Category Archives: The Zeitgeist

'Midnight Express'

That “Midnight Express” didn’t make Time’s All-Time 100 Movies confirms my opinion of the magazine. (Thankfully that 1952 classic, “Ikiru,” made the cut. I’m a big fan of Akira Kurosawa’s work. You bought that last statement? It was a joke; I was just mimicking the pretentious pseudos at Time.)

These days, a man’s home is considered the government’s castle. The case of Cory Maye, unjustly placed on death row for defending his home during a drug bust (the intrepid Tom Knapp elaborates on the case here, as does Radley Balko) conjures the achingly beautiful words of the convicted protagonist in “Midnight Express”:

“Mr. Prosecutor, I just wish you could stand right here where I am standing and feel what that feels like…cause then you’d know something you don’t know—you’d know what mercy means, Mr. Prosecutor—and you’d know the concept of a society is based on the quality of its mercy, of its sense of fair play, its sense of justice…”

Bill (Anderson) On Black (Conrad)—and Derivative Deviltry

Bush, Criminal Injustice, Justice, Law, libertarianism, The Zeitgeist

Hooray for crusader against injustice, economist Bill Anderson, who wrote in agreement with my column, Crucifying Conrad (Black):

“I am in complete agreement about ‘derivative crimes’ such as mail fraud and wire fraud. Candice Jackson and I have written at length about this stuff, so I am glad to see someone else also beating this same drum. An attorney friend of mine once told me that federal prosecutors are the single greatest threat to liberty in this country, and I agree.
That is why I have not been among the cheerleaders of Patrick Fitzgerald and the bogus “Plamegate,” in which the prosecutors early on realized that no law was broken, so they decided to look for other charges. I have strongly criticized other libertarians who have been cheering Fitzpatrick because he is tormenting the Bush Administration. In other words, all libertarian principles go out the window because the political outcomes in ‘Plamegate’ are satisfying.

Must reads are Bill’s “The Courts and the New Deal,” and Washington’s Biggest Crime Problem.

Crucifying Conrad (Black)

Justice, Law, The Zeitgeist

Mention Justice Department Ãœberbloodhound Patrick Fitzgerald, and the Securities and Exchange Commission in one breath, and even the dimmest libertarian ought to see warning lights flash. These entities are involved in the recent indictment of Conrad Black, former chairman of “one of the world’s most renowned newspaper groups,” on “eight counts of mail and wire fraud. … This epic fight, more fundamentally, is about property; it goes to a proprietor’s prerogatives in the increasingly socialized corporation. … But mostly, the bruising battle concerns an out-of-control, bloated behemoth of a state. Bush’s “New New Deal,” including the Sarbanes-Oxley’s sweeping provisions, has accomplished what FDR failed to: the final federalization of corporate governance law. This machine, now capable of occupying every company across the land, has been commandeered by private parties to do their bidding against Black. In the process, the rent-seekers and their racketeers have dismantled a business they don’t own.

The excerpt is from my new WorldNetDaily column, Crucifying Conrad (Black). Comments are welcome.

No-fault Forgiveness is Fatal

Christianity, Judaism & Jews, Psychology & Pop-Psychology, The Zeitgeist

…Christian forgiveness is… contingent on the sinner’s repentance, and can be granted only by the one sinned against, and not by the various proxies of popularity. Instant expiation flows more from the values of the 1960s than from any doctrinal Christian values…

The excerpt is from my new WorldNetDaily column, No-fault Forgiveness is Fatal. Feel free to comment.