Wise Words on Self-Defense

I should note at the outset that I do not agree with Mr. Redmond about everything in the universe. More than once he has said that he thinks--well, as he put it in this post:

Karate is not self-defense. Karate is a tactical dueling system only.

He has frequently given me the impression that he really does think that Shotokan (the system he practices) sums up what "karate" is, and that it is less a real-world self-defense system than a sporting contest with a historical connection to mano-a-mano macho contests. I, on the other hand, enter a practice session with an acute focus on the problem of keeping my pale tuchus alive and unharmed in the event of a violent assault, and think that karate--specifically RyuTe--is an excellent "life protection" art. Be that as it may, I rather liked what he had to say in this post. Herewith, a short quote:

I avoid violence. I, like most others who have practiced fighting arts or have been in the military, am well aware that when violence starts, so does chaos. And in the chaos, anything can happen. No matter which of you is the master and which is the fool, either one can step on a banana peel and end up injured severely or dead.

Those who engage in violence when ANY other option is available roll the dice that they will not be killed. Good luck to those people. I prefer to de-escalate and avoid violence unless I judge it to be absolutely necessary.

Self-defense is not about winning fights – it is about using strategy and decision making to avoid them completely.

The Truth About that Snide Little "Coexist" Sticker

That sticker has annoyed me from the first moment I saw it. This explains why.

You can, of course, click on it for a larger image. Found it on Jihad Watch.

The American Thinker on Free Trade Again

I really enjoyed this post. The author puts objections to free trade into a small, well-managed space. You really ought to go read the whole thing, but since I know you're not actually like to do so, here's a sample, with my comments interspersed:

Free trade sounds nice. Protectionism sounds ugly. Free trade sounds capitalist. Protectionism sounds Marxist. So it is worthy of note that free trade was actually viewed by Karl Marx as a strategic force, a tool with which to undermine capitalism as an economic model:

But, in general, the protective system of our day is conservative, while the free trade system is destructive. It breaks up old nationalities and pushes the antagonism of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie to the extreme point. In a word, the free trade system hastens the social revolution. It is in this revolutionary sense alone, gentlemen that I vote in favor of free trade [i].

Marx was not far from wrong. After nearly fifty years of progressive tariff reductions, America has suffered significant economic losses. This comes as a surprise to many Americans, for years inebriated with the free trade mantra.

This is because America does the "free" while the rest of the world does something else. China, for example, manipulates its currency and engages in persistent dumping, driving down Chinese prices and displacing domestic American industries.

Amen, and amen! There are few things that annoy me more than listening to or reading someone extol the benefits of free trade without so much as noticing the elephant in the room: free trade does not actually exist! Other nations protect their markets.

The results of such one-sided free trade have been catastrophic for America. Consider that in the last fifty years, U.S. tariffs have gone from 40 percent of the price of goods to 5 percent [iv]. Over the same period, manufacturing as a share of employment has fallen from 30 percent to 11 percent and is still falling.

I swear, as God is my witness, every free trade economist that I have read writes as though any idiot can do manufacturing, or as if it is somehow a low-class form of employment.

My ***. Look, I've done manufacturing. I rather like it. I started at one factory by running a large set of industrial sheet-metal shears, then operating a CNC laser cutter, then moving on to a machine shop where I spent my days operating CNC mills and lathes and my nights learning more about how it's done. When I was laid off and moved into other fields, I wasn't even close to being a full-fledged machinist, despite having been in the field for close to two years and going to school for most of that time. It takes time, time and experience, to be a good manufacturing employee. Oh, anybody, or almost anybody, can drive a small forklift, to be sure, but to be a machinist? A fab (fabrication) worker? A welder? A tool-and-die maker? Those guys don't just fall off the trees. When we lose manufacturing jobs, those guys eventually have to move on to something else. Their skills deteriorate, and for the most part, are lost to the country.

God forbid we should have to rebuild our manufacturing in a big-*** hurry. I'm not sure we could do it.

The late Milton Friedman was a committed free trade proponent. In a stunning dismissal of traditional economic theory, Friedman once remarked, "Who is hurt and who benefits ... U.S. consumers benefit. They get cheap TV sets or automobiles ... Should we complain about such a program of reverse foreign aid?"

That may sound good for the short-term, but, as classic economist Friedrich List wrote,

The forces of production are the tree on which wealth grows...The tree which bears the fruit is of itself of greater value than the fruit itself...The prosperity of a nation is not...greater in the proportion in which it has amassed more wealth (i.e. values of exchange), but in the proportion with which it has more developed its powers of production.

Manufacturing matters. Service jobs, the primary source of U.S. employment, depend on capital inputs from manufacturing even if said manufacturing is foreign. This presents problems should foreign manufacturing undergo shocks or disturbances that disrupt supply lines and, by extension, the sole source of employment for most Americans. Dependence on foreign manufacturing is inherently dangerous, since it is out of U.S. control.

The loss of manufacturing is not a trivial matter, and it has national security implications. It must be the ultimate oxymoron that Communist China is now the "arsenal of democracy." China is a strategic enemy and has threatened open nuclear war on America's homeland, and yet CFIUS has cleared the sale of factories to China responsible for producing the rare-earth magnets used in American laser-guided munitions. What happens if America ever needs to fight China?

Or, what if, God forbid, America ever needs to fight some country with which China is at all friendly?

Service economies can't issue ultimatums; only industrial economies can do that.

It is on this basis that free trade arguments fall apart. In a world with no nations, where national governments are not accountable for the economic and political security of their people, doctrines like "comparative advantage" would have validity.

Again, amen, and amen! As long as nations exist, trade wars will be just that--trade wars. And nations that refuse to protect their own people are derelict in their duties.

Refusing to protect the American economy when other nations are using manipulative "protectionist" devices is not competition, but economic suicide.

Free trade cannot work when some play by the rules and others do not. While competition and openness are desirable in ideal circumstances, reasonable protectionism has proven effective and is indeed necessary to preserve American economic strength.

This whole subject is one of the things that genuinely concerns me about the crop of "conservatives" that we are about to send to Congress. I flatly guarantee you that the vast majority of them know next to nothing about this subject and will back free trade most of the time because, if they have heard anything about it at all, they have heard it from the open-borders/free trade/free-movement-of-goods-and-people, libertarian-leaning economists that dominate most of the economic discussion in the Republican Party. You would not believe the number of "conservative" writers who pen such inanities as "free trade is a bedrock conservative principle," when it is no such thing. It might well be a bedrock libertarian principle, but whilst libertarianism and conservatism do have their areas of overlap, they are not the same thing. It is sheer idiocy to tell a nation that grew to greatness, in part, by protecting its markets, that doing the opposite is somehow "conservative," yet we have more than a few conservatives who will do just that. It's mind-boggling.

Lastly, I must point out--again--that yes, I'm aware that tariffs are not perfect and do have their flaws and negative effects. Personally, I favor the Fair Tax, which, like a tariff, is a consumption tax and will have much the same effect as a tariff, though it is likely to eliminate some of the negative effects associated with tariffs. However, if I can't get the Fair Tax, bringing back tariffs, coupled with a great lowering of income tax rates, would be something I completely support.

Robert Knight on the "Born Gay" Idea

At the risk of getting myself labeled "bigoted" again for holding the same opinion that--what? Probably at least fifty percent of Americans hold? Considerably more, if you judge by the results every time homosexual marriage comes up at the ballot box--I give you Mr. Knight's closing thoughts on the subject:

The Washington Monthly’s Steven Benen described Buck’s views as “bizarre,” “cartoonish” and worthy of “national ridicule.” Well, of course. That must also describe the views of tens of millions of Americans who strengthened marriage laws in 45 states over the last 15 years. Or any parents who simply think it’s better that their son date a girl instead of a boy.

Science, biology, religion, history, common sense and human experience all argue against homosexuality, as do grim, persistent health statistics that the media ignore. They are apparently too busy painting as “haters” a lot of good people who know, love and worry about homosexual relatives or friends but are not “pro-gay.”

Since the facts overwhelmingly favor morality and normalcy, the only thing to do is to smear and shout. "After the Ball," a 1989 blueprint for gay power by Harvard-trained public relations experts Marshall Kirk and Hunter Madsen, explains in detail how to “jam” opponents by charging them with “hate.” And it’s worked. Even most conservative talk show hosts ignore the issue or appease by ceding moral ground.

The “born gay” myth has been nurtured since the early ’90s, when a genetic component was suggested by some homosexual researchers’ well-publicized studies. But none has been credibly replicated, and several have been exposed as junk science, including Simon LeVay’s 1991 study of nodules on hypothalamuses, and Dean Hamer’s 1993 National Cancer Institute X chromosome study.

Even Dr. LeVay warned, “It’s important to stress what I didn’t find. I did not prove that homosexuality is genetic, or find a genetic cause for being gay. I didn’t show that gay men are born that way, the most common mistake people make in interpreting my work.”

In fact, virtually all studies involving homosexuality, from Alfred C. Kinsey’s fraudulent “Kinsey Reports” from the late 1940s and early 1950s and the Evelyn Hooker psychological studies from UCLA in the late 1950s, have been exposed as either fraud or misrepresented to convey what activists want the public to hear.

As with the now-debunked estimate that 10 percent of the population is homosexual, the “born gay” myth has fueled claims of parity with race or ethnicity. Never mind whether it’s true. And, whatever you do, keep those former homosexuals out of the spotlight, lest the public start thinking about this.

It’s been a grand deception, and they’re not going to let real science, Scripture, genuine compassion or “cartoonish” candidates get in the way of their script.

So far in my life, I have never seen an argument for "born gay" that didn't work just as well for any other sexual peccadillo.

"Considering all the garbage homosexuals have to go through, MOTW, why would anyone choose homosexuality? They wouldn't! They must be born that way!"

Well, considering all the garbage pedophiles have to go through, why would anyone choose pedophilia? They wouldn't! They must be born that way!

"Hater! Bigot! How dare you compare homosexuals to perverts!"

And so it goes. As far as I can tell, all the arguments for "born gay" suffer from this defect. If they prove that homosexuality is inborn, they prove with equal force that other sexual oddities are inborn. If you're not willing to concede, on the basis of what is substantially your own argument, that pedophiles, foot-fetishists, sadists, masochists, and so forth are "born that way," if your counter-argument amounts to "You're a bigot!" there's not a darn reason in the world that I should take your argument seriously when it comes to the issue of homosexuality.

Understand: I am not condemning homosexuals or denying their personhood--one critic suggested that I somehow didn't realize that homosexuals were people, too. Nor am I saying that straight people are necessarily without sexual sin. I am fairly sure that if you could get them to 'fess up to it, 'most everybody with a functioning set of glands would end up confessing to some sort of sexual sin, even if just the one about lusting after other people's spouses. I am simply saying that homosexual behavior is one more on the list of sexual behaviors that scripture clearly identifies as sin and that rather than pretending otherwise, we would do well to speak the truth about it in love and get on with helping those who want to come out of it--and with preserving the liberty of those who think it is sinful to make decisions in accordance with their convictions. For this, I will most likely be labeled a bigot and a hater.

Such is the state of discourse on the subject these days.

Compromise? Really?

I'm not naive enough to believe that all the people that voted Republican the other day agree with me on every jot or tittle of my political philosophy. I don't expect that, not at all.

On the other hand...

Since November of '06, I've listened to intellectual deadbeats on the left--and putatively on the right, in some cases--tell me that conservatism was dead, that the era of Reagan was over, that we had to pander to this constituency and that constituency, that we had to give up huge amounts of ground in terms of liberty and fiscal sanity, that we had to "reach across the aisle" in order to attract enough voters to win. That drumbeat only picked up steam with Barack Obama's--peace be upon him--election in '08.

My, how the tables have turned. Turns out that--while again, acknowledging that not every independent that voted Republican agrees with me on all things--conservatism isn't dead, pandering not only doesn't work but isn't necessary, and voters are open to arguments concerning the Constitution, liberty, and fiscal sanity. Not that conservatives have scored the ultimate victory and can rest on their laurels. Never. We must continue to make our case from now 'til the Second Coming, no doubt about that.

But now, what do I hear? What do I hear from the same people that have been telling us, "I (they) won"? What do I hear from the same people that have been telling us that we--Republicans and conservatives--need to "sit in the back"? What do I hear from the people that said they didn't want to hear Republicans and conservatives do a whole lot of talking?

Of course, what I hear are calls for "bipartisanship" and "compromise."

I have four answers. The first is one I heard from Michelle Malkin:

Take your olive branch and shove it, Democrats

Now, for what it's worth, that's not intended for every Democrat--there are some I know and am quite friendly with--but for those who march in lockstep with Obama/Reid/Pelosi. What we conservatives have learned, with pain, over the years, is that when that caliber of Democrat talks of bipartisanship and compromise, what actually happens is that conservatives lose. It is always the old story of how the wife wants a cat and the husband wants a dog, and they wind up "compromising" by getting a cat.

By now, we know better. At least, some of us do.

The second is this:

The third is this (hat tip to Sister Kat:

Every Democrat in the House, I don't care, every Democrat in the House, Blue Dogs that went out and openly campaigned, supporting Obama and health care lost. We are two Americas. We have flyover America and we have the coasts. Take a look at the map. It's 90% red. The blue is on the coasts, a little bit in Texas, a little bit here in south Florida. We do have two Americas and Obama is gonna do his best to continue to divide this country. I have to laugh. I laughed when I listened to these guys, Democrats, Obama and his aides talking about, "Well, now it's time to compromise." No. Compromise is off the table. They didn't want to compromise with us and we have no business compromising with them. They lost. Losers compromise. We don't. We've got nothing to compromise. Where do we compromise with this agenda? There's not one aspect of this agenda that's worth compromising. This agenda must be stopped. That's what this election meant.

And the last is mine:

Compromise? With those who have made a career and/or a sport of trashing the Constitution and doing their darndest to wreck my country and pick my pocket, destroy my inheritance, take away various and sundry of my liberties, all in the name of implementing Jacobinist ideas that were discredited 200 years ago?

My ***.

Pardon my French.

Muslim "Tolerance"

This apparently happened in Minnesota, rapidly becoming home to large numbers of Muslims. From The Grand Jihad:

...what happened to an Owatonna High School senior who, in an assignment to write a class paper, chose the topic "Somalian Privileges," complaining that the Muslim students were not required to adhere to various school rules. He and his mother were promptly summoned to the school and advised that he would be suspended, officially for "language and inappropriate comments," but unofficially because school officials feared he would be attacked. After a few days that officials hoped would be a "cooling off period," the boy returned to school...and was mauled by a gang that grew to somewhere between twenty and forty Somali students. He had to be hospitalized for head injuries.

Now, stop. I already know what you are going to say. "Most Muslims aren't like that." Well, let's say that is true. Let's say that in that high school, there were a couple of hundred Muslims and most of them didn't have anything to do with that attack.

That still left "only" twenty to forty Somali students carrying out that attack.

Are you beginning to see the problem here? That it's not necessarily all that relevant that most Muslims aren't like that?

The Grand Jihad on "Blasphemy"

Sharia makes blasphemy a capital offense. It considers blasphemy to be any form of expression that casts Islam and its prophet in a poor light. Islamists refer to this concept as "defamation," and their apologists follow the script. But the equivalence is absurd. Defamation is slander: harming the reputation by the publication of things that are untrue. It is not defamation to call attention to the true parts of a doctrine that believers are embarrassed by or on which they would, for strategic reasons, prefer that you didn't focus. Islamists don't see, or at least won't acknowledge, this distinction because they see Islam as the one true religion, and there fore anything said against it must, by definition, be false...and punishable by death. In fact, in a recent case in Afghanistan, now under a new, U.S.-supported constitution that installed sharia as part of the fundamental law, merely expressing criticism of the crime of "insulting Islam" was itself deemed an offense against Islam by the court.

You know, one of the quickest ways to get labeled a "bigot" is to say perfectly true and applicable things about Islam--or to confess that you think it's reasonable to be apprehensive about some Muslims under certain circumstances. Just ask Juan Williams.