important) support abortion so as to have sex without consequences. Murder and betrayal, for convenience. Abortion, as birth control.

Whatever you want to call an unborn human being- zygote, embryo, fetus, a clump of cells, etc., this is a separate, distinct individual existing inside the mother's body.  It's not the mother's body, it's the baby's body, and the baby's life.

Do Not Tolerate Evil

and don't deny that it exists...

It was with a feeling of dismay and anger that I watched yet another news report about the emergence of another variant of "the virus", sometimes referred to as "covid". I just don't know anymore what to call it; it's a coronavirus, sure, but what the etiology of the disease it causes entails, what is the exact mortality rate of the disease, and how this rapidly mutating virus ever got out there in the first place confounds me. 

It sure looks like a lot of people are still trying to capitalize on the hysteria surrounding the virus and the disease it causes. Irrational mandates and enforced vaccinations, cancelling of cultural events and the masking of children, the arrest and internment of people who violate these new rules, and the numerous deleterious consequences of these rules all have proven to be much worse than the disease itself.  

Who is responsible for ginning up the hysteria? "The media" is the first thing that comes to mind, and they certainly played a large part in it. But what we are seeing is just a symptom of a much larger problem facing America today. What is this problem? Americans have given evil a place at the table. Most of our teachers say evil is just another choice that some people make; morality is relative at any rate, and who are we to say what is good, or not? Reality is purely subjective, and whatever you want can come to you simply by wishing it. So goes the zeitgeist, so goes the lessons our students are being taught, lessons that have now gravitated to the mainstream. In such a poisonous atmosphere, it is easy to exploit disasters, calamities and mishaps for one's personal gain, without being concerned about the moral implications.

What's interesting is that evil used to hide in dark corners, running at the first sound of a human footstep, like cockroaches. Now it is out in the open, naked and smirking with malevolent glee. What else can you say about the fact that kindergartners are being taught about sexuality? older kids are being taught critical race theory? somebody successfully orchestrated the takedown of Donald Trump on a grand scale? American oil production could easily solve our current problems, but is being restricted and even forbidden? What else can you say about the fact that the Democrats first order of business after stealing the Presidency was to undo all the positive good that Donald Trump and his administration accomplished, out of vindictive spite? So why do evil people feel so emboldened these days? Why are skeletons smirking at us, demanding that we self-immolate? Why did we give evil a place at the table of society and culture?

Because of the world-view taught in the high schools, colleges, and universities. It started in the sixties, and is now bearing full bloom. What is this world-view? Basically, it's about denying the existence of objective reality and the validity of truth. Tolerance of differing opinions, thoughts, cultures and lifestyles are core values. Tolerance of others should not include tolerance of their evil. That's a good place to start.

Characteristics of the "Woke"

"We are virtuous", the woke shout, "look at what we are claiming to be!" Such a verbal claim to virtue is not based on any action, except maybe to put a bumper sticker on their cars, or an icon on their social media profiles. This does nothing positive or practical. The only thing it does is signal to the others in the mob that they are safe, of like mind, that they can be trusted and included.

They care nothing about true virtue, only in being perceived as virtuous by all the other fools who make up any mob. Their self-respect is dependent upon how others see them. They are lemmings, who will blindly follow anyone who validates their timidity and abdication of personal moral responsibility. This is why they hate those who speak the truth about anything contrary to their ideology. It is one thing to damage someone's self-respect, but quite another to damage someone's pretense of self-respect. To so do invites mindless hatred. To do so invites the mob to sever your head and parade it around town on a pole. 

Understand what you are up against. Any individual who thinks in this manner (if you could call it thinking) has pronounced a verdict of damnation upon his life, and upon life in general. They profess to be concerned about the plight of the poor, but condemn the one system (capitalism) that can, and does,  lift the poor out of poverty, and into prosperity. They profess to be concerned about the oppression of women, yet marginalize them by claiming there is no meaningful distinction between men and women, and any man who feels he's a woman may compete against women in athletics. They claim to be champions of social justice, but advocate policies that only serve to make the poor worse off than before. They say they are against racism, but in the final analysis of their actions and attitudes, they are the racists and fascists amongst us. They are about the elevation of vice to virtue, the hatred of the good for being the good, and the total destruction of what happiness is possible to human beings on Earth.

Notice their relatively recent trend of shouting down mostly conservative speakers, or anyone who says something opposed to their woke ideology. They also claim to be about "free speech", but most definitely not if they disagree with it. I've seen the videos of this happening, and what strikes me the most is how offensive and deliberately obnoxious those hecklers are. How is it that anyone on Earth could be so arrogant, as to feel justified in negating someone's right to speak? It's a totalitarian mindset, for sure. Their hysteria and shrillness is evidence of an existential fear so profound that they are actually trying to drown out their own inner voices, which condemn them. Since their self respect is based on what others think of them, upon membership in the mob, and successfully signaling to the world how virtuous they are, they will hate anyone who shines a light on their mediocrity. In reality, however, it is themselves and life that they hate. Death is the standard of all that they value. 

Is Global Warming a Problem?

It's a problem, but not nearly as bad as many make it out to be. The ice caps are not going to melt enough to flood somewhere thousands of miles away from the poles, or even close by-at least, not anytime soon, as many people rich enough to buy seafront property are well aware of. Temperatures are rising slightly on average, but it's not going to be tomorrow when people start dying en masse of heat exposure. Or next year. There is ample time to address these issues. Drastic measures are not necessary. In some cases, it might actually be beneficial to do nothing at all, as warmer climate brings many benefits. Realizing this, I find the actions of people like Greta Thunberg amusing, and a bit ridiculous. She speaks of imminent apocalypse, as have many others over the years, but none has come, and none will come. Given time-and there is plenty of it-humanity will solve the problems arising from warmer temps without pulling the plug on industry and technology.