Category Archives: libertarianism

Updated: Octuplets One Can Get Behind: Apu & Manjula Nahasapeemapetilon’s

libertarianism, Media, Pop-Culture, The Zeitgeist

I’ve been able to avoid commenting on the curious case of Rod Blagojevich, the creepy politician who’s been singled out for special attention by an equally creepy media and Blagojevich’s crooked peers.

I see I’ll not be spared the scourge of single mother, Nadya Suleman—the interest in the woman who gave birth to octuplets in California last week is simply too great. Suleman, 33, “already had six children before giving birth on Monday,” and now has 14 kids below the age of eight.

The public might not be too enamored of Suleman, or support her plans to hawk these poor mites on Oprah, reports the Times of London, since,

“Many have asked how an unemployed single mother can raise 14 children, as her first six have already strained the family budget.”

And:

“Experts believe that the unnamed fertility specialists who gave her in vitro fertilisation (IVF) should not have implanted so many embryos.”

Does the Times mean to imply that if the insane sow Suleman had been implanted with, say, four embryos only the dilemma would be no longer?

Talk about asking the wrong questions.

The question a moral society would ask is this:

How does an unmarried, unemployed ho, with iffy finances, and no partner, get fertilized again and again with potential children?

Under libertarian law, such transactions, of course, would not be banned. Since a welfare society would cease to exist, the incentives to manufacture these mites would diminish. One can trust accredited, professional, medical societies to police themselves.

And, of course, neither the government nor the market can eliminate a freak head case like Suleman and the odd quack who’d gratify her craven, selfish needs.

The first problem we have is an extant and growing welfare society that encourages and subsidized degrees of depravity (although Suleman is pretty far gone).

The second problem is immorality: A culture in which the consensus keepers refuse to condemn—or allow a condemnation of—laziness, self-indulgence, and lax morality. Look, Angelina Jolie has an unhealthy fetish she indulges: having or acquiring kids. She clearly gets a kick out of popping them out or adopting them. Once they grow into spoilt, insufferable, stupid brats, she’ll be less enamored of them, although still more than able to provide for her brood.

The thing is, Jolie can afford her fetishes; Suleman can’t.

The risky medical procedure, notwithstanding, my favorite octuplets were Anoop, Uma, Nabendu, Poonam, Pria, Sandeep, Sashi, and Gheet. They were born to a celebrity, married couple: Apu and Manjula Nahasapeemapetilon of The Simpsons. Those were octuplets one could get behind.

Update (Feb 2): “Octuplets mom gets TV, book offers” (via Roger).

Updated: Octuplets One Can Get Behind: Apu & Manjula Nahasapeemapetilon's

libertarianism, Media, Pop-Culture, The Zeitgeist

I’ve been able to avoid commenting on the curious case of Rod Blagojevich, the creepy politician who’s been singled out for special attention by an equally creepy media and Blagojevich’s crooked peers.

I see I’ll not be spared the scourge of single mother, Nadya Suleman—the interest in the woman who gave birth to octuplets in California last week is simply too great. Suleman, 33, “already had six children before giving birth on Monday,” and now has 14 kids below the age of eight.

The public might not be too enamored of Suleman, or support her plans to hawk these poor mites on Oprah, reports the Times of London, since,

“Many have asked how an unemployed single mother can raise 14 children, as her first six have already strained the family budget.”

And:

“Experts believe that the unnamed fertility specialists who gave her in vitro fertilisation (IVF) should not have implanted so many embryos.”

Does the Times mean to imply that if the insane sow Suleman had been implanted with, say, four embryos only the dilemma would be no longer?

Talk about asking the wrong questions.

The question a moral society would ask is this:

How does an unmarried, unemployed ho, with iffy finances, and no partner, get fertilized again and again with potential children?

Under libertarian law, such transactions, of course, would not be banned. Since a welfare society would cease to exist, the incentives to manufacture these mites would diminish. One can trust accredited, professional, medical societies to police themselves.

And, of course, neither the government nor the market can eliminate a freak head case like Suleman and the odd quack who’d gratify her craven, selfish needs.

The first problem we have is an extant and growing welfare society that encourages and subsidized degrees of depravity (although Suleman is pretty far gone).

The second problem is immorality: A culture in which the consensus keepers refuse to condemn—or allow a condemnation of—laziness, self-indulgence, and lax morality. Look, Angelina Jolie has an unhealthy fetish she indulges: having or acquiring kids. She clearly gets a kick out of popping them out or adopting them. Once they grow into spoilt, insufferable, stupid brats, she’ll be less enamored of them, although still more than able to provide for her brood.

The thing is, Jolie can afford her fetishes; Suleman can’t.

The risky medical procedure, notwithstanding, my favorite octuplets were Anoop, Uma, Nabendu, Poonam, Pria, Sandeep, Sashi, and Gheet. They were born to a celebrity, married couple: Apu and Manjula Nahasapeemapetilon of The Simpsons. Those were octuplets one could get behind.

Update (Feb 2): “Octuplets mom gets TV, book offers” (via Roger).

Updated: Memo To Ditto Heads: Obama Didn’t Do It

Barack Obama, Bush, Conservatism, Economy, Individualism Vs. Collectivism, Inflation, libertarianism

Just in case ditto heads are still blaming Obama for the economic depression we’re in, here’s a reality check, and an excerpt from the CNN documentary, “I.O.U.S.A.”:

January 1, 2000, Federal Debt: $5.6 Trillion Dollars.

George W. Bush is declared the winner of the 2000 election.

One of his first priorities is pushing a large tax cut.

September 11, the attacks put the U.S. on war footing.

Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq cost hundreds of billions.

May 1, 2003, Federal debt: $6.5 trillion.

Through Bush’s first term, the Fed cuts interest rates 12 times. [Creating the glut of malinvestment and spending]

The dollar begins a long, steep decline against other currencies.

Cheap credit floods the housing market.

Many home buyers grab risky, non-fixed mortgages. [Helped along by existing federal laws, to which Bush added,mandating loans to risky minorities]

The war drags on.

Bush signs into law Medicare-D, an expensive drug benefit program.

Bush wins re-election on November 3, 2004.

Federal debt: About $10.7 trillion and 75 percent of GDP.

Federal deficit: $455 billion … and now we’re talking trillions for several years going forward.

[Snip]

As we’ve pointed, the totality of US government liabilities exceeds the worth of its citizens.

Also pointed out in this space, years back, is that with an extremely high debt-to-GDP ratio, the US would not be admitted to the company of socialists: the EU. The US’s debt is about 75 percent of its GDP.

I’m often asked what is to be expected under these dire circumstances.

Assets will continue to devalue. Saving will be difficult; retirement near impossible, because, with the continuing devaluation of the dollar, savings depreciate. Hyperinflation is a very real threat, as the amount of goods in the economy decreases, and the supply of worthless paper increases.

Now Obama’s thinking is wrongheaded: he is as clueless as Republicans about the economy and will only prolong the agony. Nevertheless, “I didn’t do it” (Bart Simpson’s famous phrase) is an appropriate defense of Barack.

Update: In response to comments. I do hope the Addiction to that Rush is not on display.

So it’s Obama’s deficit as it is Bush’s??? ‘Cmon; don’t be a ditto head. As bad as he is, Obama is probably one of the least influential politicians to date, given his short tenure in office. (He is destined to change that, of course.) Didn’t ditto heads make that very point in arguing against his candidacy?

This is not about giving anyone a pass. However, spreading irresponsibility is just what ditto heads and democrats like. This allows their respective point men and women to continue to commit legalized crimes, because responsibility in government is always socialized. “Don’t play the blame game” is the political parasite’s favored term.

No, Obama was a relatively obscure politician until now. Bush and Cheney—they ought to have been impeached. Blame for the depression belongs to their administration and to its foreign, fiscal and monetary policy.

To collectivize responsibility and spread it around equally is to oblige the political operatives, and reward them for their crimes. That’s precisely what they want. You’ve fallen into their trap. I’m afraid responsibility must be assigned with laser-like precision.

While on the issue of history, not revisionism, one more thing: The only commentators deserving credit for warning of the financial crisis are my fractious political tribe—not all, but certain libertarians and assorted paleos. And Ron Paul always. Of course, because, other than Paul, we are relatively unknown, the likes of Stephen Moore, who wrote odes to Bush’s “ownership society,” can remake themselves into all-knowing gurus, without crediting their betters.

No one in the age of the idiot will be the wiser.

Updated: Older Liberals Like Me

Classical Liberalism, Conservatism, EU, Ilana Mercer, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, libertarianism

James Burnham on classical liberals of the nineteenth century:

“Older liberals tended to be patriotic and nationalistic. They believed in the self-government, independence and sovereignty of their own country, and also in the right of other nations and peoples to be independent and self-governing. They were ready to fight, and did fight… There was little trace of pacifism in nineteenth century liberalism; rather more imperialism than pacifism.”

“As rationalists they believed that … other things being equal, peace among nations is better than war. But Peace had a modest priority; there were a number of other things, Liberty prominent among them, more important than Peace.” (Suicide of the West, 1964, p. 172)

In some respects, modern-day libertarians are closer to left-liberals than classical liberals—in preaching pacifism, and in their disregard for notion of the nation and its place among nations.

Update I (Jan. 3): Speaking of nineteenth-century liberals like myself, “Eurosceptic Czech President Vaclav Klaus” is a good example. Klaus opposes the European Union for its sovereignty sundering supranational regulation, and “stubbornly refuses to fly the EU flag.”

It’s a great shame that his people, who once cheered this free-thinking, free marketeer, are turning against him—and their better instincts—and toward the prevailing, pitiful PC around them. Resisting propaganda is never easy.