Conservative Donnybrook

Dr. Jack Kerwick posted a poorly reasoned piece on the Intellectual Conservative web site concerning the difference between, well, him and me.  He being the “Classical Conservative” (i.e. paleo-conservative) I representing the “Neo-Conservative” camp.  Dr. Kerwick begins his discussion by comparing a utilitarian’s opposition to abortion to that of natural law theorist’s.  Mr. Kerwick writes:

“The utilitarian opposes abortion because he believes that the general practice of abortion will in the long run cause more pain than pleasure for the greatest number of people. In stark contrast, the Roman Catholic natural law theorist opposes it because he thinks that abortion is inherently wrong, irrespective of consequences.”  So far so good, no objections here. He goes on to state how classical and neo-conservative philosophies differ in much the same way.   Kerwick then compares the classical and neocon perspectives in three areas; reason, morality and the State.

Reason/Knowledge
Kerwick states “Neo-conservatives endorse a trans-cultural, trans-historical conception of reason.  Reason…is ultimately capable of rising over and against [tradition].”  Classical conservatives on the other hand, according to Kerwick, believe “…reason is the product of…tradition.  [Reason*] consists not [of]…’self-evident truths’ but in unarticulated feelings, habits and customs….”

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Several home schooled hoodlums in Texas have been arrested for disturbing the grave of an 11-year old whom passed away in 1921.  Those arrested claimed to have smoked pot out of the skull of the deceased.  The claim has yet to be substantiated by police who are investigating the home schooled boys’ claims.

This is a disturbing story indeed.  What is wrong with some rolling papers or a old fashioned pipe?  These kids need to have their heads examined.  Only a first class nut job would think up such a disgusting and immoral past-time.

You may ask, “Why so much mention of the sick-o’s being ’home schooled’?”  And I am not sure, I just noticed that the Houston Chronicle made sure to throw it in at the end of their story.  What is their point?  That home schooling is so inherently evil that it produces pot smoking necrophiliacs?  Maybe the Chronicle will fill us in shortly.   

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The leader of Al-Qaida in Iraq is reported to have been captured!

UPDATE:  It now appears the Iraqis got it wrong.  They captured someone that looked similar and with a similar name.  Whoops.

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In the finale of a weeklong homage to Mother’s Day, Code Pink has asked women to appear at an anti-military rally in Berkeley prepared to cast spells, do rituals, and impart wisdom in order to end war. Friday will be “Witches, clowns and sirens day.”

Reportedly, harpies, shrews and harridans are feeling left out. Phone calls to the National Organization for Women asking for a reaction to being left out of Code Pink’s Friday rally have been unreturned.

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The African nation of Nigeria may be taking the lead in sustainable biofuels.  A government body has approved funding to assist farmers in the planting and cultivation of the jatropha tree.  The jatropha tree produces peanut sized seeds that can be refined into oil for use as a bio-fuel.  Jatropha is not a food source, can be grown in arid or moist climates, does not compete with food crops for cultivatable land and may even help turn back some of the desertification plaguing much of Africa.

Should this tree produce as theorized, Nigeria and other African nations may finally have an industry that could pull them out of centuries of economic struggle.  In addition to producing a sustainable and renewable fuel source, the plant could reduce food costs and kick-start an entire continent’s economic engine.  Imagine an Africa where new industries spring up around newly created agricultural zones, where money and jobs pour into a once desolate and starving landscape.  Where all nations can produce wealth through agri-business instead of tribal warfare. 

Maybe I have become overtaken by the far-off possibility of a plant that cures fuel demand, eases poverty and ends starvation.  But if it works and the world takes interest, Africa’s future could be dominated by prosperity instead of strife and that is worth some time and investment.

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Mr. Eddy Arnold has passed away, he was 89.  Eddy Arnold was a music phenomenon.  In his hay-day he was bigger than Hank Williams, Johnny Cash and every other country music star.  His contribution to music will never be lost or forgotten. 

Rest in peace, Mr. Arnold.

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As I was writing my latest post, I kept thinking about the American Civil War (War Between the States, if you insist) and the practice of parole. During the Civil War, prisoners of war were regularly paroled on the condition that they would not then take up arms in the war again. Of course, not every person who accepted parole acquitted himself with honor, but many did.

Today, American servicemen are prohibited from entering into parole agreements. The Code of Conduct for the Armed Services states, “I will accept neither parole nor special favors from the enemy.” In some ways this makes sense, and the refusal of special consideration from the enemy is the source of honor for American war heroes like John McCain.

The idea of parole is built on honor. Essentially, it is a gentleman’s agreement that “if I let you go, you’ll just go home and stop fighting.” Of course, the flipside is, “if you don’t agree, I can keep you in captivity until the cessation of hostilities or until this position is overrun and I can no longer keep you.”  Each side benefits as long as each side upholds his end of the bargain. It seems to me that when the United States is engaged in a war against a foe that possesses honor, American soldiers should be able to accept parole agreements and the United States military should be free to extend parole to enemy combatants.

Maybe I am simply fantasizing about a set of conditions that can never occur. Certainly, the idea of parole has been demonstrably repudiated by the likes of Abdullah Saleh al-Ajmi. And, clearly, our war with Islamic extremists (or probably any other religiously motivated enemy) would not qualify for this sort of treatment as we have already seen that they will not treat our soldiers with honor when they are captured. But it seems that parole might be an option with some enemies. On the other hand, there could be the feeling that those who are captured are showing a lack of brotherhood with their fellow countrymen by making deals with the enemy. I guess I’m just thinking out loud. Should soldiers be allowed to accept parole?

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Abdullah Saleh al-Ajmi, a former detainee of the United States military who was once housed at our facility at Guantanamo Bay, was released to the custody of Kuwaiti authorities on November 3, 2005. He, along with four other codefendants, was tried in Kuwait:

The defendants pleaded innocent when the trial opened in March. Their lawyers argued there was no evidence to convict them and that Kuwaiti courts had no jurisdiction to try them because they had not done anything illegal in Kuwait.

Defence attorneys also said testimonies provided by the US could not be used in a Kuwaiti court because they did not have the signatures of the detainees or interrogators.

The Kuwaiti court found all five of the men innocent as charged and they were released.

On April 26, 2008, three suicide bombers detonated themselves in Mosul, Iraq killing nine innocents and injuring 31 others. Abdullah Saleh al-Ajmi was one of the terrorists in the attack.

Meanwhile, Amnesty International is calling for the closure of Guantanamo Bay and the repatriation of the detainees there. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 500 enemy combatants are currently held at Gitmo. I don’t relish the idea of 500 radical terrorists making their ways to Mosul and Baghdad and Kirkuk. The potential death toll in killed bystanders is just too high.

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Good morning!  An open thread for Wednesday.  If you are a conservative or a Republican and plan to support Obama in the general election, we would love to hear from you.  Why Obama?  And how does your support for him jive with your “conservative” or republican views?

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A few weeks ago, House Resolution 5800 was introduced on the House floor by its sole sponsor Paul Kanjorski (D-Pa). The bill would amend the tax code by inserting a tax on windfall profits on oil and natural gas companies. What constitutes windfall profits? Well, that would be decided by the newly formed Reasonable Profits Board - a board of three persons, appointed by the president, whose job it would be to determine when a company has surpassed a reasonable level of profits and has entered windfall territory.

For the legions of Conservative Donnybrook readers in Pennsylvania, we would simply remind you that Paul Kanjorski is up for reelection this year. Don’t send this guy back to Washington.

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If she can do it, she has my vote…Where’s McCain?

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Awesome. Clearly a product of the Obama campaign. But, if Obama really were Christ, or even Luke Skywalker, we’d be inclined to vote for him.

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The Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) and parent company Xerox are experimenting with a type of paper and a complimentary printer that would produce documents that fade away after 16 to 24 hours. … Users don’t have to wait for the paper to fade either. By running it through the special printer made for this paper, the printer will erase the old image before putting the new one on. … The same sheets of paper can be run through the printer hundreds of time … 

PARC, of course, is the research group that invented Ethernet, object-oriented programming, the GUI, and the laser printer, all in the 1970s. 

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Here are two stories that, somehow, go together. The bottom line, or course, is that if someone has their hand stuck out looking for your largesse, chances are they are scamming you. What’s a Christian to do?

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I don’t mind buying my congressman a stamp now and then (I mean, after all, how is he going to send me updates about all the screwed up stuff he’s trying to push in Congress or solicit money from me?), but I’ll be danged if I want to pick up the bill for Andre Carson’s ride. I don’t know what he’s sporting, but I imagine he’s a Hummer type of guy. With big oversized spinner wheels.

Charlie Rangel leases a Cadillac DeVille for $777 a month. But, he justifies it by asserting that his constituents want him to ride in style. Of the New York congressional delegation, Gregory Meeks of Queens takes the cake. He drives around in a Lexus LS460 which costs the taxpayers $998 per month.

On the bright side, the apparently far more ethical Senate forbids its members from milking their constituents for smart rides.

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Hulsman and Mitchell wrote an excellent article for National Interest wherein they draw parallels between characters in The Godfather and American politics. I think their take on Tom, the consigliere, and Sonny are right on the money. Unfortunately, it doesn’t appear that there is a MIchael Corleone candidate. I think the parallels most closely align as follows: Hillary Clinton was represented by Tom Hagen; George W. Bush/John McCain was represented by Sonny Corleone; and Barack Obama was represented by Virgil Sollozzo (he seems to be bringing the family a good business opportunity, but in reality he seeks to transfer the power of the Corleones to other families).

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The famous British breakfast is under attack. The classic British breakfast is composed of “two rashers of crisp backbacon, British outdoor-reared pork sausage, two griddled eggs, whole-cup mushrooms, crispy sauté potatoes, fresh griddled tomato, Heinz baked beans and toasted or fried extra-thick bloomer bread.” According to the cantankerous author casting aspersions on such a great spread, hash browns “are dismissed as “ghastly manifestations of American imperialism” (damned uppity colonials).”

Well, this uppity colonial takes umbrage at the notion that hash browns (or better yet, corned beef hash, which failed to get a mention) are so lightly dismissed.

Mr. Coren, you might hate the fattening fare, and in particular, hash browns, and you might even prefer porridge (PORRIDGE?!). But, let me ask you this: Which tastes better?

I’ve never eaten backbacon and have no idea how it tastes, but I must say that it contains the word “bacon” and that gives me hope. I have to think that backbacon tastes better than porridge. Do you want to live forever? While the classic British breakfast sounds wonderful, I will still go with my favorite American breakfast - Two biscuits, topped by three scrambled eggs, with a side of crispy hash browns and the whole works covered in sausage gravy. Take that, you British oppressors!

Next thing you know, they’re going to try to tell us that being fat is bad!

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…or, at least play havoc with state slating conventions. I will give his supporters one thing; they are motivated.

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The old saying is: “Yeah, but what does that have to do with the price of bananas?”

Well, when it comes to oil, a lot. OPEC’s president says oil could hit $200 per barrel. The problem, of course, is that the price of everything which is shipped (which is pretty much everything other than online services) is affected by the price of oil. I recently reported on a trucker revolt in downtown Indy. Those revolts have been spreading throughout the country. When trucking companies are hit with high oil prices, does anyone think they absorb the cost? Of course, they don’t. That cost gets priced into the goods we buy.

Last year, we hit $100 per barrel for oil and, at that time, the price of unleaded gasoline was nearly $3 per gallon. When (note I did not say if) the price of oil hits $200 per barrel, gas prices will likely be $6 per gallon. I drive a fuel efficient import (made in Marysville, Ohio before anyone gets all kooky and talking about how they bought a Ford, which was built in either Canada or Mexico, tells how I should support American cars) and the other day my 12 gallon tank cost me over $40 to fill up, with $50 bills not far off. Those sorts of bills used to be reserved for the SUV driving populace. Forty dollars used to be my entire budget for gasoline for an entire month. Consider this: semi trucks typically have 300 (some have 325) gallon tanks.  At $4.16 for a gallon of diesel, which is a decent price right now, it would cost the average trucker nearly $1,250.00 to fill ‘er up.

I used to work at the fuel desk at a truck stop (third shift - drank tons of coffee), and it was a gigantic sale when someone spent $300 to fuel their truck. Now that would get them about two truck stops down the road. I understand their angst and realize that if nothing is done, we’ll soon feel their pain.

Diverting grain to be used to create fuel is not the answer. First, it is extremely expensive to accomplish - more than to drill for oil, or buy from the Middle East. And, second, it drives up the cost of almost every food item, which of course impacts poor people, who spend more as a percentage of their income on food, disproportionately.

Surprisingly, Barack Obama, who seems to be clueless whenever he begins to talk about actual policies as opposed to grand ideas like change, is somehow opposed to relieving the consumer from the burden of government taxes on fuel. Hillary, at least, gets it. McCain has been out front on this issue. But even McCain’s plan is a stopgap measure. First, a hiatus on the gas tax would eventually impact our roads, which the tragedy in Minneapolis teaches us are in a deplorable state. But, second, that sort of relief, while welcome, is temporary. The real problem is that demand has far outstripped supply and OPEC refuses to pump more oil.

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UPDATE: Looks like I nailed this. That’s funny; I never prognosticate correctly!

The Democrats face a crisis. They must have a consensus candidate before the convention if they want any chance of defeating the Republicans in November. But there are two competing factions that are dividing the party sharply into two camps behind two candidates, and, with the stupidity of the ultra-egalitarian “superdelegate” system now showing forth, each day that goes by divides the party further, and brings it closer to a floor fight.

These two camps are no more separated by irreconcilable ideologies than are the candidates themselves; Both stand firmly on platforms made of dreamy dreams and fluffy promises, tales told by idiots, signifying nothing. No, the division is rather one born of political dysfunction, akin to the dysfunction that ruined the Republican party in the early 1960’s. On one hand, the Democratic realists, the young face of the party, representing the only dynamism evident in that otherwise moribund institution, want to nominate a “winner”, and that would obviously Obama. On the other hand, the old line, representing most of the big money sugar daddies, experienced political and media operatives, and entrenched pols, are still looking to follow through on the scripted coronation of the candidate “whose time has come”-in other words, the conclusion of the same political Kabuki that gave us John Kerry-and Clinton is their obvious (and inexorably inevitable) candidate.

Now, this latter group, which represents the old party alliances with the media, labor, and special interest groups, has seemingly called in some favors, albeit reluctantly, and moved Rev. Jeremiah Wright off the back burner (where he has been simmering since about November) solidly front and center. Wright has been all over the television in the last few days, speaking to the National Press Club and the NAACP. Could it be that party operatives in favor of Clinton have used their contacts in these organizations to feed Wright’s insatiable urge for self promotion in order to kill the Obama campaign in favor of Clinton? It has certainly given Hillary plenty to react to in soundbites over the last two news cycles. In any case, the fact that someone has let Wright out of his cage, or, perhaps, that the Obama campaign can’t keep Wright in his cage, is highly suspicious. Likewise, t is indicative and illustrative of the deep dysfunction in the Democratic Party.

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