Liberty, freedom and rights

The three words used to best describe the United States come with deep roots in our culture and civilization as a whole, and are descriptive of what mankind has no matter what their ethnicity, race, culture or place on the planet.  In truth these are universal descriptions of what mankind has, being born mortal within the Law of Nature that preceded all of us.  Be that Law of Nature set down by the Divine or by the result of chaotic decrease of entropy due to the local solar increase, these Laws are immutable and their result is to create a pure environment of all liberty, freedom and rights.  That is what we come from, a pure stock of complete and total set of liberty, freedom and rights, just as all animals continue to have in nature to this very day.  Some rhapsodize over this state of being as being 'more pure' and in many ways it is as it is purely about survival, day to day, hour to hour, minute to minute.  When one exists like that it is at the mercy of nature and one's own capabilities to utilize all tools, wits and knowledge to survive.  Mankind, when pressed during the last ice age and the change in climate necessary to bring that about faced a bottleneck and dwindled to a few tens of thousands of individuals, less than a small town's worth spread over Africa.  A few years worse than others would have brought our kind to extinction and left a world unchanged by the hand of man.

When one describes that Natural realm and man's place in it, we also put the terms 'red of tooth and claw' into it.  Without our mental capabilities man would not be as fast as the cheetah, as wary as the gazelle, as fearless as a great white shark or as dominant as a tiger in its territory.  The ability to form community of a very basic sort, that of existing alongside others like us, dates back far into the pre-historic eons and we see evidence of this in the fossil record: Tyrannosaurs living in family 'groups' or 'packs' and even evidence millions of years before that to the first of those developing an internal support structure of schooling and living in swarms so that a predator would have problems getting any, single individual.  Perfect liberty that would see us as alone in the wild was quickly put aside for the purpose of group survival of those who looked the same and could be bred with.  Perfect liberty saw its first compromise, not due to governments, not due to society, not due to any other action save to survive.  Those that hunt alone are pure descriptions of perfect liberty: alone, depending solely on one's wits, and rarely coming together to form a larger group.  We, perhaps, over idolize such beasts as they are all, without exception, carnivores and range over territory in search of one thing: prey.

A more discomforting thought cannot be presented to those seeking perfect liberty: be the hunter or the hunted and being the former can still mean the latter.  To survive by depending upon others that look and act like us is something so deep that it cannot be easily expunged, and those who try live short, bloody lives.  Being solitary or 'a loner' gets one distance from society, true, but society also begins to withdraw its cover for that person.  Because we have some predatory pre-history in our lineage as evidenced by our teeth and internal organs, our civilized society can and does breed contempt and hatred for such outcasts because they, like others that live in that way, are perceived as predators.  By taking up the negative liberty of isolation so as to gain more perfect freedom, society begins to diminish the rights of those to be free and at liberty to do these things.  It is that process of gaining coherence that allows society to be created that is the greatest turning point in our species, and it has brought with it marvels of advance and perils of disaster, both.  For the Law of Nature never cuts just one way.

In forming social groups we begin to form this thing known as 'society', and this formulation demands that some negative liberties be set aside to gain a part of the greater whole of society.  While solitary survival can be accepted for certain times, say initiation rights so that a youngster experiences and understands what the value of society is outside of Nature, for most times those negative liberties, negative rights and negative freedoms must be set aside for that social grouping.  We see these basic forms of society in primitive peoples who have come to light in the 20th century: Yanamamo, Higgi, Dani, amongst many.  These peoples create common norms and accepted behaviors within their groups to form culture and the basis of society, and then express those things via their culture to demonstrate that they understand nature and themselves and are actively making themselves different than man in the State of Nature.  These societies also demonstrate the hard and fast limits to them: population density and being able to get along with your fellow man. 

Ethnographers examining these cultures with as little influence as possible see a maximum size of the cultural village as between 80 and 210 people, often centering on the 150 mark.  That is man's natural tolerance for higher identification in those first and most basic of societies and causes factionation, fractionation, division and creation of new societies due to disagreements within larger groups.  And when 'bad blood' causes a split, it also brings with it the Natural Law of War which is available to all individuals.  These early societies do try to curb it by setting up a status system or systems, often depending on tribal leaders, but the ability of an individual to fight, on his or her own, and still be praised for it is present.  Of the greatest leaps of mankind, the ability to finally distinguish between the negative liberty of personal war and separate it from the necessary liberty of war for survival has not been bridged and both are utilized with no differences seen between them so long as an individual benefits their social group by personal warfare.

Early civilization would require something known as 'civility' towards those with differences and a recognition of common culture even with superficial differences.  That 'civility' comes at a price, and the price is to learn to set aside differences and create a common culture that is deeper than minor differences and disputes.  To achieve this there must be a commonality of structure between villages and that requires a higher order of connection and ways to resolve disputes.  It creates the most capable and most lethal of things that mankind has ever devised:  government.  This is not just government on the local scale, which could be based on age, insight, personal power or a combination of all of those, but one of starting to invest more of the negative liberties and their regulation to a common form of government that all under it would abide by.  If the shift from solitary to group for survival was stunning and the movement of groups to social organizations necessary, then a move to common, agreed-upon government is revolutionary as it creates the first true structure outside of the Law of Nature that is absolutely driven by human means and desires.

For government to operate it must have powers to enforce the commonality it is taking part in.  We, as individuals, vest in it the negative liberties of restriction of action, punishment, and decision making for the group.  In return there is common order, common laws and common protection against those that have radically different views on society, culture and government.  These societies can still be seen in Pakistan, to this day, where Waziristan and the North West Frontier Provinces of Pakistan are home to ethnic Pashtuns, and the south western and Iranian border areas are home to ethnic Baluchs.  These areas have been considered 'lawless' by Empires of all stripes - Chinese, Mongol, Indian, Persian, Russian, British.  This is an area, much like the Balkans, where geography drives ethnic divisions and close adhesion to hard differences due to ethnicity, culture, race and social background.  These are the areas where the largest of those keeping up Private War groups still exists in a form unchanged much by centuries, and they go by the generic name of Lashkar.  These societies still have not taken that greatest of all steps to remove Private War as an acceptable option for individuals, and due to geography these organizations are still very, very effective.

Weakness of these early types of government are seen in that sub-groups without restrictions placed upon them, can bring all their peoples to war by private activity.  Forms of this still go on across the world in Kenya, Turkey, the Caucuses, and the Philippines. Even when there are splendid cities in such areas, they do not form that next step upwards of centralization and investment of negative liberty in government for far greater protection.  That early discovery happened in many places in Mesopotamia, Africa, Asia and the Americas and while their peoples would vary, their creation of this thing called a City State would step from the loose organizations of the past and into one of highly centralized authority for common protection and defense.  Even these formulations, however, would still have deep ties to Private Warfare as that is based with individuals and is a liberty that cannot be removed by any government.   When you are attacked by wild animals in Nature you have the paramount right to wage private war in your defense and no one on this planet dares try to take that from you lest you become mere prey and fodder to the powerful and hungry.

We still have records of the City States of ancient times in Greece, along the Nile, in Mesopotamia, China, Korea, Japan, India, Aztecs, Toltecs, Maya and Inca, these City States would form the nucleus for the first large scale expansion of common culture and common conflict.  If these Empires saw their culture as supreme, and they had no reason not to, then the domination of other cultures was something to be asserted.  These interactions would create the first large scale forms of defense and warfare and the first prosecution of those waging private war that would endanger society.  If their ability to knit together a large area is seen, their weakness of internal structure and to form a vaster cultural common identity is also seen.  That step would be taken many times, on many continents, but the most remembered is the greatest failure that lived almost no time after his death.  If Alexander the Great created a vast Empire, he lacked the means to hold it and yet laid down a common pattern and culture wherever he went so that the tales of his passing are still told in the highlands of Afghanistan.  It was not his Empire that would outlast him, but the common stories and remnants of his culture that would begin a long process of setting a common theme across a large territory.

Alexander picked up after the fall of the City States and a generation past the first attempt to build that hard common culture across multiple Cities that would endure.  That was done by the Spartans at the Hot Gates and their failure would demonstrate that the culture can produce the most stalwart of defenders for all of the people of a land.  And while they failed at the Gates, their comrades and sons would not fail in forcing an Empire back and cutting its floated bridge and rending it asunder.  That society which cohered after the fall of the 300 would produce Alexander who would finally create the first Nation and he would take it to war to avenge the prior attacks on his people and succeed beyond any dreams of success held by any forerunner.  That Nation would more tightly hold City States together by common culture and form the basis of development of a National Identity.  To get that local administrators had to give up local ideas and hold to a more common set of ideals of what it meant to be this thing called 'Greek' which would span across multiple ethnic groups.  The peoples of Attica, Rhodes, Asia Minor, all the way up to those by the Black Sea would gain an identity that went to their culture they held in common and create the Greek Nation.  Alexander's Empire would fall quickly and yet leave those hard traces of Greek culture all the way to Afghanistan and change the ruling culture of Egypt for centuries until the old ones would be lost into dust.

By enforcing law across multiple ethnicities the Roman Empire would do what the Greek could not: create the Imperial State.  Rome would arise over Nations and yet leave many of the local ruling systems intact, as they only wished for commonality of trade and laws across the Empire.  In paying that tribute in taxation, a Nation gained protection from Rome and would benefit by vastly increased trade.  Rome prospered even as it decayed, because of this, and only once the power of the Legions was no longer the clear winner on the battlefield did the Empire start to implode.  What Rome had done was demonstrate the clear and remarkable benefits to large scale rule over society, and while the primitive cultures, still existing in the way we see in Pakistan, would overwhelm Rome, they would gain the infusion of what common culture was and how to protect it.  To support their cultures, these people would form City States and then National Identities in quick order, on the scales of lifetimes or even decades, and then the remains of Roman Law would be implemented by the rulers of these Nations and create what we would call Nation States.

In truth the hows and wherefores of how these Nation States would act had already been set centuries earlier by the City States.  We can read about those in the few chronicles of the Spartans, and even before that in the Iliad and Odyssey and see the traces of those ways.  The foreign ministry archive of the Hittites demonstrates that how you ran a State was well understood and its forms and protocols had been set down and existed for centuries as an understanding.  All Empires practiced them and the first Nations would take their steps with Alexander and finally get the solidified commonality of law from Rome and from another group that depended on common law for survival: the Nordic Peoples.

Migrating from the Caucuses, with the Laplanders coming from more polar regions, these peoples would have a harsh identity that grew up from the end of the glacial period.  They were not unaccustomed to working with foreigners in their slow migration north and a little west, and would pick up further sustainment of their common cultures as they went.  While their ethnic differences are high, their agreed-upon emphasis on common law is ancient and took hard root in the lands they settled in with isolated towns requiring strong and local self-defense.  If the southern cultures took up commonality for greater governance, those of the north took it up for greater protection.  What was added in, however, was the harsh accountability of those folk, so that no King would be able to do something contrary to the local officials.  If Empires and Nation States to the south saw Kings ruling over the law and setting it, those in the north saw the King beholden to the law and answerable to it.

Here the coincidence of how these Nations would run bear striking similarities while having vast differences.  If the common people would give up local powers for treaties and such to government, in the South they would have to obey such treaties while in the North they would seek common concurrence  amongst the people.  What would come from the South is a final uniting and, finally, disuniting force, which had held City States, Nations and even Empires together, and that is organized religion on a mass scale.  The Roman Catholic Church even took up the Roman Army divisions amongst personnel to have a recognizable authority structure, and that structure set the tone, temper and outlook of the Church.  If the Roman Empire had failed in secular administration, the Church would seek to give divine administration amongst these Nation States.  That would work well until the ideas of the North had percolated down through the Germanies and into Switzerland, meeting up with similar groups in France and Spain.  If the southern organizations would be persecuted and tortured with little recourse against the Church, those to the North did not take kindly to being told what they should do with the universal message of peace brought by the savior.  Martin Luther would put down that all men had the right to read the Lord's words in their common tongue as the message of salvation was universal.  And millions would die for the right to exercise freedom in pursuit of personal liberty to worship as one wished to do.

Our 'clash' of the secular and divine is not new, it dates back centuries to Martin Luther and that simple and most basic statement of positive liberty to interpret words of salvation to one's own end as one wished without persecution.  The wars in France, Spain, Italy, and finally the Germanies would all be done under the aegis of fighting for 'The Prince of Peace' and would finally put a hard limit and boundary over Nation States and how far they may go in coercing one to live.  Empires have that capability, but Nation States do not save internally and never externally.  Any Nation seeking to do this, today, is Imperial in outlook and is seeking to expand Imperial rule via religion.  That highest of civility, to allow your common man in common culture to worship as he or she pleases is the greatest liberty one has.  Even in the slave pens of Rome, one could worship as they were able, so long as it fell under the sanctions of Roman Law.  A high and dear cost that would count 20% of Europe dead at the end of the 30 years war would set down and establish that the modern Nation State had no say in religious preference of individuals, so long as it was peaceable and within set bounds of society.  There were three allowed:  Catholicism, Lutheranism, Calvinism.  These, in turn, would seek to persecute others *not* within those allowed and the final, great migration of religious outcasts would come to the New World and expand religious liberty  in that doing.

The Peace of Westphalia is a Universal Treaty made to set apart the secular and the sacred.  They can and do influence each other and, with reason, can offer hope, guidance and salvation to each other.  If the United States has Christianity as its Bedrock, then it is in the plurality of the views of Christianity that give it its strength and tolerance.  The greatest gift of mankind is not religion, but reason: so that we can distinguish the actions of the divine from the common and ordinary, and lead good lives with the teachings from the divine to enrich the secular lives we have.  The death toll to *not* doing so, from EITHER SIDE, is staggering, as those Nation States that have practiced the secular over the divine have clearly demonstrated in Stalin's Soviet Union, Pol Pot's regime, Hitler's Germany, and in all the intolerant Nations that still dot this planet in the far east, central asia, middle east, africa and south america.  Both offer staggering death tolls and when reason is set aside for divine or secular mandates that require obedience in the area of the sacred, blood flows.  If you descend from European lineage, all the way to the Poles and Hungarians, then you fall under the Universal Peace.  It allows intolerance within its bounds, but has acceptable toleration as a hallmark and requires civility to those who may, at first, seem strange in their beliefs.  In the United States and Canada we get this through the Restoration of the English Crown after Cromwell via the lineage of the Winter Queen and her children.  To step away from Westphalia requires that a Nation actively do so, because the Treaty is presumptive: it is a civil means to say that Nations coming under its lineage must act in certain ways towards it citizens.

Citizens must also recognize it and behave towards each other in civil ways, as that is the Nordic lineage put in by those who would sign on after Gustavus Adolphus died from wounds in 1632 after defeating Catholic Armies time and again.  Because there must be common and civil understanding to have acceptable norms, that was something that he fought and died for and after his death the Great Peace would embody that ideal.  That requires that personal freedom of intolerance give way to the rights of those who hold other beliefs and that you will not use the negative liberty of Private War against them.  No City State could have clearly done this thing, nor any Empire.  The foundation of the division of secular and sacred requires that it be upheld by Reason created by man as we are too feeble to understand the divine in all its glory.  Nor are we to take the divine laws and put them into force until we use Reason to assure that they are good and that there is support in society for them and accountability to both government and the individual contained within them.  If the Bedrock of the Republic is Christianity the Cement holding it together is Reason.

That high ideal was spoken of often by Christians before, during and after the Founding and upheld time and again as the multiplicity of Christian forms did not fall into any one neat and easy to define category.  Many Christians did not even see Christ as Divine, but a spokesman for divine wisdom granted to man from previous teachings.  More than a few founders, Sam Adams and Thomas Jefferson come to mind, would put forth screeds against Roman Catholics as not being true Christians or so absurdly wrong-headed in their beliefs that they would do more harm than good if they ever held elected offices.  The difference between the Orthodox and those outside the Orthodoxy were high, and some few wondered if it were right to allow these into the larger society.  What would come to the forefront, however, is that doing so made these religions no different than those that persecuted THEM and drove them to the New World.  What would bring these disparate cultures and religious beliefs together is commonality in being oppressed and having their rights ignored by the Crown.  As subjects the colonists also were citizens, and in having the Crown step from the Magna Carta and remove their ability to be heard in Parliament while imposing taxes and authoritarian rule, the differences in religion paled into the commonality of repression and no longer being regarded as equal citizens, but as foreign subjects.

What this entire history did was to create a brand, new way of examining what Nations were and how they would come about.  It was summed up in much, much less verbiage in the Declaration of Independence, which starts at the simple, and self-evident truths of all men being created equal.  It then steps through the cause for having society and having government and that government be answerable for its condition.  To form a new Nation there is a direct and specific listing of grievances and of things that have been denied to citizens who have them as their due.  In many ways it is the latter 2/3 of the Declaration that goes absent when we recall it, and yet it is the more powerful part of the document as it is not summing up what is known, but is saying that Reason gives man the right to form Just government for Societies and that it must not do as has been done to us and then lists each and every single thing that has been denied to citizens as their right and expectation of freedom.  In the exercise of liberty these rights must not be abridged and society must be protected via the freedoms we have and by government upholding those freedoms to enact liberty via rightful means.

As the first 1/3 of the Declaration is remembered so well, we forget that the following 2/3 gives the direct reason for creation of new government and that it is not taken up easily or lightly, and that we will, indeed, suffer many ills as citizens until they become insufferable and demand new government.  In giving up negative liberties of coercion, Public Warfare, and regulation to government, citizens can and must be protected by such government, the rights and liberties protected for the people to be free, and that government cannot enforce any more than those few things lest it infringe on the positive liberties and rights of the people.  From that we go from the Condition of Man to How Man Deals With His Condition.  How we deal with it is something that must be individual and recognize the need for common governance that does not infringe upon the good things society is the basis for.  Thomas Paine would sum it up that society is the basis for the good of the Nation and that government a necessary evil: the first a benefactor, the latter a punisher.

It is only in modern times starting with the fallout of the French Revolution and Bismarck in Germany that we start to see the idea that the State coming to control society is a 'good' thing.  This was spurred on by Socialism as avowed in the 19th and early 20th century and taken up by the Progressives in America.  Many would seek to start changing that accountability of government and the citizenry and to make government less accountable and the citizenry more restricted 'for its own good'.  That is a strange thing to put forth in a land where it is the citizenry that is to have the greatest free play of liberty and rights and government is to be held small and accountable lest its ability as punisher be used wantonly.  While busting monopolies and having child labor laws is a good thing, to free up capital and to ensure good opportunities in life for children, restricting medicines and shifting from minor regulations on our economic lives and moving into trying to manage and control the lives of citizens via those means is the slide from 'good and reasonable' to 'punishing due to moral outlook'.  Even worse it diminishes the citizenry by those holding such beliefs and attempts to enforce beliefs without reasonable basis upon the citizenry.

Shifts from reasonable regulation to put actual ingredients in foods and medications to that of suppressing some medications in attempting to cure a 'personal ill' flies in the face of that 'personal ill' reducing as people came to understand what was in their food and medicines.  Government shifting from common defender to common enforcer would also shift the basis of power away from its tripartite self-correcting system between National, State and Citizen input and change it to National and Citizen and begin to relegate the State to obscurity.  Yet it was the cultural differences in the States that made the Union vibrant, even in some forms of disharmony, the work to bring common accord meant a commonality of vision that would need to be reasoned out amongst citizens.  By the mid-20th century that would shift to enforced regulation of personal habits, activities and government trying to do 'good things' in its role as punisher.  That trend comes from the socialist ideal of a common working man needing some 'guidance' from those who knew better, so that while espousing such things as 'workers councils' the formulation of that would be authoritarian and highly controlled from the top heading downwards.  If America grew that during the Progressive era, then Europe would get a serious and contagious infection after World War I and the world would witness the power of industrialized, authoritarian States seeking to impose its will on its own people and its neighbors.  That was not 'progress' but a step back to Empires ruling over States, save that these new forms would try to enforce exterior government and controls, not heeding the wisdom of Rome.

While many of these countries would be seen as 'successful' and 'modern' in their rise, after the Second World War they would be despised in outward form even as many elites admired their inward control over their citizens.  If the American curve on 'Progressive' attitudes is more retarded in compared to those in Europe, it is due to the Founding influences, even as they are attacked on a daily and continual basis by elites of all stripes.  That would see those playing upon race and divisive ethnic politics supporting removing individuals from home ownership in poor areas of cities and concentrating them into high rise tenements that would dissolve the ownership culture and truly impoverish them, not just keep them poor.  In no time at all the existing culture decayed, violence rose and thugs of all sorts would roam the streets... because this was a 'good thing'.  And if you spoke out against the violence done by removing that culture of ownership you were deemed 'racist'.  Strange that the very ones who would espouse the hatred of government would come looking to it for handouts.  While urban poor turning to gangs has been a constant theme in America, those gangs were moderated by a large presence of steady homes and families.  Once that stability was removed, gang violence increased and the ability to enforce any civility declined.  And then government would come in with regulators to try and change the basis of society and how we live our daily lives.

Over half if not two-thirds of all government regulations have been put in place since 1972, and for that we get to pay high taxes for things that industry and commercial groups were already doing to themselves.  Engineering, accounting and other standards bodies required no government oversight, yet got them.  Today it is impossible to live without breaking some standard, some law or some minor bureaucratic rule, and the citizenry has gotten not to care about that.  In changing from the Rule of Law to the Law of Rules, we get a society where lawyers were few and far between in the 19th century to being a positive growth service that has much time, energy and money sunk into it with little return.  Even into modern times it was possible to sit on the Supreme Court and not ever have been a lawyer or judge: the common man could understand the effects of law and see if it conformed with our liberties and freedoms.  Today you can't even make sure that walking across the street is legal.  That is the form of government by punishment and restriction that starts to sound a lot like the rule of the Divine over the Secular.  This time it is the Elite Secular over everyone, and their credos, maxims and ideals start to look a lot like a religion.

Yet we are born free.

Those Elites wish you to believe that encroaching government is a one-way street or a 'nose of the camel under the tent'.  I take the alleyways.  And once the head is under the tent, its a good time to step outside and let the body of the beast know it can't be in two places at once... and it just might make good camel steaks.  Having our liberty and freedom exercised via our rights is a great boon to create good society and hold government accountable.  What is done by the hand of man, save for taking of life and there are arguments on the common law side there, too, can be undone.  It is not 'the rights of the unborn' but trying to keep a society together so that we can have children not brought up in chaos that matter to me.  I am willing to let common law from ancient times have its say as moderated by our scientific advances, so that we don't get a new elite view to go with that of other elites each seeking to restrict liberty and freedom.  Using Reason requires us to acknowledge that no matter what the Divine Will *is*, the hand of man must control his destiny until we get more perfection in our understanding of ourselves and the Divine.  It is the authoritarian attempt to impose *any* culture from government on the citizenry that I detest, and the ways and means it does so is toxic to having a common culture and National Identity.  If we cannot keep this limited form of government LIMITED then the next step is Imperial Rule, and we have a few main competitors for that in religion and the secular side and NONE have any reason to espouse liberty, freedom and your rights as a good thing to uphold.

Believe as they do.

Or else.

I am not impressed by either the Left or Right, Liberal or Conservative, who espouse using government to enforce their beliefs upon society.  It is authoritarianism at its most toxic, heading to its lethal form as it builds up and cannot be gotten rid of by the citizenry.  And it is the citizenry who are hurt the worst in giving up their rights, freedom and liberty to decide for themselves, as these new Imperial dogmas have the liquidation of non-believers as its goal.

Over these last few days and the days to come we face the turning point of government as regulator to government as controller.  President Andrew Jackson stopped the National Bank when it came up for re-approval, so that our security would be in our own hands as citizens in the economic realm.  Today the Elites have made sure that no government institution ever comes up for re-approval.  That is their one-way street.

It is a dead end for your freedom, rights and liberty.

The headlong rush at high speed into that dead end is worrying.

And no one willing to pull the Emergency Brake and say 'End this infringement upon the common man' is horrifying.

The Modern Jacksonian - Chapter 10 - Honor

“Every good citizen makes his country's honor his own, and cherishes it not only as precious but as sacred. He is willing to risk his life in its defence and is conscious that he gains protection while he gives it.” - Andrew Jackson

Defending our Nation and its way of life is more than just military service or police service, those are high forms of defense, but not as high as defending yourself, defending your family, defending your society.  Without those latter three you do not get the former and see, instead, Warlords, rogue armies, bands of thieves and strongmen coming to power.  The basic defense against the latter are ensuring that the simple things are done in protecting yourself, your family, your society as they are the basis for creating law and a just way to add other defenses above and beyond the basics.  If we cannot put forward that these things are worth defending in our daily lives, then we will not have them to cherish and the Nation will perish for lack of caring and oversight.  Then we go one step further and require that we, as individuals, set aside negative liberties that we have via the Law of Nature and agree to invest those in accountable institutions that come to be known as government.  Civilization follows the path of civility towards our fellow citizens so that we may entrust the negative liberties in government and not have them used upon us.  Without that basic trust in our fellow man we do not get justice, we do not get civility and life would be very, very short.

Living an honorable life means doing some few basic things, and the overall thrust was encapsulated in a short, pithy button I saw some years ago.  It is most simple.

Honor

Do what you Say.

Say what you Mean.

Mean what you Do.

A simple set of concepts that interlock, that give feedback, and that help in guiding one's life.  Honor is a feedback mechanism and one of the highest we have as social animals as having it requires an individual to go beyond more than espousing things, or doing things, or meaning things: it requires all three.

Do as you Say

Political adversaries act simplisticly, so as to attack these basic precepts of honor.  A common attack for those that did not support the Iraq war was the 'Chickenhawk' attack, which took the base notion that only by serving in the armed forces did one have an ability to advocate for war.  That idea, however, while noble with the Spartans is ignoble in a society in which the basis for defending a Nation, as a whole, is defending yourself, your family and your society, in which everyone does not have to serve in the armed forces... or die.  If those supporting the 'Chickenhawk' meme would just come out and advocate for universal service or death, I would have no problem with that position as they have worked through the honorable method to advocate it and find the pre-requisites for it.  Of course that would require military training from the youngest age and a pure survival ethos culminating in individuals being pitted against wild beasts to survive as a rite of passage.  To advocate for anything less is dishonorable as the means to get to that end are not put forth for equality of citizens to speak on a subject.  Yet it is many of those same individuals who will talk forever on equality, and just want you to shut up when you disagree with them.  And then cast ill-thought out and childish slurs that a five year old might comprehend, but that an adult can, and must eschew.  For if the only one qualified to talk about war are those who have served, then they are also the only ones qualified to talk about making peace.  These two go together, and the absolute requirement on advocating war is also the exact, same, one for setting the goals of peace.  If you want to advocate peace and hold the 'Chickenhawk' meme, then serve in the armed forces and advocate for an all-military guided culture.  Just like the Spartans.

And be prepared for the hatred you will get for wanting to rip our current culture apart.

I hate war and it is the very and absolute worst thing that can be done by a Nation, save for suffering from injustice from an ill-thought out peace that makes a Nation suffer.  No one goes lightly into war, save Warlords, Dictators, Despots and Tyrants, who will use any excuse for self-aggrandizement and distraction of their people from their absolutely base activities.  In Iraq, in Desert Storm, we came to an agreement with Saddam Hussein known as a 'cease-fire'.  That cease-fire required him to do many things that he voluntarily agreed to do.  Our outlook as a Nation, set at the Founding, was that we are a Nation that abides by the Law of Nations, and even state that as a basis for Congress to create Law in the US Constitution.  As de Vattel described in Law of Nations, an agreement made during active hostilities is a treaty and fully binding.  Worse is that making such an agreement is absolutely binding on all parties involved, without recourse to anything but War.  That is fundamental as far back as Grotius and dates back even further to previous hostilities waged by Nations back to the beginnings of the first City States.  And the basic premise for that is very, very simple:  if you can't trust someone's word during wartime then just when, exactly, can you trust them?  When one side dishonors a wartime agreement before a final peace settlement, the only action to be taken is to start hostilities again... or sue for peace and hope such a dishonorable foe will have some honor in peace while your Nation is subjugated to unjust rulers, which start at the one willing to sign such a peace treaty.

For many years my Nation has had dishonorable leadership that would not hold Saddam Hussein to account for his uncivilized behavior in regards to a cease-fire signed onto willingly by him.  That agreement was binding by all traditions and the logic of war, itself.  Deceit in preparing for more war during a cease-fire or even in not holding to the agreement and doing the things stated by a leader, is not only dishonorable it is uncivilized and base in attitude.  It is what we come to expect of dictators, tyrants, despots, authoritarian and totalitarian regimes of all stripes.  They are looking out for the hides of those in power, and care nothing of their people and will do anything, say anything and break any law, vow or treaty to that end.  They will enslave their people and murder them wantonly, without any regard to social norms or customs.  They will indoctrinate children to report on parents and tear at the fabric of what makes the world civilized, and then deceitfully claim they are doing it for a good cause or acting to better their people.  Yet the sweet words and soothing attitudes belies the blood on their hands and those imprisoned due to conscience.

Do as you Say and realize what it is that you Say means and what it requires.

Or shut the hell up until you figure it out and can offer something approaching a reasoned attitude on the world.  A worse tyranny of a world run by 5 year olds I cannot imagine, as whatever flitting idea of 'good' tends to last in times measured by seconds, and changes based on simplistic understandings of a complex world driven by simple motivations.  It takes time to disabuse oneself of the idea that simplistic remedies actually *work*, and to address actual, simple motivations and outlooks, and then understand that they make complexity in their multiplicity.

Say what you Mean

Pin a politician down on a subject and you get jello.

Politicians dare not say what they mean as to do so would require them to then act in accordance with what they say, and as so many like to point out: 'politics is about negotiation'.

But it isn't.

Treaties are about negotiation, how one runs a Nation in service to its people is about abiding by the culture and society of those people and not abrogating it.  That puts limits on politicians who want to do many things that they see as 'good' but just can't find agreement in the culture or society.  So they 'negotiate'.  They want others to step away from their beliefs and principles and start giving them away.  That is a great disrespect towards one of the fundamental principles that came to us from before the Founding, and that was in the very long treaty put forward in the Peace of Westphalia.  We get to be under that treaty due to the lineage of the royal family in England at the Restoration having been covered by that self-same treaty while that family was in Europe.  It is a Universal Treaty, which means that if you come from a Nation that is covered by it or your Nation derives direct  lineage from a Nation that was under it, you get the Treaty unless you specifically disavow it.  Nations sign up to Treaties and rebellious Colonies need to establish their start by saying just what it is, exactly, they are not continuing from the originating Nation.  Brand new Nations on undiscovered territory, or territory left vacant can start out with an absolute clean slate.  The United States kept to its traditions and upholds the Peace of Westphalia, which requires a separation of Church and State in the Secular realm, and which avows for toleration of religion.  As the Universal Peace spread, religious toleration became its cornerstone as well as shifting to move the areas of the Secular out from Sacred rule by God.  That does not mean that we do not use the wisdom and teachings found in religious views: on the contrary they form the basis for our culture and society and we must uphold those.  That upholding must be done to respect areas of religious disagreement and keep those areas absolutely in the cultural realm and away from the realm of Secular government.  That includes those who wish to profess the belief of no divine being, as it is also another belief in the realm of religious views.

The greatest backers for this, at the time of the Founding, were the leading churches.  Many of those had been first established in lands where they were not respected as those Nations had not broadened their views on religion and kept to more exacting views of Westphalia.  Fearing repression, social stigma and even death, those settlers left from those lands and came here and the very last thing they wanted to do was to establish a Nation that followed any, single religion.  The greatest backers for a Secular State were Christians, because they had seen what other Christians of differing sects would do to them and wanted nothing of that.  Yes, indeed, the Nation was founded by Christians!  Catholics, Calvinists, Quakers, Pilgirms, Church of England, Church of the Brethren, Mennonites, Unitarians... see, all believed in *exactly* the same thing, right?  No?  Sorry, they didn't cotton on to this 'broad category defines everything' concept of Christianity that so many in the modern world wish to put into their minds and mouths.  That was the point of coming to a new land - to found a new way of life that would then be picked up by the Nation - Freedom of Religion.  That did not mean that religion had no part to play in politics, and far from it.  The idea that good law would come from sound understanding of belief that would have wide appeal and infringe the rights of no one is one that comes from Westphalia and those that were persecuted as they were not covered by the Peace.  If God directed a good way of life, then those same ways of living should have wide appeal as the Divine inspired them.  Getting a majority to believe in any one aspect of any religiously founded law was a hard thing to do as one went up the ladder of governing size: something that works great in a small town may fail in the Nation.

That gave the Nation a firm basis to accept Federalism and to allow great leeway to the States and other municipalities under them to self-govern.  Very basic guidelines set up by that compact known as the Constitution would ensure the greatest play of liberty to exercise freedoms to find good ways to live with the most minimal of interference.  That also means that the rights and liberties of minorities and individuals are to be respected so long as they do not go outside the realm of those things agreed-upon in the Secular realm of governance.  Majority does, indeed, rule, but we have equal protection under the law to protect religion.  This strange and modern idea to use non-believer views to try and get the basis for good law making *out* of the Secular realm, that being Divine Inspiration, is nuts.  If a good law can be found in the religious realm and gains wide acceptance as a good way to do things and can be established with infringing on NO other religion, then that is damned good.  Good laws should stand no matter where they come from.  And those inspired to explain their views enrich our society even and especially when we disagree with them: they have taken the civil path to appeal and accept that some will not agree with them.

Saying what you Mean is more than just spouting off: it is the attempt to show that one can find reasonable basis for their views that have some greater backing within themselves.  Often those views will be contrary to how the world operates and it is up to the individual to do that reconciliation for themselves - even if it comes to stepping up on a soapbox, shouting and waving your fist about.  Do, indeed, pay out millions or billions to have other people advocate them for you!  It is good for the economy!  It doesn't make the views given any more right or wrong, just gets them heard more widely.  Own up to your backing and the honor is complete, as you are willing to put yourself forward as an advocate.  Attempting to hide those contacts and associations and pay-offs is dishonorable, because we can no longer judge what you say from you, and if you really mean it... or just have lots of cash to hide those positions from others for pure personal reasons, such as profit or power.

Mean what you Do

Simple, easy, deadly.

Killing one with kindness or because they 'know what is good for you' is, perhaps, one of the most deadly and insidious forms of activity known to mankind.  We have entire Private War organizations set up because they mean what they do and have been doing it since the dawn of civilization.  And we have those that reappear when the time to confront them draws neigh who ask if we can't pay those nasty people off since we are so good... or so religious... or so incapable of defending ourselves... that actually doing something to stop the barbarians would just be too much work.  Even when woefully inadequate civilizations, like Rome in its decaying days or the Hittites when they saw not only a change in weather variations but a slew of Sea People coming to ravage their cities, and those uncivilized forces actually 'win', they do not leave a new civilization in their wake.  They meant to kill for their causes, be it for sheer plunder or to enforce their religious views on a grand scale, and what they always do once they 'win' is to suppress, oppress, kill wantonly and set no law down that they will abide by.  They can and do change cultures, by sheer dint of killing people off and suppressing previous culture, but they are not a creative force in their destruction of what exists and they have no higher set of morals to be held accountable to.

Standing up to that requires not only opposing those who act like that, but preparing for them.  That does mean military forces against despotic States or Rogue States, but they are, when all is said and done, Nation States.  The Law of Nations applies to them and it is a civilized set of standards on how Nations act, interact and come into conflict.  These others, these 'non-state actors' have gained other names throughout history: armies of thieves, brigands, pirates and terrorists are but a few in this class.  No matter their skin color, ethnicity, or culture they come from, they shuck those all aside for the absolute liberty of the Law of Nature and the rule of the powerful on the weak, the predators on prey and the scavengers on any that are weak enough to succumb to them.  To those ends the State has its hands tied under the Law of Nations for regularized State activity in warfare: it can deploy all the civil tools at its disposal, make those as harsh as possible and augment the military whenever direct military conflict is sought.  Nations can, must and do fight those off and seek their bases... and expect help and cooperation from all Nations in doing that and rejecting the international lawlessness seeking to undermine Nations. 

Further, there is one other option to the Nation and it is a nasty tool that can turn on the unskilled user of it.  As those that attack are individuals, then the Nation can empower individuals to go after them in direct proportion to damage caused to the Nation as a whole.  It is a 1:1 deal, and in times past those who were empowered to do this were called Privateers: Private Citizens empowered to take up military arms for the State in service to the Nation.  And they were held to the military codes for their activity in doing so.  In a wide-open, mostly uncharted world, those individuals could, themselves, turn Rogue and go out for themselves.  Today that is far less possible, although it can still be done as terrorists and pirates, to this day, have demonstrated.  And they, in turn, would be hunted down.  Nations quickly learned that hiring Pirates was likely to have a blade plunged into those things they expected to be protected, which is why Citizens were used when the military forces could not properly go after these individuals in other lands.  Paying off terrorists with 'a little today, they can be reasoned with' emboldens them to attack more, demand more and call you weak. 

Because you are.

This is a two-fold path of politics and private affairs at the National level.  Being 'strong on terrorism' requires more than a strong military, more than confronting regimes harboring such people and groups, and far, far more than law enforcement.  To defend the State honorably, the Citizen must take up responsible arms on his own behalf.  No Nation, no matter how powerful, can repeal the Law of Nature, and the absolute right to defend oneself against those waging Private War transcends culture and ethnicity.  It is a right we have as humans without regard to any other thing.  The derivative right to protect property is one that develops out of positive liberty and the right to defend it, and if you wish to own anything for your temporary time in this life, then the ability to raise arms to defend them are necessary as no Nation, no matter how dictatorial, authoritarian or totalitarian, can protect your goods for you.  And most come to take them away when they are that powerful, and your right does not, cannot and will not disappear until you are enslaved, bound, shackled and kept from any means of freeing yourself to enact liberty for yourself with freedom.

The use of arms, be it for military purposes or for private defense, brings along with it social accountability for that self-same use.  Nations are accountable for their militaries, be they Public or Private, both must be held to the scrutiny of the Law of Nations and the Laws of War.  The Individual is accountable for their use of arms to those societal organs known as 'government' which enact laws to uphold the common good of the Citizenry.  As Citizens we have seen some weapons come into the hands of criminals and outlaws to raise domestic death tolls, and yet the place to divide between military and civil use of arms has come into question.  If automatic weapons are so awful, then why is it the favored weapon of terrorists... next to the bomb made up of plastic explosives, that is?  They are outlaws: they operate outside the law and many civil jurisdictions have made those weapons restricted and terrorists cannot and will not follow those codes.  If they are caught before acquiring arms, there is an attempt to show how pitiful their plans are.  And if they are caught after getting them, you get a death toll.  Societies have done similar for high explosives, fuel-air explosives, and other forms of weapons, like thermonuclear devices.  And yet, when a Rogue State makes such arms and threatens to ally itself with unaccountable Private War groups to carry out National policy, how is this in any way different from England, Spain, France and Portugal hiring Pirates to do their dirty work?

One of the prime reasons that Citizens push to have some of these weapons, and mostly in the 'I can learn how to skillfully use this and not endanger my fellow man' form where practice and skill trump criminal use, we see a society that remembers the wanton criminal use and a very bloody St. Valentine's Day.  Those who push for the puissant skill of law enforcement to protect society and the citizenry from illegal use can then find those who take up such arms and armored protection outgunning those self-same law enforcement officers.  And seeing blood on the streets as the restriction of these weapons have not put an end to their use.  Worse is that the law abiding Citizenry cannot stand up to be more than a target unless they are one of the self-select handful studying the accurate use of larger bore rifles at astonishing distances.  That rarity has led to scarcity and the ability of gangs to wantonly kill using any means or method at their disposal.  And that trump card of snipers is no longer supported by the Nation via sponsored events to ensure that the population has such skills available.

Our agreement, as Citizens is in that Preamble to the Constitution as We speak with One voice on what We declare We will do with or without government.  We believe in greater unity with our fellow man to form a more perfect Union in this Nation, allowing that absolute perfection is denied Us in the mortal realm.  We agree to abide by the Laws of the Land, the Laws of the States and Local Laws and to establish Justice in that doing and in every other thing We do in life - We are a Just people.  We seek Domestic Tranquility, which is the orderly functioning of the Laws seeking Just means to create more perfect Unity.  Then we agree to provide for the common defense.  When We the People agree to stand up for the common defense, it is not *just* the law enforcement agencies, military or National Guard.  It is in our lives as individuals that we seek not only defense, but tranquility, justice and more perfect unity.

That is our word to each other as Citizens agreeing to be Citizens of the United States.

That is what We Say as a people.

The meaning, however, now appears to be lost.

Is it any wonder we don't know what to do?

I know what those words Say, and they are my agreement to you as a Citizen.

I know that they Mean, I must abide by them in my daily life.

And everything I Do must carry that Meaning with it for those things.

When I fail I am more than willing to hold myself accountable to Justice.

I hold my Nation's Honor as my own, and I much prefer that those in charge of it....

Do as they Say.

Say what they Mean.

Mean what they Do.

 

Don't you?

Yet more of the decline of America and all things good

The following was originally presented at Dumb Looks Still Free and here, and I will add a few observations at this point in time.

One of the themes I was unaware of, when writing this, was the strong link between the Whiskey Rebellion, during the term of President Washington, and the migration of the no-tax rebels to the territory then outside of federal control in Kentuck. That hard core group of rebels moved after the rebellion, as they did not seek bloodshed, just the freedom from onerous taxation placed on a volume of liquid, not per transaction. The poor Scotch-Irish in Pennsylvania had few choices with whiskey as a medium of exchange that was readily acceptable to those without cash. This early presence in America was brought to my attention by the History Channel's Rumrunners, Moonshiners and Bootleggers, which delves into the history of hard liquor on the wild side in America.

When looking at the two campaigns remaining today, the rural/urban divide is apparent and in stark contrast, with only one ticket possibly realizing just what that contrast *is*. It will be interesting to see if that campaign has the wit to realize that it can grab that divide and the majority of the population with it, on more than just a political basis. That divide is cultural, and as I go through in the article, it is one that goes back prior to the founding of the Nation. It is the actual divide in America and it is simple, and very complex. It is the reason we seek to have government that governs, not rules, and it is why so much of the nation is turned off by modern politicians who believe that rule making leads to order. Just the opposite as it is society that creates order and government that enforces the absolute bounds of what can be allowed in civil society. As government is the punisher, so should it be restricted in power and the people have the highest authority over what is and is not allowable within society. That is civil discourse, and government is the last and least place to have those discussions and put rules in place about them.

Of the four left to campaign, only the Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin, understands this and brings the frontiersman ethos and ethical background to address this cultural divide. That is an understanding that government must have limits and that it has no business in dictating the lives of the people to the people. It will be interesting to see if the campaign she is a part of has the wits to know that and have her campaign based on culture and how it brings her to her politics... instead of having politics dictate culture as those in love with the other side of the divide want. A starker contrast cannot be drawn based on that culture and view of ethical government run by those who hold themselves accountable for their actions. You still get politics out of that, but not the 'anything I can get away with' style of today.

In the meantime those cherished roots of kith, kin, hearth and home were brought over by many and still exist, to this day. A good way to live leading to a good life, and barest essential government to live with. So that the American people can live free and determine their own society without government dictating it to us.

After this, the original article is presented as-is, with no corrections in spelling, syntax or logic, anywhere.

It is to be regretted that the rich and powerful too often bend the acts of government to their selfish purposes. Distinctions in society will always exist under every just government. Equality of talents, of education, or of wealth can not be produced by human institutions. In the full enjoyment of the gifts of Heaven and the fruits of superior industry, economy, and virtue, every man is equally entitled to protection by law; but when the laws undertake to add to these natural and just advantages artificial distinctions, to grant titles, gratuities, and exclusive privileges, to make the rich richer and the potent more powerful, the humble members of society-the farmers, mechanics, and laborers-who have neither the time nor the means of securing like favors to themselves, have a right to complain of the injustice of their Government. There are no necessary evils in government. Its evils exist only in its abuses. If it would confine itself to equal protection, and, as Heaven does its rains, shower its favors alike on the high and the low, the rich and the poor, it would be an unqualified blessing. In the act before me there seems to be a wide and unnecessary departure from these just principles.

- President Andrew Jackson's Bank Veto Message, 10 JUL 1832 (Source: The Avalon Project)

Michael Hirsch's latest article at Newsweek on How the South Won (This) Civil War, 25 APR 2008, brings to mind the outlook and views of President Jackson and Jacksonians as he cites them as being a part of America that is doing things that he just doesn't like. Apparently he, like Bill O'Reilly, is bemoaning the slow decline of American culture and cites the Scots-Irish in the South as the source of it, and I will take the liberty of extensively quoting his article so as to examine just what it *is* that he is going after:

In part this is a triumph of demographics. As John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge observed in their 2004 book, "The Right Nation: Conservative Power in America," the nation's population center has been "moving south and west at a rate of three feet an hour, five miles a year." Another author, Anatol Lieven, in his 2005 book "America Right or Wrong: An Anatomy of American Nationalism," describes how the "radical nationalism" that has so dominated the nation's discourse since 9/11 traces its origins to the demographic makeup and mores of the South and much of the West and Southern Midwest--in other words, what we know today as Red State America. This region was heavily settled by Scots-Irish immigrants--the same ethnic mix King James I sent to Northern Ireland to clear out the native Celtic Catholics. After succeeding at that, they then settled the American Frontier, suffering Indian raids and fighting for their lives every step of the way. And the Southern frontiersmen never got over their hatred of the East Coast elites and a belief in the morality and nobility of defying them. Their champion was the Indian-fighter Andrew Jackson. The outcome was that a substantial portion of the new nation developed, over many generations, a rather savage, unsophisticated set of mores. Traditionally, it has been balanced by a more diplomatic, communitarian Yankee sensibility from the Northeast and upper Midwest. But that latter sensibility has been losing ground in population numbers--and cultural weight.

This is, as they say in refined circles, garbage. The lineage of both the Scots-Irish and the Protestant English, Dutch and Germanic peoples that came to the Northeast and Upper Midwest had very similar lines of society to those of the Scots-Irish, although with a more taciturn view of things than the more rambunctious cousins to the South. The differences between rural life in the Deep South and Northeast was that of basic religious outlook between the deep Protestants in the North East and the more Catholic lines in the South, but both led to similar problems for poor, rural communities in both regions. The Yankee tinkerer is no different in outlook than the Southern Frontiersman, save that one had to fight climate and government to keep kith and kin alive while the other had to fight hostile natives, government, and brew up whisky while keeping kith and kin alive. In fact, as Rev. A. L. Perry would write about in 1890, the Scots-Irish were very much IN New England (Source: Library Ireland):

The Scotch-Irish did not enter New England unheralded. Early in the spring of 1718 Rev. Mr. Boyd was dispatched from Ulster to Boston as an agent of some hundreds of those people who expressed a strong desire to remove to New England, should suitable encouragement be afforded them. His mission was to Governor Shute, of Massachusetts, then in the third year of his administration of that colony, an old soldier of King William, a Lieutenant-Colonel under Marlborough in the wars of Queen Anne, and wounded in one of the great battles in Flanders. Mr. Boyd was empowered to make all necessary arrangements with the civil authorities for the reception of those whom he represented, in case his report of the state of things here should prove to be favorable.

[..]

I have lately scrutinized with critical care this ancient parchment stamped by the hands of our ancestors, now in the custody of the Historical Society of New Hampshire, and was led into a line of reflections which I will not now repeat, as to its own vicissitudes in the seven quarter-centurys of its existence, and as to the personal vicissitudes and motives, and heart-swellings and hazards, and cold and hunger and nakedness, as well as the hard-earned success and the sense of triumph, and the immortal vestigia of the men who lovingly rolled and unrolled this costly parchment on the banks of the Foyle and the Bann Water! Tattered are its edges now, shrunken by time and exposure its original dimensions, illegible already some of the names even under the fortifying power of modern lenses, but precious in the eyes of New England, nay precious in the eyes of Scotch-Irishmen every-where, is this venerable muniment of intelligence and of courageous purpose looking down upon us from the time of the first English George.

The direct addressing of issues via community based democratic means in towns in the North East and upper Mid West have mirrors in the social and societal organizations that may have taken a slower pace in the South, but still assured that families and clans were all brought up to date on issues of the day. The more taciturn and somewhat puritanical North Eastern Yankees did have different societal customs across the North East and Mid West, ranging from that small town view of democracy in Vermont and New Hampshire to the more blue-blooded cosmopolitan forms in the big cities (Boston, New York, Philadelphia) to the backwoods Dutch who had settled across Western NY to Ohio and Indiana, centered in Pennsylvania Dutch territory. From there the Appalachian family and clan views of the Scots-Irish intermingle and shift down through the Virginias and Carolinas to Georgia, forming the lovely Multi-Culti, wide spectrum of religious and social outlooks that gave birth to this Nation. Those differences in culture showed up in language, so you can chart out the Mason/Dixon line by the bucket/pail line, and numerous other words used to refer to items. Yet the presence of Scots-Irish in New England is demonstration that the divide being spoken of is *not* that of the Scots-Irish vs. the Elites of New England and the Mid West.

No, what Mr. Hirsch is describing is a different cultural divide, not the North-South one but the Big City - Small Town divide of America. In fact it was many of the 'East Coast Elites' that *were* elites because they sat in the halls of power in the larger cities of America and had their own derogatory view towards their Small Town and Rural cousins. A piece I did on Sam Adams clearly shows some of what that city-based elite saw as it viewed other parts of the culture in the Colonies and the Early Nation. While a noted thinker, theorist, brewer and patriot, Sam Adams did have his prejudices against Roman Catholicism, here writing in his untitled document on the Rights of the Colonists:

In regard to Religeon, mutual tolleration in the different professions thereof, is what all good and candid minds in all ages have ever practiced; and both by precept and example inculcated on mankind: And it is now generally agreed among christians that this spirit of toleration in the fullest extent consistent with the being of civil society "is the chief characteristical mark of the true church"2 & In so much that Mr. Lock has asserted, and proved beyond the possibility of contradiction on any solid ground, that such toleration ought to be extended to all whose doctrines are not subversive of society. The only Sects which he thinks ought to be, and which by all wise laws are excluded from such toleration, are those who teach Doctrines subversive of the Civil Government under which they live. The Roman Catholicks or Papists are excluded by reason of such Doctrines as these "that Princes excommunicated may be deposed, and those they call Hereticks may be destroyed without mercy; besides their recognizing the Pope in so absolute a manner, in subversion of Government, by introducing as far as possible into the states, under whose protection they enjoy life, liberty and property, that solecism in politicks, Imperium in imperio3 leading directly to the worst anarchy and confusion, civil discord, war and blood shed-4

So, when Mr. Hirsch starts talking about a more 'diplomatic, communitarian' North East, one does have to wonder just *which* North East he is talking about? The rural North East would put up with a hell of a lot from the officious governments in their State Capitols, as seen during and after the Revolutionary war. Sam Adams was a *very* enlightened thinker for his time and period, and yet the clear distrust of Roman Catholics is demonstrated. That is neither 'diplomatic' nor 'communitarian' to seek outright restriction upon individuals because they happen to believe in one form of christianity over another.

Part of the Big City Elite vs Small Town and Rural is seen in the long and gloried career of Gen. Benjamin Lincoln who would be called out after the Revolution for a problem that faced the Confederacy (Source: History of War site):

Lincoln’s one remaining official post was first major general of militia. He accepted this post in December 1785, and made a series of suggestions for improving the state of the militia, but if he expected them to see any action, it would only have been guarding the borders of the state against Indian incursion. To his shock, he was to find himself leading troops against his fellow citizens.

At the heart of the divisions in Massachusetts was the split between the commercial towns and cities of the east coast and the entirely rural western part of the state. Just as the British had found western Massachusetts almost impossible to rule, now the state authorities found themselves facing a violent uprising. In the summer of 1786 protests began as a protest against the increasing burden of taxes. Added to the tax burden was an attempt to force the payment of private debts. Most of this debt was owed to the wealthy merchants of the east coast. The farmers in the west of the state felt that they were being oppressed by an oligarchy and were not properly represented by the state government. Many of their complaints were similar to those of the revolutions of the 1770s, an irony that appears to have escaped Lincoln, but that many did see (especially British visitors to the state).

The initial response of the state government was to grant a eight-month debt moratorium, but at the same time habeas corpus was suspended, and a new Riot Act put in place. Protest in the west soon turned into armed revolt. Leaders began to emerge, amongst them Daniel Shays (after whom the revolt was named). They began by closing the courts in the west of the state, but by the end of 1786 their rhetoric had grown to include a direct threat to march on Boston and overthrow what they felt was an illegitimate government. The similarities to the events of 1775 worried many, including Washington. As commander of the militia, Lincoln found himself in the front line against his fellow Americans.

The payment of debts incurred during the Revolution and the extremely heavy burden upon the poor, rural farmer caused many families to go into poverty as their land was confiscated to pay those debts. Here the Elite center of commerce in Boston put large debt repayment loads on individuals and enforced the payment of private debts, which further burdened farmers already close to the brink of going under. It is that view from the central, establishment in the Cities upon the rural folks that *is* the Elitist brand that Mr. Hirsch talks about, but the resentment OF IT is in no way limited to Jacksonians and the Deep South.

One of the reasons Washington did so well as General and President is that he did not cut himself off from his own frontiersman roots as a scout and surveyor for the British Army, and he continued to brew Rye Whiskey at Mount Vernon. These things and his humility in listening to his enlisted officers who had better knowledge of terrain and the army itself during the Revolution allowed Washington to manage that and so inspire the volunteers that many went without pay for long, long months. And while President Jefferson would not have religious practices during his term, and, in fact, formed a religious group of one individual (Source: Thomas Jefferson letter to William Short, 13 APR 1820 via Library of Congress), he would not seek to enforce that Elitist view upon the Nation and, instead, adhere to the wisdom of letting his fellow man decide for himself about what is right and proper in their lives in regard to religion. His continued support for agrarian views would continue to endear him to the more rural population, while his elitist views put him into the 'radical thinkers' camp in the realm of human liberty and religion. Would that latter day Elitists could take the lesson from that and learn to understand and even live with Small Town and Rural America.

The concentration of industrial capacity in cities would later put that divide into play as the Nation slowly moved from agrarian based to industrial based and the flow of money and power into Big City Elites and their corporations would entrench that view that Big City Establishments were out of touch with Small Town and Rural America. Whenever a politician speaks to the needs and beliefs of Small Town and Rural America they get a derogatory name attached to them: Populist. Populism, itself, is a 'grab-bag' terminology, often employed by the Elite establishment against anything that isn't part of it. Thus when Mr. Hirsch uses the following paragraph to tell what he is seeing he is deploying the 'populist' argument as an Elite:

The coarsened sensibility that this now-dominant Southernism and frontierism has brought to our national dialogue is unmistakable. We must endure "lapel-pin politics" that elevates the shallowest sort of faux jingoism over who's got a better plan for Iraq and Afghanistan. We have re-imported creationism into our political dialogue (in the form of "intelligent design"). Hillary Clinton panders shamelessly to Roman Catholics, who have allied with Southern Protestant evangelicals on questions of morality, with anti-abortionism serving as the main bridge. Barack Obama seems to be so leery of being identified as an urban Northern liberal that he's running away from the most obvious explanation of his association with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and former Weatherman Bill Ayers: after Obama graduated from college he became an inner-city organizer in Chicago, and they were natural allies for someone in a situation like that. We routinely demonize organizations like the United Nations that we desperately need and which are critical to missions like nation-building in Afghanistan. On foreign policy, the realism and internationalism of the Eastern elitist tradition once kept the Southern-frontier warrior culture and Wilsonian messianism in check. Now the latter two, in toxic combination, have taken over our national dialogue, and the Easterners are running for the hills.

Notice that his first attack is on 'coarsened sensibility' which he then categorizes as: frontierist, shallow jingoist, backwards looking religious based views, anti-urban Northern liberal, UN demonizing, anti-Eastern elitist foreign policy while being pro-warrior and messianic Wilsonian. Do notice that he puts forward no positive views on this, nor does he recognize the large Roman Catholic populations that came to America from Italy, Poland and Spain. However he does correctly pin the problems of the Elitist as that of 'urban Northern liberal' and puts forward that *that* allows for anything against the United States to be absolutely OK with him so long as it has cover in something like 'inner-city organizer'... while not ever explaining what an 'inner-city organizer' does. Even worse is the attempt to look only at the 'messianic' part of Woodrow Wilson's foreign policy views, while trying to distance THOSE from the fact that they are tied up with the idea of extra-National organizations like the League of Nations and, later, the UN.

That last is particularly galling as Woodrow Wilson, himself, was an East Coast Elitist (to use Mr. Hirsch's terms) who used the messianic views as they were seen as a normal part of the political speech of that day and age. Indeed he did look to 'liberate Jerusalem' but when push came to shove he would not want to *fight over it* when given the opportunity to do so by taking on the Ottoman Empire. No, President Wilson was not going to do *that* to carry out a warrior-based, messianic foreign policy. Those were not Southern views he was giving, but they were part of what is called 'Progressivist' views, which Woodrow Wilson held. 'Progressivism' at that stage of things was decidedly a Christian-based movement, for all the fact it would later morph into one that held beliefs more in line with socialism and atheism.

I looked at the basis for Wilsonianism for Transnationalism, and found that President Wilson actually had a disdain for things like the Declaration of Independence (Source: 14 JUL 1914 speech Independence Hall in Philadelphia, President Wilson's Addresses, via Project Gutenberg:

In one sense the Declaration of Independence has lost its significance. It has lost its significance as a declaration of national independence. Nobody outside of America believed when it was uttered that we could make good our independence; now nobody anywhere would dare to doubt that we are independent and can maintain our independence. As a declaration of independence, therefore, it is a mere historic document. Our independence is a fact so stupendous that it can be measured only by the size and energy and variety and wealth and power of one of the greatest nations in the world. But it is one thing to be independent and it is another thing to know what to do with your independence. It is one thing to come to your majority and another thing to know what you are going to do with your life and your energies; and one of the most serious questions for sober-minded men to address themselves to in the United States is this: What are we going to do with the influence and power of this great Nation? Are we going to play the old role of using that power for our aggrandizement and material benefit only? You know what that may mean. It may upon occasion mean that we shall use it to make the peoples of other nations suffer in the way in which we said it was intolerable to suffer when we uttered our Declaration of Independence.

Yes, like many of the Elites of the 'Progressivist' movement, Woodrow Wilson did not describe the Declaration of Independence as having eternal truths but only transitory ones that lose their significance once the Nation was born. This is not one of those uncouth, ill-bred, ignorant masses telling us about the transitory nature of the Declaration, but a well-heeled gentlemen of the East Coast Elites doing so. Nor are the 'warrior culture' folks of today using the highly linked idea of President Wilson of a Christian Nation that would take part in international bodies for the greater good of the world. You can't import the Wilsonian 'messianic views' without also dragging in the international part as they go hand-in-hand, so saying that the 'warrior culture' would embrace both the pro-international institutional views of Wilson and the anti-UN views of corrupt international institutions doing more harm than good is extremely ahistorical and trying to cherry-pick an ideal here and an ideal there to put together an incoherent mish-mash to tar other folks with.

And if Mr. Hirsch will rail about the lack of holding on to 'realism and internationalism of the Eastern elitist tradition' then perhaps Mr. Hirsch can point to the actual GOOD that tradition has done for the Nation? I have looked at the unreality of those 'realists' and see much that is at fault with their high minded views that want little or nothing to do with the actual dirty ways that Nations and societies run themselves. While they did, indeed, form a semi-coherent position against Communism, these great elitist foreign policy thinkers like Brent Scowcroft, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Henry Kissinger, and James A. Baker III plus many others across party lines all *missed* the salient problems of Private Warfare, Islamic Fundamentalism and Radicalism, and had taken no price to try and confront either those waging Private War against the Law of Nations nor to confront the underpinnings of Islamic Radicals who started shooting up and blowing up choice parts of the Middle East, Europe, Russia, China, India, Africa, South America, North America and, indeed, other parts of the world. What did these great and oh-so-wise thinkers on all things Realpolitik actually *DO* about this?

Nothing.

For all the combined brain power they couldn't even bother to figure out that war waged by Private groups and individuals is anathema to all Nations and a threat to the entire international system they all so adored. So when a political figure starts to ally himself with a preacher speaking an ahistorical, unfounded gospel to condemn America and a homegrown, unrepentant terrorist, one does begin to look a little askance at just *why* this individual is so 'transcending' politics, when he is supporting those who think the place should be condemned and thrown into the ash heap of history. You don't have to be a coarse, warrior culture individual to know that such ties end up to bad places in Iran, Saudi Arabia, and other choice parts of the world being blown up and shot at by other religious and politically totalitarian individuals spouting the EXACT SAME THING.

That set of Eastern elitist views backed by powerful industrialists who seek to dissolve National borders in the name of 'free trade' and their liberal counterparts looking to liquidate society based on illegal immigration do seem to be walking hand-in-hand these days: those are views to strip those outside of the elite enclaves of their ability to have a strong culture, strong society and protect the Nation. In that we are seeing a strange confluence of individuals like Barack Obama, Mike Huckabee, Hillary Clinton and John McCain who are *each* from the elitist establishment either by background or by shifting their views to that of the establishment so as to gain political power from it.

If Mr. Hirsch wishes to look for the problems caused by the Big City Elite establishment with the Nation, it is not the future that he should worry about, but the past and Shays Rebellion. That is the problem he is describing and it isn't a purely Jacksonian one, but is of the vast Red Nation with the isolated pockets of deep Blue in the Big Cities. The last time the Elites tried to push an unfair and destructive regime of taxation that would undermine family and society, that is what the Nation started to get and far beyond just the North East. A direct attack on that culture, itself, by the Elites and backed by politics may see something very similar.

The Big City Elites are one fine Shays away from getting something far worse than a 'coarsening of culture'.

Brought to you by A Citizen of the Republic

The Presidential gut-check

The following is a position paper of The Jacksonian Party.

The small Nation of Georgia has sought, and hard, to reach out to the United States and support us, looking towards the US as a friend of liberty.  As part of that they have welcomed our training of their armed forces and have contributed the largest contingent per population size of any Nation in helping us in Iraq (Source and excellent read at Mudville Gazette).  With the current military actions of Russia over the 'breakaway' region of South Ossetia Georgia is recalling the 20% of its fighting force that it has dedicated to the mission in Iraq.  In this series of operations, Russia has been a clear antagonist towards Georgia in being the only Nation to recognize South Ossetia and then supply it with backing and encouraging it to antagonize Georgia via military means.  This is the view of Ralph Peters in his NY Post article and Anne Applebaum, who has been covering the region for years, in her WaPo column.  Austin Bay looks at this is part of an ongoing way of Russia in 'working on' small Nations, citing Kosovo for historical reference.

Michael Totten had coincidentally been scheduled to head to the region and offers this piece at Slate as backgrounder, and also offers a previous piece by Anne Applebaum.

Another ally of the United States, our longest friend in Europe, Poland (Source: Polish Radio at thenews.pl), stands up against Russian intimidation and attempts to dominate Georgia.  This was done in coordination with the leaders of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia as a co-release:

The presidents of Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia have issued a joint statement condemning what they see as the naked aggression of Russia against the independent state of Georgia, as hostilities continue in the breakaway state of South Ossetia.

The statement says: “The European Union and NATO must take up the initiative and oppose the spread of imperialist and revisionist policy in the east of Europe.”

President Lech Kaczynski told TVP public television that Poland had a mission to inform western countries, and the EU in particular, of the nature of the aggression by Moscow.

He underlined that any peacekeepers in the region must be international. “That peacekeeping troops [in South Ossetia] are only from Russia is simply a farce,” he said.

The President said that Poland would offer Georgia any help it asked for. “We are not planning to send any troops there, but anything is possible.”

Poland, if anyone cares to remember, sent light cavalry to the United States when we had none in a time of dire need by us. 

That time was called the Revolutionary War.

From this we can see how the two major party candidates reacted.

On 08 AUG 2008 Sen. John McCain said the following about this, as reported by the WaPo's Michael D. Shear:

The news reports indicate that the Russian military forces crossed an internationally recognized border into the sovereign territory of Georgia. Russia should immediately and unconditionally cease its military operations and withdraw all forces from sovereign Georgian territory. What is most critical now is to avoid further confrontation between Russian and Georgian military forces. The consequences of Euro-Atlantic stability and security are grave. The government of Georgia has called for a cease fire and for resumption of direct talks on South Ossetia with international mediators. The U.S. should immediately convene an emergency session of the United Nations Security Council to call on Russia to reverse course. The U.S. should immediately work with the E.U. and the OSCE to put diplomatic pressure on Russia to reverse this perilous course that it has chosen.

We should immediately call a meeting of the North Atlantic Council to assess Georgia's security and review measures NATO can take to contribute to stabilizing this very dangerous situation. Finally, the international community needs to establish a truly independent and neutral peacekeeping force in South Ossetia.

That is a prime 'gut-check' response by anyone wanting to be a President of the United States: a friend of liberty helping our friends to rally around liberty when it is under siege by a tyrant.

At Politico, Ben Smith on 08 AUG 2008 reported the following, starting with Sen. Obama's statement:

“I strongly condemn the outbreak of violence in Georgia, and urge an immediate end to armed conflict,” Obama said in a written statement. “Now is the time for Georgia and Russia to show restraint and to avoid an escalation to full-scale war. Georgia’s territorial integrity must be respected.”

Obama added briefly that the international community should get involved. More than an hour later, as more details of Russia’s incursion into Georgia emerged, he cited Russia more directly: “What is clear is that Russia has invaded Georgia’s sovereign — has encroached on Georgia’s sovereignty,” he told reporters in Sacramento.

[..]

John McCain’s top foreign policy adviser, Randy Scheunemann, defended McCain’s direct criticism of Russia in the early hours of the crisis.

"Sen. McCain is clearly willing to note who he thinks is the aggressor here,” he said, dismissing the notion that Georgia’s move into its renegade province had precipitated the crisis. "I don't think you can excuse, defend, explain or make allowance for Russian behavior because of what is going on in Georgia.”

He also criticized Obama for calling on both sides to show “restraint,” and suggested the Democrat was putting too much blame on the conflict’s clear victim.

“That's kind of like saying after Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, that Kuwait and Iraq need to show restraint, or like saying in 1968 [when the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia] ... that the Czechoslovaks should show restraint,” he said.

A foreign policy adviser for Obama, Ben Rhodes, said Obama was deliberately measured in response to the conflict, balancing his disapproval of Russia’s “troubling behavior in its near-abroad region” with “the fact that we have to deal with Russia to deal with our most important national security challenges.”

Rhodes declined to discuss McCain’s statement directly, but did indirectly criticize it.

"The temperature of your rhetoric isn't a measure of your commitment to Georgian sovereignty,” he said, noting that the two candidates’ statements shared a substantive commitment to Georgia’s borders. “You don't want to get so far in front of a situation that you're feeding the momentum of an escalation.”

Critics of McCain’s stance said he’d imposed ideology on a complicated situation in which both sides bear some blame.

“McCain took an inflexible approach to addressing this issue by focusing heavily on one side, without a pragmatic assessment of the situation,” said Mark Brzezinski, a former Clinton White House official and an informal adviser to Obama.

“It’s both sides’ fault — both have been somewhat provocative with each other,” he said.

[..]

A public relations firm working for the Russian Federation pointed out Scheunemann’s lobbying past to reporters — a sign that McCain’s stance is not, for better or worse, being welcomed in Moscow — as did Obama’s campaign.

“John McCain’s top foreign policy adviser lobbied for, and has a vested interest in, the Republic of Georgia and McCain has mirrored the position advocated by the government,” said Obama spokesman Hari Sevugan, noting that the “appearance of a conflict of interest” was a consequence of McCain’s too-close ties to lobbyists.

Scheunemann dismissed the criticism, saying he severed his ties to his firm and to his client on March 1 and noting that McCain has been a firm supporter of Georgia’s move toward the West, and away from Russia, since the Arizona senator’s first visit there in 1997.

What Sen. Obama did is come out with not only pabulum, but an unmeasured response that did not take into account Georgia's commitment to helping the United States.  While we work with Russia, we cannot consider it a friend in much of anywhere in the world where it operates.  It is a large Nation and gets consideration due to that size, but liberty and freedom are commitments that go beyond the mere size of a Nation in geography or population.  Even worse, in backing a Russian line on Mr. Scheunemann, Sen. Obama is taking sides in the conflict with the non-liberty embracing Russia against the interests of the US in promoting liberty and freedom abroad.

Further the comments of Mr. Brzezinski show the influence of his father (and both have influence in this campaign, apparently), Zbigniew, who had the unfortunate position of first backing the Shah of Iran, then trying to find if 'moderates' in Iran would take part in some sort of 'Islamic Green buffer zone' between the West and the USSR.  I have detailed Sen. Obama's problematical 'foreign policy team' along with the past views of Sen. McCain.

The one thing the Cold War did demonstrate is the United States *must* be a staunch advocate of liberty and freedom in more than just rhetoric, which is why the response from Sen. McCain demonstrating knowledge of the situation and having previously supported a Nation that supports the US is one to be respected.  As Mr. Smith notes, the view taken by Sen. Obama is a 'European one' that does not apparently recognize that Russia is also seeking to bring all of the pipelines from the Far East that supply Europe with oil and natural gas under the sway if not direct control of Russia.

In this, the most primal of gut checks for who you would vote for as President, Sen. Obama loses and clearly does so by backing a tyrannical regime's attempts to meddle in US politics and puts the blame 'equally' where the blame is unequal and weighs heavily towards one side.

By supporting a friend and ally of the US, Sen. McCain wins and if Poland seeks to step in and asks for our help in remedying the situation, then the current President should back that.

Because liberty is purchased by feeding the Great Tree with the blood of tyrants and patriots, both.

You do not play political games with those who have come to the US seeking our help in securing their own liberty and befriending our Nation in such a hard fight as in Iraq.

 

Both candidates have also had a chance to get a 'gut-check' on another issue, far closer to home, in the area of international affairs:  Mexico.

From AZ Central on 07 AUG 2008, Sean Holstege of the Arizona Republic reports the following:

Four Mexican army soldiers entered southern Arizona and pointed their rifles at a U.S. Border Patrol agent early this week, the Border Patrol said.

The incident Sunday was the Mexican military's 43rd incursion across the U.S. border since October, the agency said. However, it was unusual because firearms were involved. The Border Patrol and the Mexican government are investigating, Border Patrol spokesman Mike Scioli said.

Details remain sketchy, but the incident occurred at 2 a.m. on the Tohono O'odham Indian Reservation about 50 miles southeast of Ajo. The incident took place just north of the border in sight of the new border fence.

[..]

In Washington, D.C., State Department spokesman Gonzalo Gallegos said the encounter "stemmed from a momentary misunderstanding as to the exact location of the U.S.-Mexican border."

A 'border fence' is a clear demarcation line of a border.

This incident took place within sight of that fence to the North, clearly in US sovereign territory.

I have examined this previously (here) and find that Congress had the Library of Congress create a report looking at the slow incursion of money and foreign operatives with arms into Northern Mexico, and looking to disrupt and take over the old cartel based crime syndicates.  That report, in 2003, detailed influence from Russian Mafia groups, Islamic terrorist organizations, and from FARC which used to have better control over such criminal operations after it took over the old cartel businesses in the late 1990's.  Last year the monthly violence in Northern Mexico passed the violence of levels for Iraq, both heading in opposite directions with Iraq's down and Mexico's up.

As part of the influence brought by outside funds, the Mexican Federal Police and Army have been corrupted to an extent that the older cartels were unable to do.  In many cases individuals now utilize their positions of power (even in such places as the judiciary in Mexico) to aid and abet these purely criminal operations now trending towards terrorist means.

To date neither campaign nor the current President have been able to offer a clear defense of the US border and its sovereignty.  As that is done in neglecting the corrupting influence of organized crime in Northern Mexico, the violence has been spreading with criminal hit squads starting to show up in the US to take out US criminals and take over their local operations.

Many have offered that 'Sen. McCain saw clearly in Iraq on COIN'.

Very well: what is Sen. McCain's view on the COIN needs of the SW United States along the Mexican border now that Mexico is falling into a criminal based insurgency with backing from larger organized crime and terrorist groups?

Sen. Obama is absolutely clueless here and has demonstrated that for months.

Sen. McCain has done no better and some worse in not making any statement that would antagonize the Hispanic population in the US, forgetting that many came to the US to get AWAY from such situations and to be SAFE in a Nation they could call their own.

In this gut-check, they both lose, and horribly.

I expect nothing from Sen. Obama and he consistently delivers less.

I expect much from what those touting Sen. McCain have said about him: he under-performs and is often self-contradictory in his skills and ability to analyze a situation.

As both of these situations are primal defenses of liberty and freedom at home and abroad, I expect any candidate to get both of them RIGHT.  Otherwise the days of refugee camps being reported upon will not be overseas, but right here at home.

I heartily applaud giving good, hard support to our friends and allies abroad.

I damned well expect to have our own liberty and freedom protected from military incursions, criminal insurgencies and not 'helped' by a government that takes liberties in exchange for increased taxation, thus diminishing liberty further.

Defense of the Nation must include supporting those that support the US, and I look for any good signs that we will do so with Georgia as, although having problems, they DESERVE IT.

And so do WE.

Right there, along that southern border before it goes to hell, and the next deployment for major COIN operations is not in Iraq or Afghanistan, but places like Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, California, Nevada... unless you really like the idea of refugee camps in such places as Oklahoma, Colorado, Utah?

America can support freedom abroad and insure our own at home:  it is a prerequisite of those running for President to understand that.

Or God Help the United States, because no one else WILL.