Useful Idiots

Who voted for the Reed Amendment in 1995 and 1996?

"The Reed Amendment — which bans people determined by the Attorney-General to have 'renounced citizenship for the purpose of avoiding taxation' — was an amendment to the Immigration in the National Interest Act of 1995. I was aware in a general sense that Republicans had taken back the House and the Senate in 1994, but I’d never really put two and two together until reading this list: Republicans formed a majority among the supporters of the Reed Amendment. Indeed, every single one of the Republican freshmen on the committee who joined the House as a result of the 1994 'Revolution' voted for Reed’s amendment." Continue reading →

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Herbert Spencer: Patriotism (from Facts and Comments, 1902)

"Were anyone to call me dishonest or untruthful he would touch me to the quick. Were he to say that I am unpatriotic, he would leave me unmoved. 'What, then, have you no love of country?' That is a question not to be answered in a breath. [...] To me the cry – 'Our country, right or wrong!' seems detestable. By association with love of country the sentiment it expresses gains a certain justification. Do but pull off the cloak, however, and the contained sentiment is seen to be of the lowest. Let us observe the alternative cases." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingHerbert Spencer: Patriotism (from Facts and Comments, 1902)

Irish ‘rage’ after bank cheated on multi-billion bailout

"The taped conversations, obtained by the Irish Independent newspaper, between John Bowe and Peter Fitzgerald, who led Anglo-Irish's capital markets and retail banking arms, respectively, indicate the Irish government was duped into pumping €7 billion of emergency cash into the bank on the assumption that it would plug the lender's funding crisis. But the €7 billion figure was just a ruse to get the government to put 'some skin in the game,' with the bankers assuming that politicians would have no choice but to provide further emergency funding once they had been 'pulled in'." Continue reading →

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David Galland: How to Tell if You Live in a Police State

"It is always worth remembering that humans can adopt very warped attitudes, even to the point of falling in love with mad dogs… and mad rulers. But more to the actual point of mad dogs and all that, the mindset of all the various branches of what is currently lumped under the moniker 'Homeland Security' – from the top right down to the domestic police force – has devolved to the point where a growing swath of the general population is now actively afraid of them. Previously, it was only black people who had been trained by bitter experience to fear 'the man.' Now the rest of us are beginning to understand what they have been complaining about all these years." Continue reading →

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Cheers erupt as Egyptian president removed and constitution suspended by military

"The head of Egypt’s armed forces issued a declaration on Wednesday suspending the constitution and appointing the head of the constitutional court as interim head of state. In a televised broadcast, flanked by military leaders, religious authorities and political figures, General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi effectively declared the removal of elected Islamist President Mohamed Mursi. Sisi called for presidential and parliamentary elections, a panel to review the constitution and a national reconciliation committee that would include youth movements. He said the roadmap had been agreed by a range of political groups." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingCheers erupt as Egyptian president removed and constitution suspended by military

Creating a Culture of Denunciation

"The Gestapo created a culture of denunciation, which destroyed the goodwill that comes from people living in peace and privacy together. It replaced goodwill and tolerance with suspicion, resentment, paranoia, and the breakdown of civil society; Nazi Germany was a psychological version of Hobbes’s 'war of all against all.' Because denunciation was thus institutionalized in Germany as a norm, the Stasi was able to walk directly into the void left by the Gestapo. How is a culture of denunciation established? The first step is to create an institutional framework that facilitates it." Continue reading →

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Americans troubled more by governmental abuse than terrorism

"In the dozen years since 9/11, frequent polling conducted by Fox has suggests that the majority of Americans have all the while said they’d give up their freedoms for the sake of security. Only with the latest inquiry though are those answers reversed: the last time a majority of Americans opposed giving up privacy for security was May 2001. Not only are Americans more opposed now to giving up personal freedoms for the sake of security than they were after 9/11, but other statistics show that distrust against the federal government continues to climb." Continue reading →

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Egypt: What a Shame

"When was the last time you saw a Jiffy Lube tear gas everyone who refused to stop in? Have you ever seen a Chiropractor driving down the street shooting water cannons at people who refused his services? Every single person could make a decision that 'I'll never go to Jiffy Lube as long as I live,' and Jiffy Lube could do nothing about it. Should that decision be made by everyone, it would have no choice but to close its doors. No pickets....No chants....No fairy tales like 'making your voice heard' or 'the will of the people'. No injuries, arrests or tanks trampling over bodies. Just a simple decision not to interact...not to exchange...not to associate." Continue reading →

Continue ReadingEgypt: What a Shame

Florida man facing criminal charges after cooking and eating family dog

"A 25-year-old Florida man was arrested and charged with animal cruelty on Thursday for allegedly killing his family’s dog, then cooking it and eating it. The Tampa Tribune reported on Friday that authorities picked up Thomas Huggins after being alerted by his his mother, Margie Huggins, that she had found the dog’s ribs inside a pot. She later showed officers more of the dog’s remains in the freezer, along with the dog’s head and innards, which were in a trash can. 'I don’t understand it. I’ve never been violent like that,' she said to the Tribune. 'I grew up in the church, in fear of Jesus Christ and the wrath that will be put on you. He doesn’t feel that.'" Continue reading →

Continue ReadingFlorida man facing criminal charges after cooking and eating family dog