Crusader War College

Goodness gracious! How Spengler spells out the obvious at the link! Go read it all, for it would be copyright infringement for me to quote all the parts that are relevant: I.e. the whole thing!

Here are some good ones:

Strictly speaking, I do not quite agree with Wilders that the Koran should be banned along with Hitler’s Mein Kampf as an incitement to violence. Nonetheless, he is doing precisely the right thing. A house divided against itself cannot stand, as Abraham Lincoln quoted the Gospels as he made ready to tear down the half that was misbehaving. No civilized state can abide a rival from within who contests the monopoly of violence of legitimate government. If governments refuse to act, the optimal course of action is pre-emptive: bring matters to a decision as fast as possible before the rot destroys the entire house.

And.

Not since lions tore apart slaves for the prurient enjoyment of the Roman mob has Europe witnessed a spectacle as revolting as Hirsi Ali’s appearance last week before the European Parliament. She has lived under guard since Theo van Gogh’s murder in 2004. To its shame, the Dutch government has stopped paying for her security. On February 14 she asked the European Parliament to fund her security, saying: "The threats to my life have not subsided and the cost is beyond anything I can pay ... I find myself in a very desperate position. I don't want to die. I want to live and I love life. I'm going to do anything legal to get help."

Before the eyes of the world, a leading citizen of the Netherlands begs the legislature of Europe to protect her against assassins whose declared goal is the destruction of Europe’s liberties as well as its civilization. The Dutch government turns its back. Europe’s Parliament listens politely and refers the matter to committee.

The best summary of the Archbishop of Canterbury sharia comment I've found is this:

I am ashamed to say that it did not become clear to me that Wilders has taken the only appropriate course of action until I read carefully the Archbishop of Canterbury’s now-infamous "sharia" speech. Stripped of casuistry, he proposed that Muslim women subject to forced marriages, genital mutilation, or domestic violence should be handed over to Muslim religious courts, rather than be offered the protection of English Common Law. To my knowledge, this is the first time that one of Europe’s spiritual leaders has proposed to abandon innocent victims to their fate.

Archbishop Dr Rowan Williams, to be sure, has a point. But he should have stated plainly what he really thinks. What he wanted to say is more or less: "To protect a few hundred or a few thousand colored ladies, the English state will have to put its big boots on, kick down the doors of Muslim homes, trample through Muslim living rooms, tear up the fabric of Muslim communities, and disrupt the social order. Why not turn such cases over to religious courts and wash our hands of them?" I reiterate: this is satanic hypocrisy.

If decent and well-meaning men like Dr Williams are so afraid of communal violence as to abandon the founding principles of common law and Judeo-Christian ethics, it is long past time to debate the fine points. Blessed are the pre-emptors, for they will get on with it.

Hattip Anguper via Rantburg, with much gratitude.

=> Read more!

One of the methods used by Leftists to gain and keep power and influence is to exploit webs of implicit trust. This post shows an example of this.

There was a study published by the British Medical Journal Lancet that stated that there were 100,000 more deaths in Iraq than normal as a consequence of the Second Gulf War. The paper has been critiqued before, but the most devastating one is reproduced at Michelle Malkin's blog at the link above. In it, David Kane uses statistical analysis on the data cited in the original paper to show that the "confidence interval" was incorrect. The confidence interval is a measure of how different the given value is from the "norm", and thus a measure of how significant the difference is.

While I am no statistics wizard, I perused the paper at the link above, and noted that Kane correctly uses a Bayesian analysis, because nobody really knew ahead of time what the baseline risk of dying in Iraq was before the war. After some analysis, Kane notes that the confidence interval that was published is obtainable if the authors left out the statistics they gathered in Fallujah. However, because the authors of the Lancet paper have not released the raw data or the detailed analysis methodology, one cannot really review their methodology or double check the data or the results.

That bolded part is all that you really need to know about the validity of the study. Forget about the complexity of the math: One of the core requirements of science is replication and verification, so a refusal to reveal the data or the methodology after the paper is published, so that it can be double checked, is a gross violation of those requirements. While there are people who do not think that this should be enough to disqualify the paper or its authors, and reject as unproven its conclusions, that merely shows that they are ignorant of how real science works.

=> Read more!

Zionist Youngster has an excellent post on postmodernist tricks to avoid, deflect, or put down criticism of their narratives. ZY correctly points out that one can LISTEN to the narratives of others: they are, at base, arguments for looking (or not looking) at a certain set of facts in a certain way. However, Listening does not constitute acceptance. He then points out how Postmodernists react to critical non-acceptance of their narratives.

This put me in the right frame of mind to comment on a certain aspect of liberal argumentation: that they are not really arguing, but merely stating a narrative and are expecting acceptance of the narrative on grounds that it agrees with certain beliefs of theirs. The treatment is not as much as a framing and laying out of the facts to support an argument as much as it is the expectation that the narrative be accepted IN THE PLACE OF FACTS.

It was while making a comment at ZY's blog that I realized that what passes for 'arguments' on the left are merely narratives that are structurally similar to college class reports and homework essays graded by leftist college professors (LCPs). These are not expected to examine the facts, but intended to be catechisms: a recital of statements and beliefs intended to check items off of a unspoken checklist that is not transmitted verbally by the professors, but is transmitted non-verbally, via good and bad grades awarded by the LCPs. A fact can be cited, but only if it helps check an item off that checklist. If it does not, or even leads to the implication that the item cannot or should not be checked off, it's left out. Facts are not central, but supportive: useful only if they help to reach a goal, but not to be considered in a way that would require one to change one's goal. To change one's goal is to say that the demanded narrative is incorrect.

This is not education, but pavlovian training for behaviour that produces narratives that support preconceived leftist conclusions, with good grades being the positive reinforcing stimulus, and bad grades being the negative reinforcing stimulus. There is, in a sense, a Liberal Narrative that is held as a Platonic ideal for every situation, with goodness or badness being judged by how close or far one's concrete and materially real narrative reflects that Ideal Liberal Narrative. Noam Chomsky's arguments are greatly flawed, but that's merely from the point of view of an argument based on looking at and reacting to the mere facts: his essays are hailed because they come close to manifesting that Liberal Narrative Ideal.

Contrast this with the dry and factual lab reports and homework demanded by professors in the hard sciences and mathematics. Such products more nearly match that which real-life employers demand. Thus, such professors help their students prepare for a life of labor that produces that which is truly useful.

Having been conditioned, not educated, the liberal students graduate with the expectation that continued spouting of narratives that strive to support and reflect the Ideal Liberal Narrative should produce the "real world" equivalent of good grades. When such is not forthcoming, they see that as support for the Ideal Liberal Narrative about the cruelties and injustice of capitalism, rather than as evidence of the abject failure of Liberal College Professors to educate them to do anything remotely useful.

The former probably don't have the sense to fear the day when someone sees through this and remark, "Y'know? Nobody EVER made anything useful thinking the way YOU DO!"

Selwyn Duke has an excellent article on the offensiveness of taking offense at The American Enterprise's website.

"The voicing of the unpopular being the very soul of free speech, the right to give and take offense shall not be infringed."

Sometimes I think it is time to insert the above into our First Amendment. Whether it's an off-color joke or colorful commentary, it's now hard to make anything but the most plain vanilla statements without offending somebody. In fact, so ingrained is the notion of being offended that it's become a topic of TV commercial satire. Just think about GEICO's commercials with stone-age characters taking umbrage at the slogan, "So easy a caveman can do it."

Ironically, associating cavemen with being thin-skinned is quite apropos, since it is a frailty born of the more ignoble aspects of man's nature. As to this, I think about documentarian Alby Mangels who, while visiting primitives in Papua New Guinea, warned against "knocking back their hospitality." Prudence dictated he be wary, as those less spiritually and morally evolved are ruled by pride, the worst of the Seven Deadly Sins. And, lest we entertain the fancy that it is the superior person who doesn't give offense, know that it is actually the superior one who doesn't take it. It's hard to offend the humble.

In truth, though, our civilization is not as overcome by pride as by duplicity. And this is what is truly offensive (in the way an odor is so) about this offensiveness business: Screaming "That's offensive!" is nothing but a ploy. Yes, you heard it here first, few who emit that utterance are actually offended.

They just don't happen to like what you're saying.

Go read the whole thing.

James Arlandson has an extended series of articles at The American Thinker on the relationship between Christianity, Pacifism, and government. The link is to the last article, which contains pointers to the entire series. He concludes:

The kingdom of God is distinct from the kingdom of Caesar. Briefly stated, the mission of the Church, which is created by the kingdom of God, is to save souls, teach believers, and help the needy in practical ways. It was not and will never be called to bloody people with swords.

May the two kingdoms never again be fused together!

And may the Church fulfill its true mission!

I had arrived at the same conclusion a while back, and am thankful that Mr. Arlandson has a wider audience than I.

In consultation with involved college faculty, the Department of Transdimensional Warfighting has been renamed the Department of Experimental Religion, with warfighting being a division within that department. This change was initiated by the faculty of the former department when research indicated that the original focus was too narrow, and that confusion would result regarding the former name if that focus was broadened. This is not in response to a "softening" of the original intent of the deparment, but due to a realization that transdimensional warfighting is a sub-menu option of a larger set of capabilities, the research of which requires a larger and more integrated program that does not lend itself to an inter-departmental/inter-disciplinary approach.

The new department also serves a need that the old one had inadvertently ignored. While not disputing the dire need to train transdimensional warfighters, such a program trains practitioners, but not researchers. After some prayer, the faculty realized that the required research program for the new department would dovetail neatly with the needs of the older department: A researcher would necessarily be a warfighter, but a warfighter is not necessarily a researcher. Developing researchers is to be preferred: we are a War College, not a vo-tech school. The current outline of the research program/curriculum leads us away from a dual-track program to a program with initial and follow-on components. To modify and extend an old, but true, saw: "Giving a man a fish feeds one man for a day. Teaching a man how to fish feeds one man for a lifetime. Teaching a man how to teach other men how to fish feeds multitudes."

The output of the new Department will be documented in Journal of Experimental Religion.

I am going to juxtaposition two passages from the Sermon on the Mount that are conventionally not put side by side. The first is known and loved by Liberals: to quote to OTHERS of course:
The first is Matthew 5:38-48:

"You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.' But I tell you not to resist an evil person. But whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. If anyone wants to sue you and take away your tunic, let him have your cloak also. And whoever compels you to go one mile, go with him two. Give to him who asks you, and from him who wants to borrow from you do not turn away.

Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so? Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

The second is Matthew 7:7-11

Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?

=> Read more!

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5

I have removed "Day by Day" from my blog list, but you may click on the title of this entry to go to the site and install a link to it.

My reason for removing it is somewhat personal and complicated, and can be read via the link below:

=> Read more!

Pages: 1 2

I am in a bit of conflict regarding praying for the "Christian" "Peacemakers" hostages:

• Given the post below, there is no doubt that the hostages, and the group that sent them, classify as fools. Thus, one could be justified in praying that justice be done: they have been accusing america of being something they are not, and they, in turn, are being accused of being something they are not. With no regard to prudence or wisdom, they put themselves into a situation that begged for this result.
• On the other hand, there are indications that these people arranged this little sideshow to highlight their cause. I never heard of this organization except via a church member: a liberal professor whose sister is in the organization, and who does not hesitate to use any opportunity to state his politics. (I, in turn, never hesitate to respond in kind to his provocations.)
• On the third hand, they ARE accused of being something they are not, and I sympathise with that, regardless of the fact that these people are the ones throwing false accusations about.

My, my. What to do?

I have DEFINITELY decided to do the following:

• I will NOT GLOAT. That will just jinx the entire situaton, leading God to deliver them JUST to stop me from gloating. On the eternal scale of things, my behaving rightly is worth more to God than correcting these bozos.
• This is NOT a problem. This is an OPPORTUNITY: rest assured, "Christian" "Peacemakers" is definitely seeing this as an OPPORTUNITY, even though the hostages don't feel that way.
• Because these are fools, I will NOT respond in a way that makes me like them. To me, this means evading responsiblity and throwing blame onto someone else for one's own shortcomings.
• Because these are fools, I will respond in such a way as to make sure they don't come away thinking that they are better than they are.

To me, at this moment, the optimal solution is to pray that the hostages are kept safe UNTIL AND DURING THEIR RESCUE BY AMERICAN AND IRAQUI FORCES. It goes without saying that we should also be praying for the safety of the rescuers as well.

My wife one time read me a summary of a top 10 Men's tennis player: His forehand stunk. His backhand was atrocious. His serve middling. Always won games.

I was puzzled until my wife read the rest of the article: the guy was a brilliant stragegist and had great placement. He was able to analyze what the other player didn't like, AND GAVE THAT TO THEM. He was beaten only by players who had NO weaknesses that he could leverage.

This strategy will work in this situation as well. "Christian" "Peacemakers" has kindly told us what they don't want by their demanding that no actions be taken to save their people when they are taken hostage. ERGO, we do what they don't want us to do. This has many advantages:

• It grabs the spotlight away from "Christian" "Peacemakers" and puts it on our terrific armed forces. They'll hate losing it, and they'll hate even more where it goes.
• It has all the delicious POISON that makes the parable of the Good Samaritan such a kicker: The people that "Christian" "Peacemakers" despise the most are the ones that help them when they are in trouble.
• Even if this is a charade to puff the terrorists ("kidnap us, threaten to kill us, and then release us! It'll be great publicity!"), they can't really SAY anything if they are rescued and the guys they dealt with get killed or captured.
• Imagine the sheer torture that "Christian" "Peacemakers" will endure deciding if they have to say "thank you" to their rescuers: If they do, it certainly won't sound sincere. If they don't, both God and man will despise them. Ingratitude never was a sin in Islam, but the last time I looked, it still was in Christianity.

Praying for a successful hostage rescue is the best option at this moment, and one I will follow.

Peter Schweizer has out a new book: Do As I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy that tears the mask off of Liberal Hypocrisy. Not that we already know that they do it, but he goes to great lengths to document everything. A tip of the hat goes to Tipper Via Rantburg

While most of what he says is interesting, I found this answer to Kathryn Jean Lopez' question very penetrating:

Lopez: One overarching kinda question: We all have our moments of hypocrisy. That we don't practice what we preach doesn't make what we preach any less valid. People are human, etc. Is there something about your book that is somewhat fundamentally unfair?

Schweizer: Yes, we are all hypocrites and I talk about that in the book. But liberal hypocrisy and conservative hypocrisy are quite different on two accounts. First, you hear about conservative hypocrisy all the time. A pro-family congressman caught in an extramarital affair, a minister caught in the same. This stuff is exposed by the media all the time. The leaders of the liberal-Left get a complete pass on their hypocrisy. Second, and this is even more important, the consequences of liberal hypocrisy are different than for the conservative variety. When conservatives abandon their principles and become hypocrites, they end up hurting themselves and their families. Conservative principles are like guard rails on a winding road. They are irritating but fundamentally good for you. Liberal hypocrisy is the opposite. When the liberal-left abandon their principles and become hypocrites, they actually improve their lives. Their kids end up in better schools, they have more money, and their families are more content. Their ideas are truly that bad.

That makes a fiendish sort of sense: The media can justify THEIR hypcrisy by saying that bad things happening to people is news, but it isn't news when good things happen to people. William Bennett losing millions of dollars on gambling (which his teachings say is wrong) is bad news. Noam Chomsky making millions investing in the stock market (which his teachings say is wrong) is good news.

=> Read more!

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5

Via the February 2 print editon of PC Magazine, John Dvorak forsees the revival of the dot com boom after the Google IPO offering, and offers some advice to avoiding getting fleeced. He sagely observes that the state, usually full of idiotarians, is prone to fads:

Many fads begin in California, so you have to understand California culture. Some fads become fashion; most do not. One that crept into the collective unconscious of the trend-crazed California citizenry was the dip into self-actualization movements, beginning in the late 1960s and continuing strong until the mid 1980s and even the early 1990s.

California has long been clogged with all sorts of New Age training systems and methodologies. Even today, the state is crawling with crackpots promoting weird schemes designed to make you a better person. The successful ones do the best job of separating you from your money.

A prime mover years ago was a character named Werner Erhard, who developed mind control– based "training" techniques to help people improve themselves. Erhard Seminars Training (est) was popular among go-getters looking for success in life and in business.

Erhard's est established a thought process that still permeates California culture and the business investment environment. Most Erhard audio tapes were full of reassuring commentary about how est was fabulous and how it worked better than anything else. Often heard was the comment that people who say est is bogus simply "don't get it."

What is the "it" that someone "doesn't get"?

This idea is key. The rationale is that people don't get it because they cannot see or understand a paradigm shift (another key phrase). This simple notion permeated est and also permeated the dot-com revolution.

Dvorak gets personal:

I was lucky enough to host the TV program Silicon Spin in the midst of the dot-com phenomenon. Executive after executive would come on the show and say that "people don't get it," to explain how online grocers, for example, not only were going to be successful but would dominate their market. The execs would throw out some numbers but make no connection between the numbers and reality.

Pets.com, for example, came about only because people buy a lot of pet food. The investors made a ludicrous leap of faith in assuming that people would begin to buy pet food online and have it shipped via FedEx. Why? Because there was a paradigm shift. If you said Pets.com was a crazy idea, you were told that "you don't get it."

Here's where Dvorak strikes gold and comes up with the insight worthy of inclusion in this blog:

The "you don't get it" retort serves only one real purpose: to stop a conversation. You can use it as a ruse to end any debate or argument. It's uniquely dismissive, and nouveau-management decision making has been heavily influenced by the concept.

Read the rest of the article for his take on "California style group think". Given the number of idiotarians out there it was probably to be expected that such practices would have escaped the social and political spheres, and start invading the commercial and technical spheres. If you "don't get it", don't let THEM get your money.

Often, while battling trolls, Idiotarians, and LLLs, they'll trot out variants of "You don't get it": You don't understand Islam. You don't have any compassion. You don't know what it's like to (fill in the blank). You don't know what it's like to be (fill in the blank). You don't know how hard it is to be a (fill in the blank) in America. You can't see the bigotry of Americans toward (fill in the blank)s because you're not a (fill in the blank).

In the end, the purpose of using these as arguments is, as Dvorak has astutely noted, "to stop the conversation." They'll "use it as a ruse to end any debate or argument." In typical liberal "blame anybody except the perpetrator", when they're losing the argument, they'll trot it out to blame YOU for an inability to "get it", while excusing themselves from having to prove "it". It's not THEIR problem they can't argue themselves out of a paper bag and are losing ground when debating you: YOU not "getting it" is the REAL problem in their eyes, with an explanation that involve them being really smarter/better/more virtuous than you are, or you being dumber/worse/more evil than they are.

To be forewarned is forearmed: I think I would state, out loud, that "not getting it" is attempting to shift the blame, and that the burden of proof rests with the person already "getting it" and trying to convince me, the person who "doesn't get it", to "get it". You may come up with a better counter.

This article at Israpundit by Ed Remler suggests that there's a distinction between being Moral and being Moralistic:

Morality cows us. Moralists like to proclaim their conclusions as being evident: <>what is it about Thou Shalt Not Kill that you do not understand? If you dare falter, if you cannot immediately see the validity of the argument, you are morally obtuse. Arguments of this type are moralistic as opposed to being merely moral. They aggress. The only defense against them--against being bulldozed by moralistic bullies--is tough analysis.

Similar to the distinction between moral and moralistic is that between rational and rationalistic. As I have discussed elsewhere [The Death of Yassin and the Limits of Rationality], the rationalistic argument misleads by a rhetorical focus the use of logic. It thereby suggests that its conclusions have the degree of certainty we attribute to science. In human affairs, such a suggestion is always false. It is rationality oversold by its purveyors and often overrated by its consumers.

What's the difference between being rational and being rationalistic?

Perfect logic does not guarantee certainty, for there is also the matter of ones assumptions (premises, postulates, and so on). And in human affairs, these are innumerable, commonly hidden and always uncertain. Rationalists and moralists both focus our attention on only the few assumptions they need to reach their sought for conclusions. Rationalistic rhetoric emphasizes the reasonability of favored assumptions (we all seek to maximize our happiness, seeing is believing,...); the moralistic, emphasizes the obvious truth and overwhelming force of dicta.

Carefully selected obvious truth and overwhelming dicta.

This is one of those rare insights that make the long hours of web surfing worthwhile, since such insights bring into focus and comprehensibility behaviors that otherwise seem puzzling or give one a nagging feeling. However, rather than discourse at length between the moral and the moralist, I will assume that you, my readers, are moral rather than moralists. You being familiar with the real thing allows me to speed up your education by pointing out where the counterfeit comes up short.

The goal of the Moral is to be good relative to an objective code, and influence others to be good relative to that same code. The goal of the Moralist is to win an argument by using moral arguments.

The Moral regards the code as objectively good, and holds suspect any cause that contradicts the code. The Moralist holds that a certain cause is good, and holds suspect any code that contradicts or undermines their cause.

The Moral makes judgments based on all the facts. The Moralist focuses only on selected facts that support their argument.

The Moral adheres to the code at all times. The Moralist adheres to the code only while convenient.

The Moral attempts to embrace all that the code encompasses. The Moralist selectively chooses that which supports their argument.

The code judges the moral. The Moralist judges the code.

Following all the code may be hard. Therefore, failure in others to follow the code is an occasion for the Moral to educate and encourage. The Moralist sees failure in others as an occasion for posturing, condemnation, and extortion.

Understanding the code may be hard. Therefore, the Moral are aware of the possiblity that they may be mistaken in some aspects, and thus welcome education (to better understand the code) and correction (to better follow the code). The Moralist assumes that they are always right, and thus never feel themselves in need of education or correction.

The Moral seeks for all men to follow the code. The Moralist seeks for all men to follow him.

Fred Lapides at Israpundit found an excellent article by Jason Pappas at Faithfreedom.org, titled "Is Islam Evil?" It is chock full of good insights about the more general question of evil and what it is, as well as providing some tips to Warfighters. He starts off noting:

"Sophisticated" critics usually react to the word "evil" with condescension and derision. Describing something as "evil," in their view, generally brands one as an unenlightened throw-back to the dark ages -- or the equivalent of a televangelist preaching hellfire and damnation. Who forgets the outcry when President Reagan described the Soviet Union as the "Evil Empire?" Or today, when President Bush refers to the "Axis of Evil?" Commentators unequivocally condemn the word as an outmoded judgmental term unfit for today's multi-cultural world.

However, he also notes an interesting exception to this rule:

Unless, of course, one wants to use it to describe the United States of America or Western Civilization itself.

The question, "Is America evil?" is routinely discussed not just on message boards and in chat rooms -- the Internet equivalent of bathroom walls -- but by tenured professors and in respected newspapers. A New York Times book review on January 11, 2004, quotes author Lance Morrow from his book: "Evil, An Investigation". "Americans are struggling now with the possibility that their country may be evil -- or, to be more practical, that their country may be doing evil in the world." Just two weeks later, the front page of Book Review section reads: "Is America an evil empire? Seven new books seem ready to think so."

So, the critics REALLY don't scorn the use of the word "evil". They just take umbrage at WHO it is who is using the word. It's perfectly okay for THEM to use the word to describe America (and Israel, whom Mr. Pappas left out), but not okay for ANYONE else to use the word to describe whoever they are targeting at the moment. Perhaps they don't think that hypocrisy isn't evil either, provided THEY are the ones indulging in it.

Warfighting tip: Don't hesitate to use the word "evil", for fear of being derided. Instead, turn the derision back on the deriders by noting that THEY have no problems designating America, Capitalism, Christianity, or Israel, as evil. Demand why your use of it is so "primitive" and "backward", but THEIR use of it is not. Veiled references of their appearing hypocritical, juvenile, or childish are optional.

Mr. Pappas continues:

=> Read more!

John Ray's Feb. 11, 2004 posting about "Leftist Psychology" at Dissecting Leftism repeats a theory about Leftism and leftists that I have found intellectually unifying and fruitful as an explanation of their behavior.

He quotes from the e-mail of a reader:

"I noticed certain "errors of thought" occuring with those to the left of me -- logical errors, or a disinterest in fact, and quick switches to emotionally-based arguments. I wondered if there was actually some kind of thinking impairment going on, if there was some kind of brain defect or differing cognitive structure.

John replies (my bolding):

You are right that Leftists SEEM to think differently but they don't really. They are just dishonest about what they think. Arriving at a self-serving conclusion is all that they care about and they will slip and slide all over the place to do that. Their defect is of character, not of the mind. They know perfectly well what they are doing but their own ego matters more to them than the truth.

That explains pithily what they do, but WHY do they do it? John congently notes:

In other words, puffing themselves up as wise and benevolent is their overriding aim -- not confronting and dealing realistically with harsh facts -- and they will duck and weave and say anything convenient that occurs to them to achieve their aim. So most of the time it is pointless even to argue with them. They are just not interested in the facts -- only in their own warm inner glow of righteousness and wisdom. They will allow nothing to threaten that. It is generally only middle of the road people who have been hoodwinked by the Left who are worth your breath.

This is spot on. This attempt to come across as more virtuous and "righteous" accords with what the Apostle Paul says in the Book of Romans about how sinners grope toward satisfying the soul's demand for right standing with God.

One tactic I have used against Leftists and Lefist arguments is to abandon the argument and attack their moral basis for arguing it. It is easy to refute their arguments intellectually, so they will stoop either to ad-homniem argumentation, or assert a moral basis for their belief as a pretext for condemning you as a moral inferior. Ayn Rand, the Objectivist Philosoper, called this the "Argument from Intimidation," and I credit her for part of the response I recommend, which is to be morally certain of your position so you can't be intimidated.

However, I go further and recommend going on the counterattack by attacking their moral base: Think of an argument as an intellectual version of "King of the Hill", except that the Liberal proclaims that "the Hill" is always where he happens to be standing. In this context, you attack their moral credentials and standing as a Judge. In essence, you "deconstruct" their moral claims and kickm them off the hill.

Fair warning: This creates lots of sparks, smoke, and fire, for John has properly pointed out that "feeling good about oneself" is the REAL goal of the Liberal, and they WILL feel threatened. I know from personal experience: I inadvertently started doing this in an argument with a lefty cousin-in-law, and got a furiously indignant response that was all out of proportion to the supposed "offense" of demanding the moral credentials of a particular stand. So much so, that my wife demanded that I "apologize". When I explained the situation, my wife relented, realizing that extending the "apology", if it was an honest one, would have offended him even more, a situation of the cure being worse than the disease.

Another instance: At work, I have two liberals in adjacent cubes, one being an illegal-migrant-worker activist of sorts. They used to throw liberal comments out their cubes to the world in general, and to me and a fellow conservative on the other side of the room in particular, the one reinforcing the other. One day, they were trading barbs and debating health care and school education for illegals. They started moving toward the "How could you be so cruel?" argument, when I raised my voice and said, "How kind, noble, and good you all are, being soooo charitable with MY MONEY! How virtuous you are, as long as I am the one bearing the costs!"

Sudden, dead silence. The fellow conservative came over 10 minutes later and congratulated me. I haven't had any occasion to comment in a similar manner since that time.

Highly recommended. Asbestos longjohns mandatory.

Memo from the Dean's Office

One of the things that I've observed is that, given any particular country, that country's political "right" is unique and grounded in its history and culture. That is, to compare the "Right Wing" of France to the "Right Wing" of Russia, Germany, Canada, or the United States, is to compare legumes to bananas, oranges, cherries, and passion fruit.

However, another thing I have observed is that every country's political "Left", if it is democratic enough to have one, is depressingly the same. It is the "Right" that has true diversity and variety, both good and bad, while it is the "Left" that is monotonous, depressing, and stultifyingly uniform.

While the Left undoubtedly takes pride in this show of "international solidarity" (They're real big into "solidarity": when one of the absent Texas Democrat state senators boycotting the redistricting of Texas gave up and returned to do the job he was elected to do, the whole effort collapsed. The fight against John Ashcroft fell to pieces when Democratic Senator Zell Miller broke ranks and declared that Bush had the right to have a Cabinet of his own choosing), it provides us anti-idiotarians the advantage of being able to draw upon a wider range of critics than they do!

Thus, when I read this post from Israpundit, this statement stood out (emphasis mine) as being eerily familiar. Does it sound familiar to you?

Although there is no single answer to these questions, I think the main answer is: the reason the Left perseveres in its attitudes and behavior, and cannot change, is that doing so would mean saying, “We are being attacked” — i.e., joining the general Israeli population, renouncing its sense of being separate and superior. Put differently, it would mean acknowledging that the conflict is one between two nationalities, an uncivilized, aggressing one and a civilized, self-defending one, and that one is part of a national struggle, rather than a quest for peace based on universal principles.

"Separate and superior." Fits MY Leftists to a Tee, doesn't it? How about yours?

But wait! There's more!

The implications of viewing the situation that way — as it is — are unbearable for the true Left. Anybody who knows Israeli leftists knows that much of their emotional life, their socializing, and their identity revolves around expressions of hatred toward right-wing prime ministers and politicians and toward right-wing and religious parts of the population (not all leftists are like this, but most are). Predominantly college-educated products of intensive Marxist and postmodern indoctrination at Israeli and foreign universities, they view themselves as an enlightened, rational elite with a sophisticated grasp of politics that is beyond the reach of their benighted countrymen.

Wow. Substitute "American" for "Israeli", and the message would still be dead-on target. (The emphasis, by the way, is in the original, as it is in the following.)

Yet, once you say, “These bloody bastards are attacking us, even though we bent over backwards to make peace with them!” all that is lost. At that moment, your basic grasp of the situation becomes no different from that of a taxi driver, of segments of the population that you disdain and despise. At that point, too, a wall goes up between you and most of the visiting professors, the foreign journalists, the various international luminaries you consort with. Instead of acquiescing in their derogations of Israel and its leaders, you would have to defend your country, stand up for it — and thus dissolve, before their eyes, into the rabble.

This — unequivocally saying “We” — is the Rubicon that the Left cannot cross. Leftists do not hate war and violence, fear for the safety of themselves and their loved ones, more than other Israelis do. What they do fear is losing their identity, wholeheartedly joining the nation, becoming a nationalist. It doesn’t matter how many times the Islamofascists make chillingly clear that their genocidal target is all Israeli Jews — “settlers” and kibbutzniks, haredim and Tel Avivites — everyone and his brother and his children. The leftist will go on insisting that we are in a peace process, that the government is not being “creative” enough in pursuing diplomatic solutions, that “both sides” have noble goals, but are hampered by “extremists.”

If this next paragraph doesn't send a chill up your spine as equally applying to YOUR Liberals and Leftists, then you ARE one! It sure does apply to MY nation's lefties!

After these last three years, we’ve learned who the true leftists are, how deep-seated their anti-nationalist pathology, their resistance to reality, really is. True Israeli leftists are people who cannot be bombed and massacred into changing their way of viewing things.

I'd probably amend that last sentence to: "True Israeli leftists are people who won't let the bombing and massacre of other people change their way of viewing things." Hell, I'd probably amend THAT to:"True <insert nationality here> leftists are people who won't let <insert stupid government induced disaster> happening to other people change their way of viewing things."

Which is, of course, why dictatorships won't permit REAL, Western Style leftism to flourish in their country: They not only won't be able to stand the whining and criticism, but it's pretty damn suicidal to have such unfeeling bastards having any kind of say in running the country to boot.

=> Read more!