Category Archives: Individual Rights

Update III: Bush Bolsters Israel, Makes Policy Change Hard for Barack

Barack Obama, Bush, Democracy, Economy, Individual Rights, Israel, Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Neoconservatism, War

“President George W Bush called the Hamas rocket attacks on Israel an ‘act of terror’ and outlined his own conditions for a ceasefire in Gaza, in his weekly radio address to the American people.”

Listen to the president’s radio address. This is a very emphatic statement from George Bush. Such a forceful position in support for Israel makes it hard for the incoming president to deviate, or chart a new course.

Update I: The backdrop to the Israeli offensive:

A quarter of a million Israeli citizens have been living under incessant terror attacks from the Gaza Strip with thousands of missiles fired over the past eight years.

Israel left Gaza in 2005, giving Palestinians the chance to run their own lives. Despite this, more than 6300 rockets and mortars have been fired into Israel since then.

During the past year alone, more than 3000 rockets and mortars have been launched into Israel.

As US President-elect Obama stated during a visit to Sderot five months ago, “If somebody was sending rockets into my house where my two daughters sleep at night, I would do everything to stop that, and would expect Israel to do the same thing.”

More…

Update II (Jan. 4): Regarding Bush and the comment by “gunjam” (may his gun never jam): Bush’s support for Israel’s self-defense need not be psychologized. The president’s violation of the negative rights of Iraqis; and his support for those of Israelis is not courageous, but craven and contradictory. As I observed in “Conservatives For Killing Terri“:

I can think of only two occasions on which I agreed with George Bush. Both involved the upholding of the people’s negative, or leave-me-alone, rights.

The first was his refusal to capitulate to the Kyoto-protocol crazies. Not surprisingly, some conservatives denounced this rare flicker of good judgment. And I’m not talking a “Crunchy Con” of Andrew Sullivan’s caliber—he does proud to Greenpeace and the Sierra Club combined. No less a conservative than Joe Scarborough commiserated with actor Robert Redford over the president’s “blind spot on the environment.” (Ditto Bill O’Reilly.)

The other Bush initiative I endorsed was the attempt by Congress to uphold Terri Schiavo’s inalienable right to life—a decision very many conservatives now rue.

Update III: Did I hear Bush claim Hamas took over Gaza by violent coup? This is what the neoconservatives would like their acolytes to believe. This pie-in-the-Palestinian-sky helps neocons downplay the failure of their democratic evangelizing. Hamas, of course, won the 2006 elections fair and square. Even J. Carter conceded that much, if I’m not mistaken, as did other observers like him, who rushed to the PA to watch their Palestinian protégés practice democracy. The neocons will never admit that a democratic heart does not beat in every breast. In their cultural relativism they are no different from the lefties. Neocons are simply lefties who like war.

Home Invaders-Cum-Home Liberators

Communism, Crime, Individual Rights, Private Property, Socialism

All the characters involved in this operation are de facto and de jure squatters, trespassers, and home invaders.

But to the Associated Press, they are “activists,” “homeless,” and “realtors” with a difference. In an article titled “Activist moves homeless into foreclosures,” the AP prattles:

Rameau is an activist who has been executing a bailout plan of his own around Miami’s empty streets: He is helping homeless people illegally move into foreclosed homes.
“We’re matching homeless people with people-less homes,” he said with a grin.
Rameau and a group of like-minded advocates formed Take Back the Land, which also helps the new “tenants” with secondhand furniture, cleaning supplies and yard upkeep. So far, he has moved six families into foreclosed homes and has nine on a waiting list.

It takes all kinds to make a village of idiots.

Updated: Don’t Tase Me, Big Bro

Crime, Criminal Injustice, Individual Rights, The State

“Baron ‘Scooter’ Pikes had been confined, cuffed, and was nonconfrontational. There was no need to kill him. Nevertheless, Scott Nugent, a Louisiana police officer, stunned Pikes repeatedly with a Taser. The man was dead ‘before the last two 50,000-volt shocks were delivered,’ surmised CNN. An autopsy revealed no evidence of drug use in Pikes’ system—he had been detained for possession. Nugent was indicted this month on a charge of manslaughter.”

The excerpt is from my new WorldNetDaily.com column, “Don’t Tase Me, Big Bro,” where I point out that “The Taser X26 has become a fixture in the increasingly fractious interactions between the police and the people.” And that, “Something has gotten into the country’s lymphatic system—and the infection becomes most apparent in these street-level scuffles between the State and its subjects.”

You can read the complete column, “Don’t Tase Me, Big Bro,” on WorldNetDaily.com.

Updated (August 18): This story about a couple tasered on their wedding day was sent by Sam Karnick, with the following fine comment:

“Note that the article does NOT say, nor do the police say, what the real or implied contract was between the couple and the art gallery owner. It seems the couple did nothing illegal but the owner called the cops on them because he was afraid they might break something, which is not a valid use of the police nor an excuse for their use of force.”

‘José Medellín’s Dead; Cue The Mariachi Band’

Crime, IMMIGRATION, Individual Rights, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Natural Law

As I write in “José Medellín’s Dead; Cue The Mariachi Band,” my new WND column, “local, international, and loco “liberati” fought ferociously for José Medellín’s life.”

“After raping Jennifer Ertman and Elizabeth Peña in every which way possible, Medellín proceeded to strangle, slash, and stomp the young girls to death.” He was executed on August 5, 2008, by the (dashing) governor of Texas, Rick Perry.

“But the case … roiled liberals, for they had uncovered—or, rather, minted—new rights: ‘consular rights.’”

But, as I contend, “a procedural default such as the failure to apprise a defendant of his consular contacts is never a violation of a natural right. ‘Consular rights’ are of a piece with Miranda rights and the Exclusionary Rule—technicalities tarted up as real rights.”

For details of how Bush wrestled a crocodile for Medellín, read the complete column, “José Medellín’s Dead; Cue The Mariachi Band,” on WorldNetDaily.com.