RYC on Dan's blog: I would rather most women stay clothed as fully as possible. There are too many women I don't want to see any more of unless we can get them on a workout schedule. In the meantime ...cover up those legs and belly.

You don't know me, but you seem to be pretty interested in politics.  I would appreciate your input on my latest post.  Already asked my atheist communist friend for his.  Yours would be a good counterpoint, if you wouldn't mind taking the time.

RYC:  Your question is stacked, kinda like, "So when did you stop beating your wife".  Talk radio nuts use these kinds of questions to deflect valid criticism and shut down the argument in their favor.  When the caller refuses to conform to the preposterous limits of the yes/no question, he or she is accused of stonewalling.  It is one of the more infuriating aspects of the medium.

A man is entitled to keep what he earns, but he also has an obligation to contribute to the society and infrastructure that provides him with benefits he could never receive as a result of individual efforts.  I cannot afford to pave a road to my job.  I cannot afford to hire a private security firm to keep me safe.  These are services the state must provide, for the benefit of all, and they require that someone pay for them.  Unless you regularly send voluntary contributions to the Dept. of Highways, local police dept., etc., then I guess you can't cry foul if the government taxes you to pay for them.  People by nature will not voluntarily pay for all of these services, thus, we have mandatory income tax in addition to various other taxes.  But if we weren't blowing money in other places, the state wouldn't have to raise my gas tax to start with, would it?

Do you know anything about Grover Norquist?

Sorry, realized you weren't asking me that question, plus it wasn't pertaining to what I answered with, so just ignore the whole thing.

I still would like to know if you know anything about Grover Norquist though.

But if we weren't blowing money in other places, the state wouldn't have to raise my gas tax to start with, would it

Allow me let you in on a little secret: welfare accounts for far more federal tax $ than the war.

My view is that government should to see to those essentials which only a government can do: interstate infrastructure, war, diplomacy, regulating commerce, etc.

But to leave those things which private citizens, foundations, &c. can do alone: such as welfare, teaching, etc.

still would like to know if you know anything about Grover Norquist though.

I hadn't heard much of him before, he sounds a little extreme for my tastes: government is in the business of securing order. It should have precisely what it needs to accomlish that task.

Robert Kennedy: "Government belongs where evil needs an adversary and there are people in distress who cannot help themselves."

Lincoln at Cooper Union: "What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried?"

"And now that the legislators and do-gooders have so futilely inflicted so many systems upon society, may they finally end where they should have begun: May they reject all systems, and try liberty: for liberty is an acknowledgment of faith in God and His works."
-- Frederic Bastiat

Some Frenchie versus Lincoln and RFK? Man, that doesn't even seem a fair fight.

It seems Lincoln would be on my side (all things being equal I'd rather Robert E. Lee or even an honest man like US Grant).

As for calling Bastiat, 'some frenchie,' I guess that is all we need to know about TheWhale's cultural education.

Bastiat is far more important than some Kennedy Klanster.

Hey, just wanted to give you a shout out. Apparently, you're really hated on some of the liberal blogs here on Xanga, so I figured you're worth subscribing to. Take care.

Allow me let you in on a little secret: welfare accounts for far more federal tax $ than the war.

My view is that government should to see to those essentials which only a government can do: interstate infrastructure, war, diplomacy, regulating commerce, etc.

But to leave those things which private citizens, foundations, &c. can do alone: such as welfare, teaching, etc.

Yes, but I don't see the Republican-led congress and Bush running out and cutting 'wasteful spending' in the welfare sector.  I do see them cutting the funds for roads, bridges, etc., the infrastructure it is supposed to be supporting.  And most of that 'welfare' is Social Security, which may be wasteful, but noone is going to touch it.

Granted, he tried to fix SS, but rather than push the privatization angle, maybe he should have pushed the 'don't give checks to idiots who claim they're bi-polar and can't keep a job' angle instead.

I don't have a problem with welfare, though it should be more locally controlled.  The Federal gov't should give the money to the states, or eliminate that portion of our federal tax completely and let the states collect it to be used in their own programs.  Not everyone collecting a check is a deadbeat, but a state-controlled system would be somewhat more responsive to weeding those types out.

State welfare would be far more palatable -- not to mention legal -- but privatization would be even better.

I agree that it would be a shock to see Bush and the Republicans actually do something (didn't J. Gresham Maechen and Grover Cleveland warn us about this sort of thing?), but the dems being ready to skewer any ideas of budget-cutting on domestic spending -- and the MSM ready to crucify any real reformers -- doesn't help.



In other, news, per the comments above, it seems the lefty blogs dislike me. Looks like I'm doing something right.

YOU are defending the French? Isn't that role-reversal? How can you criticise my "cultural education" when every time I am in Paris I make sure to spend some time at Pere Lachaise, so I can visit Moliere and Wilde? A man who spends his free time reading Pascal? My God, man, I am a New York liberal overeducated Democrat, I am rotten with cultural education--heck, I was just at the season premiere of Wagner's opera "Lohengrin" at the Met. Rotten with cultural education, I tell you. Bastiat was a hack, that's all.

I suppose you have a similar view of Blackstone...

Have you ever read Pensees?

Did you know of Wagner's view about racial equality? Hiler enjoyed his music quite a bit (maybe he did have some taste!)

You sure want to speak of Hacks (Bastiat was not one) after posting an opinion by RFK?

I've always felt that if the Israeli philharmonic can overlook Wagner's stupidities, then so can I. And I have read Pensees several times, and in parts very often.

I do in my heart believe Bastiat a hack; Blackstone was very, very smart--although still a grotesque monster (I rarely have any sympathy for Catholic haters).

The rumor that I've heard is that Hitler just pretended to like Wagner, but it was too long an complex for him, and he really liked smaltzy crapola. Don't know if that is true or not.

I do in my heart believe Bastiat a hack; Blackstone was very, very smart--although still a grotesque monster (I rarely have any sympathy for Catholic haters.

Interesting that you can overlook Wagners hate of the jews because he wrote beautiful music, yet Blackstone -- who established the basis for our law -- is a monster.

And on what basis do you accuse Bastiat of being a hack? Other than disagreeing with you.....

Now, no one said I overlooked Wagner's anti-semitism. James Levine is the musical director of the Metropolitan Opera, and he can enjoy Wagner music, but as a Jew I doubt he forgets the monstrous stupidity of his notions of racial superiority. Wagner was a monster in the same sense Blackstone was--sure Blackstone was brilliant, but it is well worth remembering that the guy was hateful, just like Wagner. And Wagner is hardly my favorite, not within a mile. Of this last season at the Met "Le nozze di Figaro" (Mozart) and "Falstaff" (Verdi) were my favorites. "Lohengrin" was good, but not on the same bus with those two.


And while my French is not good at all, and I certainly could critique Bastiat on his ideas, which are creaky and often just dumbly wrongheaded, but his writing is duller than Foulcault's, which is saying something.

Blackstone at least had some good historical and religious reasons to dislike catholics (Bloody Mary anyone? How about laods of faulty doctrine?). Wagner was just silly (although he greatly influenced Hitler).

Now, as for Bastiat, you have yet to prove that his ideas are creaky or that his writing is dull. I have read parts of his writings and they seemed just fine to me. Not that I spend alot of time listening to great European operas, however.....

Another excellent quote from Bastiat:

"But how is this legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime."—from The Law