The simple self-evident

The following is a pure opinion piece.

Yesterday was the last day for complaints.

You have been warned.

There are a variety of the 'self-evident' truths that we learn in our life that tell us much about the nature of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  These are not 'rights' nor 'freedoms' but the consequences of actions that we all must understand and live with.  Most of them are cliches as they are well known and used as 'rule of thumb' or something we can readily identify with when looking at a problem.  Yet few actually apply these to their daily lives and overall outlook in life, even though they are self-evident truths.

What sort of truths are these?  Here are a few that one can live their life by:

- Neither a borrower nor a lender be.  Biblical but a good rule of thumb for life as when you are in debt you are in sorrow, and when others owe you then you are constantly wondering if they will ever pay you back.  Do without the heartache on both sides and you will live a better life and be happier with the results of what you do.  That does mean buying fewer things, in life, and not going into debt.  And there is a simple truth for that and easily learned.

- Outgo must be lower than income by a wide margin for you to survive.  It is a corollary to the first truth, but a vital part of understanding what the role of debt is in your life.  If your debt burden is more than you can pay off, you will be forever indebted to others and they will call much of the tune in your life.  In all instances paying your debt burden down and off is a first priority after food, shelter and a means of income.  Pay off on the principle of loans early, and you will lower the length of the loan and, thusly, pay it off faster.  Wherever possible use the funds you have stored from not being a borrower nor lender to purchase big ticket items with cash on the barrel-head.  You will not be a part owner and partially in debt, but the full owner and the burden of ownership rests with you, solely: it is your responsibility.

- Idle hands are the Devil's workshop.  Today the devilishness is in the games and frivolity with which we can populate our lives.  Yet for all of the fun of killing the Boss on Level 39, you have accomplished little with your time, save to have some transient and somewhat addictive fun.  Avocations are those things of interest that require you to do and think about them so as to gain information, improve your skills and otherwise better yourself and those around you with what you can do.  If you can do for yourself, you need not ask others to do for you, and that means you cut expenses and live a better and richer life.  The feeling of accomplishment from doing for yourself something that is vital is enduring: you can look and say that you are self-supporting.

- If you want something done right, do it yourself.  This is a corollary to the previous self-evident truth, but is far more subtle.  It is a subtle mis-statement of the actual meaning and should more rightly say - Do it yourself and you will work to be satisfied for yourself.  This means it is done right in your estimation, even if half-assed by that of an 'expert' that does not matter as you are the one with the accomplishment of achievement to your own satisfaction.

- You are your own worst critic.  You had better be or you will not live long.  Those who are always satisfied with not striving to achieve more and better never do achieve either and become a burden to themselves and those around them.  Thus your self-criticism is one of the highest and hardest things to deal with in life as when you fail yourself, there is no one there to forgive you but yourself.  Those who cannot do that never improve their lot in life and soon come to expect others to do for them, because they hold no value in themselves of what they do.  That is why we praise the efforts of others, even when they do not achieve great results: their effort will be re-doubled with modest praise as they know it is earned and that they can see the flaws in what they did.  Those who criticize harshly, continually, without ever giving praise have a mean spirit towards themselves and their fellow man and seek to demean and belittle others without ever, not once, attempting to make a better world through their own work.  It is easy to be a critic.  It is much harder to strive to build a better life for yourself and others, and the ever-mean critics only seek to destroy your efforts.

- Stop to smell the roses.  Then get back on the path and keep walking.  We appreciate nature for its natural beauty, given to us as a bounty of creation.  We invest time to preserve it as best we can while doing better for ourselves, and lingering to afford too much praise on what is free in life can warp our perspective of what is of great value given naturally and what is of value for our investment of time in it.  Your time with the rose will not make it a better rose, and if all you do is praise the rose, then you are becoming lesser for such praise, not more in life.

- There Is No Such Thing As A Free Lunch.  From Robert A. Heinlein and a self-evident truth.  Someone pays for that lunch in the time and effort to get it there, and your attendance to it is by no means free as it depends on someone else.  When you come to expect that which is free from another, then you are indebted to them and no longer thinking of how you can get it for yourself without someone else providing for you.  You are not entitled to the generosity of others, you are expected to earn it by making yourself a better person while your body is sustained.  That free lunch is there for a reason: to keep you alive to find a way so you don't need it.  That gift is a great burden to you to give back once you do achieve a better life as that is a burden we must all share.  When you are given a fish to eat, it is time to take fishing lessons or you will soon be enthralled to the provider of the 'free' fish.

- If you cannot live with yourself as you are, no one else will.  Except for those seeking to 'change' you to fit their role in life for you.  Self-love is far harder than loving God or, indeed, loving any other person as you must live with yourself on a continual basis.  The easy self-love makes you a narcissist as you come to see perfection in all you are, the never given love makes you miserable as you never allow yourself to see your good side: it is only the love in moderation with the fair assessment of what you do achieve and understanding that it is not up to your best but is still good that gives you the strength and courage to admire others without fawning.  Once fair to yourself, harsh at times but fair in that harshness, how can you not help but be generous to others who have better skills than you and see those seeking to better themselves as on a worthy path?

- Life is for the living.  Failure is an option and a pre-requisite of life.  What you are not good at teaches you humility and the necessary lesson that to achieve in that realm you have failed in will take much, much, much hard work on your part.  No one succeeds in all things thus be wary of those of who it is claimed otherwise.  Your experience at achievement and failure is the teacher of wisdom for you, if you can but accept that the lesson is good even when you do not achieve your goals.  When you fail you are put to the test to see if you can fairly evaluate yourself, your skills, your outlook and then pick yourself up from such failure to be a better person in understanding your limits.  And failure first time is not a guarantee of permanent failure as you may not have all the necessary skills and abilities to do what you wish to do.  Even the very best, those with the pinnacle of human skills will have bad days, off hours and poor judgment in those areas of expertise, especially when they advance beyond what they can easily do.  To achieve in life you must be able to accept life's lessons, fairly evaluate them for yourself and then figure out your path from failure and success.

- The helping hand up cannot be forever expected.  If failure is a prerequisite to success and being a full person, then you cannot expect that you will always have someone or something to cushion the blow to you.  Parents guide children, help them understand that failure is not a personal, moral fault but one of skills, ability and fortitude.  Those necessary lessons in learning and play become fewer as a child grows up and when the child learns the larger lesson of self-reliance and the ability to shake the dust off of themselves after a failure, they are then operating in the realm of adults.  Adults must learn that there is no 'safety net' for them that does not come at great expense to others and that when this expense is not given freely you then feel entitled to always be a failure.  A culture of entitlement is anathema to adults as it does not allow individuals to grow and become functioning members of society.  The responsibility to those who fall rests upon each of us, not all of us, and it is our charitable heart that up-lifts the fallen with a hand up to a better life, not the hand out due to a serf.  We do not denigrate our fellow man with a hand out, but offer the friendly hand up and offer to help them so they can succeed in life.  Those without a charitable heart are the most evil on this Earth, save those wishing to coerce others to cover their responsibilities for them:  forced 'charity' is not charity at all, but pure and utter evil as it takes from those who would give freely to their own causes and forces them to endorse causes in which they have no choice.  Every tyranny coerces in the name of 'charity', and beware all those who say that charity does not begin at home but in your wallet for they care not about your home but only about your wallet: of you they care little, and it is your works of liberty they seek without your input.

- Anything too good to be true usually is and anything promised to always be there and never end, won't.  Every scam that offers something for nothing pulls in the gullible, those known as the target of the scam: The Mark.  To those wishing to defraud, everyone else is The Mark.  In a large scam the last person to realize they are The Mark of the scam, is The Mark.  As we all know, everything has its season, its time, its beginning and its ending, including our universe.  Thus nothing lasts forever, no fiscal system is guaranteed to produce always good results, and anything that requires the next generation of a scam to pay for the previous generation of it will fail.  Thus the promise of a 'social safety net' that requires an 'inter-generational agreement' fails by demographic movements known for decades.  Attempts to 'help' the system are merely attempts to make it last just long enough to get pay outs to those currently paying in.  If forced giving to a 'safety net' is evil due to its coerced nature, it is made deeply so by the false nature of it as the point where it can be sustained reaches a maximum and then fails, catastrophically.  And The Mark are those paying in who can see that this will not work for them and that there is no way it ever will.  The promises were false, the nature of the scam evident since it was started, and the idea of you actually getting some 'retirement' funded by everyone else is too good to be true.  Like all good scams The Plants who claim it will work are in on the scam: they are seeking to make it last long enough to get them into a payout position.

These are self-evident truths we know, in our hearts, as we see them in every day life.  You cannot force someone to do good, only restrict them in doing harm to their fellow man and society.  The necessary evil of restricting those seeking to harm the innocent is still an evil and the very best we can seek is equality of protection and the administration of blind justice to all citizens regardless of income, class, status, skin color, religion or any other thing.  As it was said of our Nation before it was a Nation, when we were under the Unwritten Constitution, government is only a Punisher and that is its role for us.  It can only do 'good' by inflicting harm upon others: financial, moral and physical harm each, in turn, has been justified to make all outcomes in life 'fair'.  Yet life is, itself, very fair, as no one can thwart death and it is equal to all mankind without favor nor fervor, visiting each in their turn.  There are no permanent fortunes as there is no permanent life, and any financial empire will, through mismanagement and greed, fall on its own or be pushed by competitors who can out-compete it.  That is the nature of all things built by man.

Our quest to a more perfect Union is one that is ever forming anew, and there is no permanence to society as the necessary good of one generation may be seen as an evil by the next.  Of the few truths we hold self-evident, we are each born with the blessings of Our Creator to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness and they are inalienable to our very being.  We accept that the pursuit of happiness is a quest, not an end-state, and that to our dying breath if we are very lucky then we will still be in pursuit of happiness, even if that means a horrible death in a far off corner of our world to protect our fellow citizens from harm.  Far better that death than the to be a peasant and slave to government only wishing for a next meal and then cursing government when it does not provide it as you have forgotten that you are to provide for yourself.  Freedom and liberty for our fellow citizens is worth dying for in its defense, which is why tyrannical regimes have such poor armies and always lead to cruel and bitter ends... no matter the victories it gains, it has lost the soul of its people and there is no glory in that at all. 

To live free or die means you must do for yourself and are willing to live with your works and yourself.  It is the hardest way to lead a life.  Yet it is the only way that creates a life worth leading full of freedom, liberty and the responsibilities you gladly accept to help your fellow man so as to create the greatest good of a better society for all, with malice towards none.  Those who viciously deride and attack any segment of a civil society deserve to be shunned, disdained and to rant to their dying breath about the injustice of the world that they only want to make worse to their own ends. 

Into your care is given the heart of liberty. 

Only you can protect it from tyrants.

These two go hand-in-hand.

Stumbling on principle, recovering by hard work

The principled stand against abortion is excellent: human life begins at conception.

That is an ironclad concept that only runs afoul of citizenship conferred at birth and the awful ruling from the SCOTUS on Roe v. Wade on the right to privacy issue AND the viability issue.

By being unable to take the multi-track approach against abortion as a three-pronged encirclement maneuver, we have wound up with the horrors of Dr. Kermit Gosnell (link to a NY Daily News report, but there are hundreds of reports out there) which may be multi-State in its scope, and the problems revealed on Planned Parenthood (Andrew Breitbart's Big Government for that).

The counter-attack on Roe has been single vector and has not utilized any of the Leftist playbook strategies against things like smoking. Wait? Playbook strategies?

Why, yes: making smoking to be socially unacceptable has been a long-term procedure in the health care area that has taken a relatively self-destructive habit going back centuries and slowly changed the perception of it on a social basis. If there was that sort of capability to go against abortion to reinforce and push forward against the main avenues of attack that got us to Dr. Gosnell and Planned Parenthood as has been used against smoking, we would end up with far fewer abortions and the shunning of it over time.

The Leftist push via the SCOTUS and then expanding on that locally by the rather sparse certification for abortion clinics and NO review of them has been an absolute abandonment of the primary principle (human life begins at conception) on the secondary avenues of privacy and viability which have been conceded, absolutely and totally, to the Left. In the last decade some push-back on MINORS has happened, but that has been the extent of it, and has been thwarted by the SCOTUS 'privacy' finding.

So what to do?

The first venue of counter-attack is to use both the logic of the ruling and follow it through to conclusion, much like the Left does painting all smoking as habitual and lethal which is a reductio ad absurdum so the Right will be on firmer ground because it uses the purely logical approach to the law.

The second venue is regulation and it dovetails with the first.

I have outlined this in The Limits of Our Creation as a logical point and will expand upon that here. First things first is the going over of what should be done with the decision at the State and local levels by following the natural logic of 'viability' to its conclusion, and I will draw upon my previous verbiage here:

In looking at Freedoms, Rights and the People I started looking at the actual framework of the issues involved and then a whole lot more in When do your rights start? Now in this I do *not* try to figure out when someone is or is not a human but *when* there is a passing point *into* Citizenship. Now why did I do that? Because it is imperfect, of course! Far, far less than ideal but... it does head towards the common ideal of Citizenship and upholding all rights and all responsibilities. Citizenship is a damned important thing in this Nation and the Supreme Court has created a two-tier system of 'Due Process' that actually violates the outlook of the Constitution for one form of justice for All of the People. Here is what it boils down to:

1) The SCOTUS has put a 'viability test' on when an abortion may be performed,

2) What does 'viability' measure? It measures the ability to be sustained outside of the mother or host.

3) What happens when an Individual is outside the mother or host and sustainable? They are 'born'.

4) Being born of Citizens of the United States within a State of the United States or within limits set externally by Congress for such things under its Immigration and Naturalization powers makes one a Citizen.

Short, sweet and to the point: viability is a measure of Citizenship.

Thus when a fetus is 'viable' it is a citizen as it has passed that threshold (totally and absolutely temporal, bound in the material world) in which the life can be sustained without a direct umbilical cord attachment to the mother or host and can then develop normally outside of that host. At that point the full citizenship rights are with the fetus as it now gets absolute and full legal protection including the right to privacy and safe conduct within its host or via secondary means at a cost to the State or via designated charities willing to do this work.

To be clear: abortion when a fetus reaches 'viability' is murder, not manslaughter. All involved to make that happen are conspiring to commit murder. That means the 'patient', doctors, people who review tests and procedures, their clinic and its leaders... get where this is going? The only way this could ever drop to manslaughter is via ambivalent evidence, which means that all involved did NOT get enough evidence to prove the fetus was NOT viable. If States can start turning this into manslaughter on principled grounds, then more power to them. The long-standing traditions of 'quickening' being the first sign of life and birth being a major event, however, cuts both ways, which is why we have 'viability' language in the SCOTUS decision.

Citizenship is conferred from birth via States, not the federal government. You are born in a State that is part of the United States, not the other way around as the State is the one that did the joining to the Nation, not the Nation absorbing the State via conquest. That's why the birth certificate deal is such a big thing: it demonstrates you are a citizen by birth, not naturalization nor immigration which are federal areas. Via Amendments IX and X the ability to confer citizenship via birth rests with the States and the people as the un-enumerated powers they reserve for themselves.

From this the first venue of attack outside of the primary holding the line is: push States to adopt viability language for the conferring of full citizenship rights and protections to fetuses, adapted so that as the state of the art improves in embryology and pre-natal care, that viability line can move down with those advances.

The second venue of attack via regulation is more numerous but has an immediate dovetail to the first outcome. The other method of determining the viability of a fetus comes from impregnation. This centers around the act known as sexual intercourse. These acts have dates and times when they happen, plus places and individuals involved. The second way to determine viability is to have individuals responsibly know who they have had sex with and when that happened. If a woman or host wants an abortion, the record keeping puts down hard lines of development of a fetus by a given point. Simple exams including ultrasound can determine if these dates jibe with the given development phase of the fetus. Multiple sex acts will give a range of time, yes, but the establishment of minimums and maximums for fetal development will help to determine viability questions much faster.

How is viability determined? My guess is the regulatory language would include three independent reports on the status of the fetus from unconnected physicians and labs. One might be a State organization (Health Dept. perhaps). Further the doctors and clinic involved in the abortion must review and sign-off on all of those reports within a given period. In all cases the abortion MUST happen before viability is reached and ALL leeway is given to the fetus as the arts and methods of determining fetal development will always have a ragged edge to them. Finally the fetal remains are sent for an autopsy at the cost of the patient and clinic to confirm viability status and get genetic material so that in case there is any question the father can be identified if not done so already.

What else can be done via regulation?

Mandatory 'snap' and unannounced inspections of the premises of clinics to ensure that they are up to all hospital standards for the patients and procedures involved. In the Gosnell case it has been revealed that beauty salons get more oversight than do abortion clinics. Why anyone on the Right has let this go un-addressed is beyond me. Bringing the full panoply of inspections, licensing, certification, re-upping these things, making sure staff are up to snuff, clean and sanitary working conditions... all of this will start to winnow out the abortion providers by putting a barrier of entry into the market by making it more costly to run such an establishment along the exact, same lines as a hospital. No one, in their right mind, can argue against this.

With State and local health departments on tap for determining viability, there is also the question of knowing the patient's age, which must be taken into account. To date clinics and doctors involved with this procedure, a medically invasive one by design, have been given shelter from this. By putting a State based citizenship concern into play, that will now end as the health and welfare of all involved in abortion procedures falls into the State venue. Statutory rape is still rape and no amount of 'consent' or 'privacy' should ever enter into this question as the law is clear. States can and do vary on age of consent, and if those supporting under-age abortions are so hot on the topic, they should be forced to argue for pushing the age of consent down. Clinics that hide such material are in a conspiracy to do so, and a conspiracy to cover up statutory rape should have some rather harsh penalties added on to it.

Schools should be covered on the conspiracy to aid and abet statutory rape language when they hand out condoms or otherwise 'help' in the reproductive situation of minors under their care for the school day. Thus no distribution of condoms or other prophylactics to those under the age of consent, otherwise the discovery process that illuminates such help places those doing the distributing in that conspiracy category: nurses, schools staff, school principals, and even the school board for not properly doing mandatory oversight of such distribution programs. Negligence of children under the care of local governments is less acceptable than that of abortion clinics. Education is one thing, encouraging, aiding and abetting is something entirely different.

These simple ways of addressing abortion start creating the inroads to changing the social attitude about it.

First they will be a defined procedure with safeguards and costs involved. This will drive home that an abortion is not something done on a whimsy or as an alternative form of 'birth control' but something that is destructive, invasive and has risks attendant to it. This is done through State and local regulation, but requires an attitude change to remind people that there is no such thing as a free lunch in the medical community. Also put abortion clinics under all malpractice law... if you want to see tort reform and limitations on pay-outs, putting these people under those venues will start that off, nicely.

Second making adults responsible for their sexual activities puts a different light on those activities after the 'sexual revolution'. That revolution did not withdraw the laws of biology, only changed a few circumstances, and the social implications of using 'sexual liberty' unwisely should have costs involved with it as well as fun. By putting the accountability back into sexual activity starting with abortion, the entire climate of what is and is not acceptable for society comes into play, and it is an area that the Left has had on their own for far too long. Teen pregnancies, single parent households, and absent fathers is an outcome of 'sexual liberty' without any accountability... and do note that with fathers also having to keep track of who they have sex with as a back-up source plus genetic testing, they are as on hook for the outcome of an abortion as much as the mother or host. This one is part of personal practice, but can be backed by regulation so it is made a part of regular expectations of those seeking abortions.

Third the venues for getting 'viability' sooner are huge. Investment in better pre-natal care, better embryology, better technology and techniques to sustain life outside the womb or transfer a fetus to an alternative host offer many and vital ways to push ever further back the time of 'viability' closer and closer to conception. This will have many side-benefits of children born healthier and with diseases and disorders addressed in the womb to remove birth defects or other systemic disorders and try to address them before they can happen. With the knowledge we have garnered from adult stem cell use, we can examine fetal development and seek to address auto-immune disorders before they happen and correct other genetic deficiencies long, long before birth. The energy into holding the line on life beginning at conception also means we see great value in the first few weeks and months after conception and are willing to invest in charities and for-profit institutions to research this critical time of development. These are important areas as they will also begin to close off the other reasons for abortions: genetic disorders, systemic diseases and other problems that would either kill the fetus or create life limiting conditions after birth. This can be done through existing funds, charities and corporations, or creating new ones specifically devoted to these issues.

Fourth is a follow-on to the third and that is the slow removal of the need for IVF clinics by addressing fertility problems via other biological means. If the 'pro-life' movement is serious about life beginning at conception, then the 'murder mills' are the IVF clinics that can autoclave thousands of fertilized ovum in a few hours as their clients no longer need them. In an hour or so of time more in the way of potential life can be removed from the board at an IVF clinic than at an abortion clinic in a year. Or longer. As we cherish life I can see why IVF clinics get a pass from the 'pro-life' crowd... but by their own logic they should be major targets in this battle, as well. For a principled way of looking at things, not addressing this is an opening to being blind-sided and must be closed off.

What this comes down to is a thorough re-working of the 'pro-life' agenda to expand it and make it pro-development and pro-health with both of those being proactive concerns from the need to remove the horrors of abortion. When the major excuses and reasons NOT to follow the SCOTUS decision are removed and the decision enforced, in full, with the full regulatory authority of States and localities, the issue of 'privacy' for those of the age of consent can be maintained while the custodial accountability (particularly of courts stepping in with children against abusive parents in this venue) can be sustained. By putting the courts on hook for their decision about minors and families in the way of judges stepping in, those judges then become accountable actors in the abortion situation and should be addressed and treated as such.

This issue of what life is cannot be driven solely by emotion, because that leads to yelling, screaming, threats and even violence. By adding reason (even to an unreasonable decision) the outcomes of reason can be created to temper our emotions and harden them into concrete steps to take so as to make a better society via our actions. If this route had been taken in the years immediately after Roe v. Wade we would see far fewer abortions, greater advances in pre-natal care and technology, and the pushing back of viability closer and closer to conception so that abortions are slowly wrung out of the system across the board in all forms. Instead the principled Conservatives let the Left choose the emotional battleground and agreed to fight on that ground, and start losing and ceding vast swaths of society to the Left based on purely emotional fights.

Now that the sentiment of society is turning, that sentiment must not be lost and must be given avenues of concrete and substantive action to take so as to advance this cause. It will also mean a personal willingness to understand that you, as an individual, actually are responsible for your sexual activities and accountable for them in all instances. That has been a vital battleground that must be taken back to firm up society into one that is life supporting and tolerates as little in the way of abortions as possible and is attempting to remove the need for them through technology, techniques, principled empowerment of understanding the vitality of life and the best route of putting your money where your principles are at. If those principles are right and good, then investing in them in concrete terms will yield a better society and better future.

When you do that you then have a reasoned and passionate approach, tempered to a hard core that will convince others that this is a worthwhile way to live and sustain society. Don't just protest: have the portfolio of investments and means to sustain your argument with you and the rationale for doing so. For any argument won purely on emotion can be lost just as easily to more emotion, and that is not the way to build society. The principle is excellent, but the execution has been on the ground of the enemy's choosing and it is time to stop doing that and choose a different set of venues and weapons to go with. Stop fighting defensively and go on the offensive in ways that cannot be countered easily.

Put down the placards, start in with the emails and phone calls, and get organized in your locale to pick up the vital concerns of regulating and putting in place the safeguards for life that are currently taken for granted and, thusly, not there. This means working at the State and local level to address issues close to you and find those willing to help you organize beyond your location and come together on this vital concern.

Just like the Tea Parties did.

Moral principles, sustainment of society and using government to enforce the secular requirements of those can build a Nation stronger via the promulgation of those morals from people willing to go all-out in all venues to win the day. The Left has won in many areas because no Conservatives have shown up with the right tools nor prepared the battleground. That can change the moment you change from seeing this as just a principled moral issue and one that goes far and wide beyond just morals and engages everything we do as a people. That means fewer tactics, placards, yelling, screaming, and more engaged debate and backing your moral principles with your time, effort, money and love. Together they will forge something that will not be broken. Right now they are scattered and a number of things left undone that could be done... that does not rest upon me, but upon you.

Why is Egypt a vexing problem?

If you've read the newspapers there is this bit about President Obama that does illustrate a major problem with the Leftist thesis (such as it is) for government. This from 31 JAN 2011, ABC News:

As the situation on the ground in Egypt continues to evolve, the White House is constantly recalibrating its public statements, with President Obama and administration officials now issuing carefully worded statements that lean more into the notion of a significant change in Egypt’s leadership. After speaking with the leaders of the UK, Turkey, Israel and Saudi Arabia over the weekend, President Obama issued a statement saying that he supports “an orderly transition to a government that is responsive to the aspirations of the Egyptian people.”

Those words, which closely track comments made on Sunday shows by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, represent the U.S. more publicly demanding that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak either embrace democracy or cede power to someone who will.

These words represent a change in tone and substance from President Obama’s Friday night remarks that he told President Mubarak “he has a responsibility to give meaning” to words “pledg(ing) a better democracy and greater economic opportunity”….”to take concrete steps and actions that deliver on that promise.” They represent a clear departure from the words of Vice President Joe Biden, who on Thursday told the PBS NewsHour that Mubarak was an “ally” and disputed the notion that he’s a “dictator.” Mubarak, indeed, has been extremely helpful to the US in helping to broker peace between Israel and the Palestinians, in opposing Iran’s nuclear program, and in recognizing the new Iraqi government.

Is there some reason to have situational ethics on this question of backing a government? Is it truly not to the best to accede that a nation is governed by the rule of law? Or is it required that we can only help a nation if the situation is 'right' or 'to our interests'?

This is a basic premise that we, as Americans, should know by heart, and yet through decades of Presidents putting forward situational responses, we now have a President who has problems even speaking the words 'due process of civil law'. Of course he came in with 'Hope & Change' to make civil law 'better' and more 'socially just', which means putting the law aside and having a government ruled by men who don't care much what a law actually says.

A people who adhere to equality of application of the law expect that it be applied dispassionately upon all classes, races, creeds, rich, poor and believers of all religions as the due process of law will determine who is innocent and who is guilty without respect to any of those things.

Those peoples who adhere to a government ruled by men with their distant adherence to law only when it suits their goals wind up with tyrannical regimes that rape women and girls, suppress basic liberties, and impoverish the many via the role of government to enrich the few who run the government. These are authoritarians, totalitarians, rogues, despots, dictators, and any government that feels it is above any law, whatsoever, and fit to rule society as the men in power see fit.

The United States is founded on the concept of equal application of the law via civil means that are well defined and adhered to. Hiring better lawyers can help some guilty parties, yes, but that is no reason to scrap a system that works well for the overwhelming majority of people so as to address the few that game the system. Scrapping that is to punish the many, the bulk of society, to get the few playing games with the system. And in some instances if you are the leaders of Enron or Bernie Madoff, it doesn't how much you pay out for lawyers, as justice still gets served, blindly.

With our understanding of a civil society creating a civil system that is equally applied to all, in all circumstances, in all aspects of law, what, then, should our response be in Egypt or, indeed, in any land seeking to depose a tyrant, dictator, autocrat, or other similar creature?

It is pretty simple.

1) The American People stand up for all peoples of the world to have a voice in their government via civil means and to not have that suppressed by ANY government run by ANY ONE, without respect to how rich or how poor they are, nor in any other respect to their position in life. Yes, that is a sane and rational basis for foreign policy.

2) The United States government rests upon the civil process of the transfer of power via normalized elections in which parties each are given the ability to speak, have votes for their members recognized, to have those votes counted in the tally of all votes. This requires having all members of society who are deemed of majority age, not insane or ineligible due to criminal acts, to not be intimidated while casting a secret ballot the contents of which is only known by the person casting the vote in the particular, and not to have that vote tied to a particular individual when counted so they have anonymity of the secret ballot.

3) To those ends the United States pleads with any dictator, despot, oligarchy, or any other authoritarian or totalitarian system to create the environment of freedom of expression in political thought, to listen to the people of their Nation as they give input to how they are governed, and to not exclude any party, no matter how vile, from the political process as suppression of that freedom of expression is anathema to a free people and a curbing of fundamental, unalienable rights due to each person born on this Earth.

4) The United States pleads with all protestors to adhere to civil means of protest, to support the civil transfer of power via known election systems, and to demand a change to any election system which discriminates against any of their fellow countrymen as stated in (2). Equality before the law is the greatest justice that can be brought against those that have corrupted a civil system to their own ends for it is a form of justice they have denied to everyone, and the equality and equanimity of its application to such leaders is something that requires civil restraint.

5) The United States mourn all those in the quest for the liberation of their fellow countrymen from any system which does not guarantee fundamental human liberty of freedom of speech, religion, self-defense, the press, and having their voices heard in their government. Those who die in this cause are the lifeblood of the Tree of Liberty, as is the blood of tyrants and despots unwilling to release their grip on power and who are then forced to release their grip on their lives. Those who temper their emotions to bring equal application of the law to all within their Nation are patriots, and those who seek to thwart or pervert those ends to any partisan end are traitors to the cause of human liberty for all mankind.

There, pretty simple.

State once, apply to all Nations, equally, without exception, without favor nor fervor.

And make our foreign policy payments favor those Nations that seek greater liberty for their people and who befriend us in this great cause.

All others need to read those five points and understand why they receive no favor, no fervor and no cash or goodies. Plus to be a 'friend' they must actually start to loosen their grip on power and establish equality of justice and uphold unalienable human rights for their population.

Mind you, this would shake up our foreign policy establishment no end, this concept of supporting absolute human rights and not 'social justice' which is all relative and has no real ground to stand upon because of that.

Then America could get into the business of encouraging all tyrants, dictators, despots, etc. to reform their system and themselves so that they are no longer part of the system, and what is left is a system that has equality of application to all members of society.

But then that takes morals and ethics from those we elect to govern us.

No wonder we are in such sorry straights these days.

On the Duties of Man - To God

I am working through Samuel Pufendorf's On the Duty of Man and Citizen (1682), and now reach beyond the introductory material and into the actual duties of Man.  I am doing my best to understand as I go and will try to keep personal commentary to a separate piece as the logic and reasoning behind this work are of paramount importance to western civilization based on the Treaty of Westphalia and the reconciling of having a secular State as a separate but dependent domain from the Faith of Christianity as practiced in that time.  This is critical as Pufendorf creates much of the logic and lexicon that will be utilized all the way to the present day, and to understand where we have gotten to we must understand the roots that allowed us to draw sustenance for the creation of the modern world.

The section is: On man's duty to God, or on natural religion.

The basis of man's duty to God is seen to come from:

1) To have right notions of God.

2) To conform our actions to His will.

Natural religion, that is religion derived from the basis of Man's duty to God which creates the areas of theoretical propositions and practical propositions.

I must note that this formulation of knowing a system correctly, in this case man's duty to God, creates the necessity of having a theoretical understanding of the system (which is to say its underpinnings, axioms and other known systemic outlays like given interactions) and then extending those concepts into practical applications by utilizing that knowledge and working out what such a practical application will look like. This also leads to a saying attributed variously from computer scientist Jan L. A. van de Snepscheut all the way to Yogi Berra:

In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. But, in practice, there is.

This is a critical understanding of systems and how this is dealt with at the beginning of the modern Nation State is critical, and the basis starts out with God but, as seen later, not limited just to God for from the prime mover comes many effects to be dealt with.  Yet it is vital that the concept of theory put into practice for the formulation of natural religion guided by Scripture and the necessity of salvation that is so well explicitly stated in this work.

To understand what Pufendorf is looking at it is necessary to examine the axioms, or basis, of the foundations of Moral Law and the duties of man to God.  Thus I will try to paraphrase and condense so as to outline the structure of what is seen to be, what is our duties to what is seen and why that matters.  Do remember the year this was created and that this book is, itself, a condensation of a multi-volume work examining what the three realms of Law are.

From Paragraph 2 we get the axioms or givens:

1) Everyone must hold that God exists.

2) There is a supreme and first being upon which the universe depends.

3) The first two are true due to there being beginnings and ends to events and this is reflected by the very nature of the universe.

4) Claiming not to understand 1-3 is no excuse for atheism.

5) Anyone claiming the non-existence of God must not only come through with better arguments and reasoning against God's existence, but better and more convincing set of reasons for our existence.

6) The salvation of the human race depends upon worship of God.

7) Impiety stemming from those who do not agree with support of the worship of God must be punished.

These are the first, vital statements of where and how man's duty to God come about.  It is a concern that puts forth the universality of God (indeed God is beyond the universe as the universe is a creation of God as seen in 8, following) and that understanding that creations of any sort have a beginning and an end creates the pre-conditional support for God existing.  Absent better arguments against such a God coupled with a better set of reasoning and rationale for how we are in our present circumstance within such a pre-defined universe (that is it has beginning and end), the worship and support of worship of God is necessary for the salvation of mankind.

Do note that this is not just the formulation of man's duty to God but is the basis for the natural sciences.  In the natural sciences for a hypothesis to shift previously understood theory (that is a theory is more widely accepted than a fresh hypothesis) the hypothesis must do more then explain things the old theory cannot explain but must, as a pre-condition, better explain what the actual ordering of events or phenomena are and offer predictive ability so as to validate its claims.  Thus Newtonian physics was used even when it was falling apart when speeds greater than 0.5 c were reached as it offered a experimental and theoretical framework within which one got valid results.  Relativity replaced Newtonian physics by explaining all that happened within Newtonian physics and then offering a testable and verifiable framework for future experiments that then validated the hypothesis.  This same framework of not only better explain, but offer a framework for validation is laid at the feet of those wishing to replace God with something else, and it is a very, very high hurdle to pass just as it has been in the natural sciences.

It is next put down that:

8) God created the universe.  The universe, having been created, will end while God is eternal, thus nature is derived from the order of God.

9) God exercises control over the universe and human affairs which is demonstrated by the order of the universe, itself.  Having a start the universe will have an end, its order is that which is created by God.

10) God is perfect in all things and no limited set of feelings or attitudes can be attributed to God for they imply a temporal limitation upon that which is eternal.  When Scriptures speak in the way of God wanting something, it is our limited and nature oriented views that are imposed upon the message: our minds cannot conceive of the actual message and, thusly, must put it into terms that we understand.  The God of the infinite in all things is not limited, in any way, by how we must address what happens in the limited universe as we cannot come to grips with the infinite as finite individuals.  God exists in no given place, at no given time, nor at any reference point as all such are under the domain of God.

11)  There is only one God, for many Gods would only exhibit finite powers while God is unlimited in all respects.

===

Those are the givens of our universe and our place in it that we must contend with.  From these the duty of man to God is both internal and external, and honor unto God must be in both.  In our honor we must revere that which is most majestic who has created this universe and acknowledge that we act within that order to that supreme will which has brought it about.  Above all God is the greatest good within our universe, and is thusly deserving of honor and appreciation from us for that great goodness.

From this our duties follow:

- To give thanks to God for the benefits we receive from Him.

- To express His will and obey Him in all things.

- To admire and celebrate His greatness.

- To offer up prayers for goodness and to ward off evil, and to seek His signs of hope and acknowledge those as an expression of the goodness and greatness of His power.

- To swear by God's name and to keep one's oath scrupulously as that is demanded by God's omniscience and power.

- To speak respectfully of God as that is a sign of fear which is a confession of His power.  Thus we do not use God's name in vain or speak rashly about God as that is to show a lack of respect.  One is not to swear when there is no need to do so.  One is to not speak curiously and insolently about the nature of God's government as this is an attempt to limit the unlimited.

- To offer only what is excellent to God as this is to show Him honor.

- To worship God privately and openly, for it would be in shame to not show open worship and obedience to Him.

- To make every effort to observe the laws of nature as they are the creation of God and not to do so is an insult to God and His creation. 

These are the duties of Moral Law that must temper Natural Religion so as to put the basis of fear of consequences in the next life for actions taken in this one.  This is the basis for religion amongst men.

Without religion and fear of God man reverts to his natural state of being and would act in a less civil manner towards other men.  Religion is thusly seen as a civilizing method for man to treat his fellow man better through Scriptural teachings.  Man without the self-restraint necessary to worship will see himself fit to rule other men to his own pleasing and that, in turn, will displease other men who will seek to overthrow their current rulers.  Conspiracy would flourish as it would be seen as profitable for those engaged in it.  This erodes good will and trust amongst individuals as they come to fear each other as they no longer fear God.  Rulers would rule without conscience, see conspiracy about them at every turn and never fear that their actions would be punished in the next life for such ill treatment of their fellow man in this one.  Citizens would come to fear the oppressive nature of government unbridled by any inhibitions of those running it.

From this view atheism is not seen as merely misguided but the pathway to losing one's conscience and moral underpinnings as they no longer fear God.  It is the lawless nature that atheism puts forward that then creates the decline of justice and orderliness of the civil law as laws are put in place by rulers to safeguard themselves against their fellow man and impose tyrannical rule over man.

===

Thus ends the overview of man's duty to God.

To properly appreciate the arguments that Samuel Pufendorf puts forward it is necessary to understand the context and overview the the system his is enlightening.  Agree or disagree with the overall system view, as you will, but this served as the first generation of thought upon which all later Western Civilization would form.

Thus I present it dispassionately so as to outline the system, its underpinnings and outlook.

What is presented is foundational and a major shift from how the order of society worked leading up to the 30 Years War as it puts the onus upon keeping civil society not with the rulers nor even with the Church, but upon you as the individual and your relationship to the Divine.  As our civil law is based upon the moral precepts of man as he understands religion when applied to himself, then he will govern himself (singularly and in plural) differently than when it is a top-down affair.  Here, at the review of this new order promulgated from the Great Peace of Westphalia we are given the greatest understanding of our role in the world: we self-govern to create a just moral order.

You are the point of God's creation.

And it is upon You that the very foundations of society, civil law and our understanding of each other as natural beings resides.  Heaven will not help you if you seek to have government do what is necessary to be civilized for you.

That other mind

When looking at the symbology of the Tucson memorial service, finding the handing out of t-shirts with this,

Source: AZcentral.com

one can be a bit disconcerted, to say the least, as 'Together We Thrive' does not fit with a memorial service.  As Michelle Malkin points out the service was being branded, like a stage play or entertainment venue.  If this is an attempt to appeal to people based on an emotional level then it is one that does not link up the honor of the dead with the message.  In fact there is no way to link the two up as the venue is one that is distinctly not about thriving.

 

If this were an ad campaign, then the appeal would be towards one of the fundamental drives of people.  Which drive would it be?

 

Some ad campaigns utilize sex at some level, usually subliminal, but this event and that message don't help towards that end.

 

Nor is it a message that jibes with aggression as the actions taken to cause the event were aggressive and the message definitely is not that.  Part of the jarring symbology of the message is the welcoming passivity of it in the face of heinous murder.

 

Self-preservation doesn't seem to be a part of this message, either, as 'Together We Thrive' isn't particularly something that is concordant with self-preservation: you can't use 'thrive' it just happens to you.

 

It isn't a message that radiates security, as the venue and events that made it happen are the exact opposite of ones of security.  Putting such a message out at this event would be the equivalent of saying: 'We thrive through violent murder'.  That just doesn't work and is part of the problem with the messaging.

 

So what is left?

 

Going by the Freudian methodology used in advertising there is one part of Freud that gets left out by most modern analysts as its not something that is pleasant.  It is one force that was used for propaganda by the National Socialists in Germany, by the Japanese Empire and, to a lesser extent, by the Fascists in Italy.  The 'aggressive instinct' goes a bit beyond aggression in Freudian realms and is properly termed the destrudo: the destructive impulse that arises from Thanatos or death impulse.  If we are guided by our animal instincts then it makes a form of sense that we come together in groups so as to be more powerful in using the death impulse towards other groups.

 

Thus the symbology comes to be a couple of inter-related things:

1. A celebration of death.  We thrive through death and it is through death that we get meaning.  Unfortunately this is through the death of others, and the message's surficial soothing point and 'warm fuzzy' feeling is a bringing together of a group not to honor the dead but to thrive through the death of others.  This is an 'in-group' formation message which would allow it to be led to direct hostilities outwardly so as to continue the death impulse.  Because we do thrive from death, right?
2. We become stronger and more alive through the deaths of others.  This is, perhaps, worse than (1) as it posits the fostering of a message that to thrive we must have death, or in this case murder.

I could get into some nits to pick on President Obama's speech but I will not do that and only offer one comment on part of the demeanor he had at points in the speech.  The points of greatest animation and involvement in the speech he gave were during the points he talked about government service.  For the staffer helping constituents with Medicaid (do remember the health care fight that went on before this) or for the young girl's getting elected to a position in the student council, it was at those times that he came alive and his eyes sparkled: he was full of energy.  That made the messaging far worse, to me at least, than just the message and t-shirt as it was sending the message not that government service was important, but that it brought you alive and made you animated in your approach to life.

This was not a JFK 'ask not what you country can do for you' moment, but during a memorial to honor the dead.  I can understand that the lack of intimate knowledge of those killed would lead to some dispassion, that is perfectly natural.  To be animated while talking of government service during a memorial?  Something was seriously wrong with that passion at those times, it was jarring to me and mentally disturbing and wholly out of place.  Honoring a murdered judge for his work is one thing, becoming animated about the work another as it is the man who had the position that is being honored, not the position that had the man.  The same with the staffer and the girl, something was just not right during those parts of the speech.

Taken as a whole the entire memorial becomes something very unlike a memorial and was turned into some sort of a strange and morbid rally.  With the message going out about thriving at an event to honor the dead and becoming passionate about government service, the overall concept with Freudian overtones is one to create a new death-based in-group that will become energized via killing in service to the government.  That is not what the speech was saying, in and of itself, but the emotional tone and subliminal messaging were giving that out loud and clear.  Thus the juxtaposition between the rhetorical content of the President's speech and the entire event is jarring not on the intellectual level but the emotional level and runs contrary to the rhetoric of the speech itself.

The rhetoric of the speech was decent beyond some nits here and there, the audience reaction was indecent (standing ovations? cheering? at a memorial service?) and the entire crossing of message with undertones horrific in implication.  This would have been, perhaps, President Obama's best speech... if it weren't for what was going on in the immediate foreground with the audience and the background with the branding of the event.  I have tried to come to a more definite analysis of what I witnessed which was unlike anything else I have ever seen on any other event of this type.  Something is just very wrong with what happened in Tucson, AZ yesterday and this is the best I can do to put my finger on it.

A simple agreement

From Glenn Beck's website:

Denouncing violence from all sides including your own does not make your movement any less just.  To quote Martin Luther King:

But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

I challenge all Americans, left or right, regardless if you’re a politician, pundit, painter, priest, parishioner, poet or porn star to agree with all of the following.

• I denounce violence, regardless of ideological motivation.
• I denounce anyone, from the Left, the Right or middle, who believes physical violence is the answer to whatever they feel is wrong with our country.
• I denounce those who wish to tear down our system and rebuild it in their own image, whatever that image may be.
• I denounce those from the Left, the Right or middle, who call for riots and violence as an opportunity to bring down and reconstruct our system.
• I denounce violent threats and calls for the destruction of our system – regardless of their underlying ideology – whether they come from the Hutaree Militia or Frances Fox Piven.
• I hold those responsible for the violence, responsible for the violence.  I denounce those who attempt to blame political opponents for the acts of madmen.
• I denounce those from the Left, the Right or middle that sees violence as a viable alternative to our long established system of change made within the constraints of our constitutional Republic.

I will stand with anyone willing to sign that pledge.  Today I make a personal choice.  I urge leaders of both sides and all walks of life to join me as all Americans joined hands on 9.12.2001.

Do note that this goes along with my agreement to The Manifesto Against Islamic Totalitarianism, with the provisos I outlined for that.

In this case the following I see as being recognized as being fully in accord with political non-violence:

• The right to defend myself via my civil rights against those who seek to do me injury or go after my loved ones or property. 
  
• To hold myself accountable in all such instances as is necessary for the continuation of a civil society by the rule of law when I must exercise the right to self-defense.
  
• The right to have and utilize my physical property without any interference so long as I present no danger to any one and the right to tell others to get off my damned lawn and keep their grubby fingers from my stuff.
  
• Likewise I respect the rights of others to their property and will respect their right to it and abide by their wishes for it as this is necessary to have a civil society.
  
• In all cases I abide by the Law of Nations which is universal and will resort to the positive liberty of war to defend myself, my loved ones and property from the violence and depredation of those seeking to bring savage war to me.
  
• I reject the savagery of personal warfare without sovereign sanction, denounce it in all cases and shall never exercise that so long as we maintain our civil society.
  
• As a citizen from a Nation that comes from the Great Peace of Westphalia via the colonizing power that started it, and in recognition of the great good of religious freedom, I extend the coverage of non-violence to religion as I have done previously for speech, as violence is never a prerequisite to religious belief or adherence.
  
• Anyone impugning violence as derived from speech must show a clear and demonstrable linkage between the actions and the speech involved and cannot assert that any atmosphere, iconography or 'feeling of hatred' is a cause to violence.  Crosshairs on districts is not a call to violence, nor is looking for a smaller and more accountable government. There is a distinction between evidence and hyperbole, and I do not misunderstand the latter for the former.
  
• Do note that violence propagated for political means is seen as savagery under the Law of Nations, and my unalienable rights do apply.

Not a single item on that list is a threat.

They are a solemn promise to you from me.

Just because they come from someone you don't like doesn't invalidate the promise behind them.  I am willing to take such a promise as it is an inherent exercise of my positive liberties to do so without regard to the source asking for such be it Glenn Beck, Cthulhu, Christ, Odin or that poor fellow down the street predicting the coming advent of the influx.  This is the responsibility of citizens to have a civil society, and I accept this burden gladly.

Can you do the same?

The ends of power is bureaucracy

From Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy (from Jerry Pournelle):

Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy states that in any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people: those who work to further the actual goals of the organization, and those who work for the organization itself. Examples in education would be teachers who work and sacrifice to teach children, vs. union representative who work to protect any teacher including the most incompetent. The Iron Law states that in all cases, the second type of person will always gain control of the organization, and will always write the rules under which the organization functions.

This law can be disproven by having a bureaucratic organization that has realized it has met its ends and self-disbanded as no longer needed.  Thus, like any physical law, it has conditions that, if met, will disprove it.  It is possible to disprove it by finding a bureaucracy that acts contrary to this Iron Law.  While such 'Iron Laws' are not real physical laws, they are often used to characterize the condition of man who sets up certain social artifacts that then run beyond any original limits.

While government is the most often cited organizational system, do note that even charities run afoul of this Iron Law.  Two quick examples:

1) The March of Dimes - This should have disbanded with the invention of a polio vaccine.  Instead the organization 're-purposed itself', that is expanded its bureaucratic boundaries from the inside, and continues to this day wishing to use the cachet of its former good works as an umbrella for its current works.  It could have been a successful case to disprove Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy but, instead, becomes a quintessential case for it.

2)  Mothers Against Drunk Driving - By highlighting the social problem of drunk driving this organization caused the public to be aware of it and deal with it.  Drunk driving went down as a problem and traffic statistic because of this.  MADD has continued, however, and is now a form of neo-temperance organization that has goals to eradicate alcohol from so many venues it is hard to count them all.  Instead of declaring victory and disbanding, a credit to social work and history, it fell into Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy.

There is a compounding problem that is of particular interest when applied to larger bureaucracies when they become dysfunctional as a set of organizations.  This is not that often seen in the private sector or charity, but is rife in the public sector and is one that demonstrates the belief that the ends of power is the creation of bureaucracy.  It is a belief in the power of regulation to make man safe from harm while, in fact, doing just the opposite.  I have no easy 'Iron Law' for this phenomena but it can be described.

In the wake of the 9/11 attacks a number of agencies inside the federal government were seen as not working well together: those of the INTEL Community (IC) and those that dealt with traffic flowing into the Nation from foreign lands.  The reaction of the political class was that the bureaucracy needed to be 'reformed' to make it more 'accountable' so as to 'remove inefficiency' to give a leading organization (newly minted in each case) power to control the underlying structure.  Thus to get cooperation another layer of bureaucracy was landed on top of pre-existing bureaucratic structures and given its own set of mandates.

The problem in both areas (IC and ingress functions) was that of lack of communication between organizations and an inability to share information amongst organizations due to 'turf' conflicts between pre-existing Congressional mandates for disparate organizations.  To address these problems Congress need only have strengthened or amended previous mandates and, let a few heads of organizations disappear, and put stronger accountability standards in place to the bureaucracy with hard and fast rules that would say: 'if you screw this up you are fired'.

That is how you 'reform' bureaucratic organizations: tighten the power definitions, remove or sharpen mandates, and cut staff from the top down to the mid-level so there is no longer a finger-pointing structure able to deflect criticism.

That is sane.

This did not happen.

Instead the pre-existing mandates were lightly massaged over, all the higher level staff in organizations going under their 'umbrella' leader organizations (the DNI for the IC, DHS for the disparate ingress functions of immigration and commerce) and then those higher level organizations need to formulate sub-parts to address the functions under the 'umbrella'.

Staff was no only not cut or kept the same, it was increased.

Bureaucratic layers added on got their own 'turf' inside the new 'umbrella' organizations.

Communications were not flattened between organizations mandated to work together, but were funneled through yet another series of even higher level 'channels' which added their own time and relevancy problems, as well as massaging information from analysts yet again.

Adding a layer of bureaucracy to dysfunctional organizations does not address the prior dysfunctions and only adds to them and makes them worse.  Doing this is a definition of insanity by Albert Einstein:

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

The belief that bureaucracy can be used to improve the human condition has a loose association with factual evidence for such things as military and diplomatic affairs amongst Nation States.  Beyond that criminal laws to hold private organizations accountable have a demonstrated effect only when enforced.  The bureaucratic regulation system is an outgrowth of the primary ideal of bureaucracy (used in the military and diplomacy) given power by the secondary ideal (criminal laws) and then 'softened' to punitive levels that are not has harsh as the secondary level so as to coerce accountability of private affairs to this tertiary level of government.

In Marxist terms this is a petit power over the petit bourgeoisie, which includes small business and 'middle class' workers in large institutions.

Larger institutions better able to control the regulatory State form an internal alliance via political channels that then creates a crony capitalist class nominally under the petit power but, in fact, in control of it via political channels.  This has many names: State Capitalism, State Socialism and National Socialism, which are all variants of Fascism.  The concept of Fascism, the bundling of sticks so as to make an axe, puts forth that the bundle is that of society, the axe blade is that of crony capitalists and the power to wield that structure is of the State.

This conception of the refining abilities of bureaucracy via intra-State means is one that pre-exists Marxist terminology, as in the Hamiltonian outlook on economics (American School) that would be embraced just prior to the US Civil War.  This system gave the federal government a strong say in the economic system of the Nation with a goal to centralize the planning and deployment of infrastructure and a "Harmony of Interests" between the owning class and working class of citizens.  That 'harmonization' is seen as an economic goal undertaken via legislation via the secondary route (tariffs and trade restrictions) and then enforced via the third route (internal regulation).  The result was economic growth, but only with a series of booms and busts that happen with government intervention to support some industries over others done via protectionism and taxation.  Mind you this 'harmonization' still didn't happen and the economic swings were seen as a cause of the non-harmonization .

Yet this system would have added on to it: Dept. of Agriculture (under Lincoln), anti-trust laws, the Federal Reserve, the SEC, the Labor Dept., FHA, Freddie, Fannie, securitization pushed by HUD to create Ginnie Mae, the FDA, FCC, EPA, Energy Dept., Education Dept., National Endowment for the Arts...

The American School of Hamiltonian-based economics that seeks to 'harmonize' culture by intervening between individuals and big businesses is little different from the National Socialist venue that seeks to do the same thing, save that the Fascists concentrate on secondary (laws) over tertiary (regulations) effects while the American School reverses those, going for regulations over laws.

If it appears that the bureaucratic State has grown by leaps and bounds under the beneficent and ever-helpful eye of the US government: you are right.  Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy works at the large and the small scale of bureaucracies and is scale independent.

No bureaucracy has ever declared itself at an end and dissolved itself.

The power of bureaucracy only grows unless it is checked by government and the people, and since government is all about power,  it is left to the people to tell government when the bureaucratic State has reached its end and must be dissolved.  That is your responsibility to be made heard through the organs of government.

Three Realms of Law

Starting in on the James Tully edited, Michael Silverthorne translated edition of Samuel Pufendorf's On the Duty of Man and Citizen (1682) (Online copy at Constitution.org), a reader cannot help but be struck by the powerful introduction that covers the time just after the 30 Years War and the Great Peace of Westphalia.  It is in this transitory period that Europe shifts from the power-basis system of Nation States that was continuous up to that time, to one of the Secular Nation State which would set the foundation for our modern understanding of Nations, States, Law and Duty.  Pufendorf does not stand alone, and points out that he draws in large part from Grotius and Hobbes, but what he does do is put down the philosophical foundation for the third part of our lives which, prior to that time, was subsumed either via the State or via Divine Revelation.  This third part is what we call Creation and it is run by Natural Law.  By establishing this part of our reasoning into our philosophy the foundations of all later Westphalian Nations is created, although it would take nearly two generations to become the standard lexicon of philosophy and how we approach our works within Creation.

Within our cognizance before that time there was the civil law, that instance of law created by the bodies that rule government, and Divinely Revealed law which was held in the realm of rewards in the afterlife for good works done in this one.  If the State saw its place over man due to the power of its structure, and motivation for good works was solely put into those things done in fear of punishment after death, there would not be a basis for any good society at all.  Most such societies were repressive, authoritarian and the State would dictate what was and was not allowable and even go so far as to dictate what is to be done on religious Holy Days.  Nature, when she was considered at all, was seen as the sole domain of the State and, as a created edifice, it was seen as malleable to the changing mood of the Creator or Creators.  If Nature was malleable to that degree, and the State's power was draconian in what could and could not be done about Nature, then the ability to actually examine our Natural world was circumscribed as belonging to the one realm or the other, and not being a separate realm in and of itself.

If the horrors of a war that saw Nobility and Royalty change sides within their families then requiring all subjects of the civil law to change their religious viewpoint to accord with that of their rulers was horrific, and it was to the point of public executions and purges against civil populations, then the tacit acceptance of the Church (and even Protestants) on that state of affairs was rendering mute the Divine Revelation and its Wisdom through the slaughter of innocents.  Between these two there was nothing, and if your heart bade you one way and the State bade you another, then you had the choice of convert, hide, flee or fight.  Without a moderating force between these Domains, there was repression, tyranny, bloodshed and horror, and yet that was not what the State of Man should be upon this Earth if one followed Divine Revelation.  Something was amiss.

Insight reveals another form of wisdom, however, that is not predicated on the State nor the Divine, although depends heavily on the latter for Creation.  This wisdom was not unknown before the 30 Years War, but was rarely the guiding path of Citizens, Nations or Theology because it addressed the Law of Nature in a way that did not look to the State or Divine Revelation for answers, but turned to the Creation as the direct artifact of the Divine and having the wisdom of Creation embedded within it.  To get to this wisdom would require the great faculty that man is blessed with: Reason.  Nature is to be approached with Reason as it will not lie to us about its Creation. 

The Law of Nature is unwritten in books, not handed down via Divine Revelation and cannot be found in any Civil Law Code, and yet it is a Law unto itself that we are all compelled to obey being products within it.  Because of these factors is defines its own Domain which is separated from the other two, although fully a part of the greater structure between them.  Thus it is not only complementary in being, that is to say it is necessary to have so as to understand the other Domains, but forms its own coherent set of Laws if we could but reason them out.  These are not Moral Laws, which are the realm of the Divine which concerns itself with the afterlife, nor is it the Civil Law, which concerns itself with matters punitive so that the State may exist, but are a set of Laws through which the Moral Laws speak to us as individuals and, from that, to the Civil Law which we create.

This is head turning and eye-popping stuff not just for war ravaged Europe that had 20% of its population killed by the 30 Years War (not to speak of plagues, famine, and the other followers of that Horseman) but becomes pertinent when, today, the movement to have the Nation State shift to dictate to us our approach to Natural Law follows in the same path of the pre-conditions for the 30 Years War.  When Reason is subverted to the power of the State it does not speak clearly and does not put forward that the Great Engine that creates the State must deal with all of those things not concerning the State.  It is here that Samuel Pufendorf gives us the self-evident truth that it is our mutual association that makes Society that then creates the Nation State, not the other way around.

To understand this and how it pre-dates Westphalia and Pufendorf, it is necessary to look at an older text on the English Common Law.  Bracton on the Laws and Customs of England has a home page at the Harvard Law School Library where the work attributed to Henry of Bratton is available for reading and it comes from that era written in the 1220-1230 timeframe with additions around 1250 will help in this endeavor.  Henry of Bratton was a judge who worked to get decisions on cases written down so that future judges would have an understanding of how cases worked and why they worked the way they did.  This is vitally important in a time when there wasn't much written law and there was much in the way of unscripted and local laws that were verbal in nature.  Further the domains of State and Church, along with the local laws, meant that there needed to be a differentiation of the realms of law so that a judge could properly figure out just where a case belonged in the legal realm.  From that would come the concept of natural law:

What natural law is.

[019] 21Natural law is defined in many ways. It may first be said to denote a certain
[020] instinctive impulse arising out of animate nature by which individual living things
[021] are led to act in certain ways. Hence it is thus defined: Natural law is that which
[022] nature, that is, God himself, taught all living things. The word ‘quod’ is then in
[023] the accusative case and the word ‘natura’ in the nominative. On the other hand,
[024] it may be said that the word ‘quod’ is in the nominative case, so that the definition
[025] will be this: Natural law is that taught all living things by nature, that is, by
[026] natural instinct. The word ‘natura’ will then be in the ablative case.22 This is what
[027] is meant when we say that our first instinctive impulses are not under our control,
[028] but our second impulses are. That is why, if a matter proceeds only as far as simple
[029] sensual pleasure, not beyond, only a venial sin is committed. But if it proceeds
[030] farther, to the contriving of something, as where one puts into practice what he
[031] has shamefully thought, it will then be called a third impulse and a mortal sin is
[032] committed.23 And note that for the reason that justice is will, taking into account
[033] rational beings only, natural law is impulse, regard being had to

[001] all creatures, rational and irrational. There are some who say that neither will nor
[002] impulse may be called jus, jus naturale or jus gentium, for they exist in [the realm of]
[003] fact; will or impulse are the means by which natural law or justice disclose or manifest
[004] their effect, for virtues and jura exist in the soul.24 This perhaps is said more clearly,
[005] that natural law is a certain due which nature allows to each man. Natural law is also
[006] said to be the most equitable law, since it is said that erring minors are to be restored
[007] in accordance with [natural] equity.25

Natural Law is given by God to all of Nature: it is a direct power grant from God to Nature.  Because of what Nature is, those within it act within certain ways (which goes beyond the animate, although the inanimate has constrictions based on lack of impulse) within that Natural Law.  We understand Natural Law as we are creatures of Nature and, thusly, a part of Creation.  The power of each creature within Nature is given by Natural Law and it acts within accordance to its form and powers with this thing we call 'instinct'.  Bracton's review of the law then starts to divide what the differences are between Natural instincts and those under conscious control so as to differentiate the realm of Nature and its laws and the realm of Moral Laws given to man by God via Revelation.

Because we are surrounded by Nature and take whole part of Nature, Natural Law applies to us as creatures and we are bidden to its Laws as none may deny them.  We may extend life, but even if that is to the end of time we will not be Eternal as Nature is, and we are merely mortal.  We cannot abolish the Laws of Nature, we cannot will gravity to disappear nor change the nature of electromagnetic emanations: we can define them, understand them, use them, but they are beyond are capacity to change as we would need change Nature to do so.  This part of us that takes part of creation is, thusly, limited to it.  The part not limited to it, that part which is conscious thought and reasoning, then allows us to work inside of Nature to understand it and utilize it.  To do so, however, we must put aside some of the power and liberties of animals that we get via Nature and Nature's God.  In doing that, in creating the next thing that allows us to be sustained within Nature by her products beyond as they are within Nature, we then must create the jus gentium.

Again, Bracton:

What the jus gentium is.

[017] 33The jus gentium is the law which men of all nations use, which falls short of
[018] natural law since that is common to all animate things born on the earth in the
[019] sea or in the air. From it comes the union of man and woman, entered into by the
[020] mutual consent of both, which is called marriage. Mere physical union is [in the
[021] realm] of fact and cannot properly be called jus since it is corporeal and may be
[022] seen;34 all jura are incorporeal and cannot be seen. From that same law there
[023] also35 comes the procreation and rearing of children. The jus gentium is common
[024] to men alone, as religion observed toward God, the duty of submission to parents
[025] and country, or the right to repel violence and injuria. For it is by virtue of this
[026] law that whatever a man does in defence of his own person he is held to do lawfully;
[027] since nature makes us all in a sense akin to one another it follows that for one to
[028] attack another is forbidden.36

What manumission is.

[030] 37Manumissions also come from the jus gentium. Manumission is the giving of
[031] liberty, that is, the revelation of liberty, according to some, for liberty, which
[032] proceeds from the law of

[001] nature, cannot be taken away by the jus gentium but only obscured by it,38 for
[002] natural rights are immutable. But say that he who manumits does properly give
[003] liberty, though he does not give his own but another's, for one may give what he
[004] does not have, as is apparent in the case of a creditor, who [may alienate a pledge
[005] though the thing is not his,39 and in that of one who] constitutes a usufruct in his
[006] property.40 For natural rights are said to be immutable because they cannot be
[007] abrogated or taken away completely, though they may be restricted or diminished
[008] in kind41 or in part. 42It was by virtue of this jus gentium that wars were introduced
[009] (that is, when declared43 by the prince for the defence of his country44 or to repel
[010] an attack) and nations separated, kingdoms established and rights of ownership
[011] distinguished. Individual ownership was not effected de novo by the jus gentium but
[012] existed of old, for in the Old Testament things were already mine and thine, theft
[013] was prohibited45 and it was decreed that one not retain his servant's wages.46 By
[014] the jus gentium boundaries were set to holdings, buildings erected next to one
[015] another, from which cities, boroughs and vills were formed.47 And generally, the
[016] jus gentium is the source of all contracts48 and of many other things. What long
[017] custom is will be explained below.49

The Law of Nations is derived from us being: creatures within Nature, sentient creatures within Nature, and wishing to safeguard ourselves through the use of our positive liberty while creating a means to govern ourselves as men, plural, via a common understanding of what it is we seek to have together.  The start of this is with marriage, as it is the wish to see one's offspring live to maturity and create an environment of safety for them.  To do that man and woman come together and create an understanding that they will not utilize many of their negative liberties on each other or their common offspring.  In this act of agreement within Nature, utilizing reason, the Nation is born as well as society, and the agreement to govern one-self is mutual and reciprocal.  Thus we put aside the use of some of our rights, those to use our negative liberties, to receive the benefits of society, self-government and create the unwritten Law of Nations.

From this we can draw the following:

• The basis for all government is self-government as it is the first form of government being mutual, agreeable and reciprocal in nature.
• Society is created by self-government, which is our creation by our Reason and affection for each other starting at marriage.
• To do these things is to follow an unwritten law, the jus gentium which is the Law of Nations.
• The Law of Nations is not a part of Nature, it is created by Natural beings via the use of Reason.
• The Law of Nations is required to understand Divine Revelation, but is not an artifact of Divine Revelation and an indirect artifact of Creation itself, as it is a pre-requisite to having beings who can utilize Reason.

It is not surprising in reading Purendorf, then, to come upon his first divisions amongst law, this taken from his preface on pg. 7:

I  It is evident that there are three sources of man's knowledge of his duty, of what he is to do in this life because it is right [honestum] and of what he is to omit because it is wrong [turpe]: the light of Reason, the civil laws and the particular revelation of the Divinity.  From the first flow the most common duties of man, particularly those which render him capable of society [sociabilis] with other men; from the second flow the duties of a man as a citizen living in a particular and defined state [civitas]; from the third, the duties of a Christian.

  Hence there are three distinct disciplines.  The first is the discipline of natural law, which is common to all nations; the second is the discipline of the civil law of individual states, which has, or may have, as many forms as there are states into which the human race is divided; the third discipline is called moral theology, and is distinct from the part of theology which explains the articles of our faith.

These are the same areas of law that Bracton examined, although they are now put through a post-Westphalian lens so that the areas of law are better defined and delineated.  By dividing the natural law from civil and moral law, their areas become not only understood but what they teach us as wholly different from each other.  The unwritten law gets a seat at the table, but it is not a nice seat as both moral law and civil law must recognize that they operate through the realm of natural law which has its own foundations set at Creation. 

The reason that this has to be explained is that no one knew, exactly, what Westphalia had done in the way of law, save that the civil law (and states) were now seen as a separate and temporal entity from moral law.  Moral law would apply to the temporal entity of the state via its citizens, and the state may use moral law for general guidance but only insofar as its people supported that.  This broke the problem of Nobles switching religions (either via conversion or via replacement in position) that caused so much havoc in the 30 Years War.  This was not the expected nor pre-destined outcome of the war, but a simple means to help keep one of the leading causes of it from recurring.

Religious freedom becomes an established civil right that is one that the state must be circumscribed from dictating to its people.  This is a natural right, gained through creation and our use of reason so as to create society via self-government.  Civil law, the law of states, is a temporal entity bound by being an artifact of society.  Thus the state comes from our ability to self-govern, which rests upon Reason, and coming from nature.  As each of these realms of law address different things, they are seen to be in separate domains, and Pufendorf looks as to why this is so:

II  Each of these disciplines has its own method for proving dogmas, corresponding to its principle.  In natural law a thing is affirmed as to be done because it is inferred by right reason to be essential to sociality [socialitas] among men.  The ultimate foundation of the precepts of civil law is that the legislator has imposed them.  The final reference point of the moral theologian is that God has so commanded in the Holy Scriptures.

This ordering is not by accident as it is a necessary following of the state of man.  We are first creatures of nature, but ones with unique capabilities that draw us together.  In our ability to utilize Reason we make society with our fellow man and through our self-government we realize that we must all abide by restraint of our natural law based gifts which requires legislation.  When we affirm ourselves and our society then the direction of our beings into the afterlife and what is necessary in this life to achieve the fruits of the afterlife then are given by moral law.  For once we have secured our society and ourselves there is some point to it which goes beyond our natural selves and that guidance cannot come from nature nor civil realms, but seek higher guidance in morality from Scriptures.

From this we can say that our relationship with God is direct for moral guidance in how we are to live our lives and be good Christians.  Society will reflect that, but its basis is in Nature, and thus we see the point of nature is for those who are molded in the form of the Creator to come together to form society with each other.  Restrictions upon us as individuals is done to protect society and our fellow man, and that is performed via the civil law, and just as we must protect ourselves from our negative natural liberties so we must affirm that in so doing our positive ones are not put in jeopardy by our creation.  We look to ourselves and God to find our positive natural liberties that are used to create a better society and the civil law is to reflect that understanding and support that it is we, as individuals making up society, that have the right to exercise our positive natural liberties on our behalf and on behalf of our fellow man. 

It is here that Westphalia establishes the positive natural liberty of choosing one's faith as belonging to the individual and not the State, so that the State is precluded from dictating one's religious beliefs to them.  From this single establishment the entire framework of what it means to utilize civil rights for one's own behalf separate from the State and the Church flows as this creates the moral underpinning for individual participation in more than maintaining society but in helping to uplift it via moral law learned as individuals.

Each of these law realms also comes with an exclusionary principle attached to it, and this is the underpinning for all that would follow from this era:

III  The discipline of civil law presupposes natural law as the more general discipline.  However if there is anything in civil law on which natural law is silent, it should not be thought for that reason that the latter contradicts the former.  Similarly, if anything is taught in moral theology on the basis of divine revelation beyond the scope of our reason and therefore unknown to natural law, it would be very ignorant to set these disciplines against each other or to imagine any contradiction between them.  And vice versa any positions which the discipline of natural law adopts as a result of investigation based on reason, are not on that account in any way opposed to the more explicit teaching of the Holy Scriptures on the same subject; it is merely that they are formulated by a process of abstraction [abstrahendo].  For example, in the discipline of natural law, we abstract from knowledge drawn from Holy Scripture and form a conception of the condition of the first man so far as reasoning alone can achieve it, however he may have been put into the world.  To set that into opposition to what the Divine Scriptures teach about that condition is the very essence of black malignity and is pure malice.

  It is in fact easy to show a harmonious relation between civil law and natural law but it seems to be a more arduous task to fix the boundaries between natural law and moral theology and to determine in what parts particularly they most differ.  I will give my opinion of this in a few words.  I do not of course speak with papal authority as if I had the privilege of being guaranteed free of error, nor as if I were inspired on the basis of dreams sent from God or by an irrational instinct relying on some extraordinary illumination.  I speak simply as one whose ambition it is to adorn, as his modest talents allow, the Sparta which is allotted to him.  I am prepared to welcome suggestions for improvement from intelligent and learned men, and am ready to review the positions I have taken, but by the same token I have no time at all for the critics who imitate Midas and rashly jump to conclusions about things that are not their business, or for those like the tribe of Arelioines whose character Phaedrus hits off so wittily: 'running around in circles', as he puts it, 'busy in idleness, sweating for nothing, always doing and never done, a torment to themselves and a great nuisance to everybody else.'

I need to get that second paragraph framed!

What is fascinating about the first paragraph is that it is echoed in mathematics in the 1920's and 1930's via Godel's incompleteness theorems about logic systems and their consistency concerning natural numbers:

The first incompleteness theorem states that no consistent system of axioms whose theorems can be listed by an "effective procedure" (essentially, a computer program) is capable of proving all facts about the natural numbers. For any such system, there will always be statements about the natural numbers that are true, but that are unprovable within the system. The second incompleteness theorem shows that if such a system is also capable of proving certain basic facts about the natural numbers, then one particular arithmetic truth the system cannot prove is the consistency of the system itself.

And paraphrased a bit later the second theorem turns into:

If an axiomatic system can be proven to be consistent from within itself, then it is inconsistent.

Thus the basis of natural law is Nature, herself.  You cannot prove Nature exists within natural law.  Similarly within moral law the basis of it is God.  You cannot prove God exists within moral law.  To do either of these things is to point out that the logic systems used are inconsistent and exist within yet another logic system, entirely, which has axioms that cannot be proven within the system (thus making both Nature and God definable and derivable within that larger system).  Just as the concepts of 'point' and 'line' are necessary to create geometry, the concept of 'Nature' and 'God' are necessary to have natural law and moral theology.  Further there are truths that exist outside of these systems that cannot be found via deduction or enumeration within them.

That is not to treat those systems as mathematical systems, mind you, but to demonstrate how a system can be consistent and incomplete within themselves so that they have independent reasoning types due to their differing basis.  When taken as axiomatic that Nature and God exist (and even having their own relationship via Creation), the law types utilized by both are bounded and incomplete for what is given in both.

This does not mean that these separate realms of law are not inter-related!  In fact each of them puts the point of relationship upon individuals:  your ability to self-govern, your ability to create society, your ability to create the State with your fellow man, your obedience to the moral law are all at that intersection.  How you act in accordance with Nature, God and Reason to create society and bring the civil law into existence via the Law of Nations rests totally upon you.

Not God.

Not Nature.

Not the State.

Not your fellow man.

That is what 'free will' is all about.

That is what the rest of the book examines, this thing called: Duty.

And guess who gets that?