Negative Railroad

A few days ago, I attempted to explain a Rush Limbaugh position to neo-neocon. I was mostly successful. Neo’s general question was about Republican elites and how Limbaugh views some of the possibilities in this fall’s election.

Neo’s post began:

Lately I’ve been puzzling over a meme that’s permeated the blogosphere in connection with the rise of Newt Gingrich. You know, the one that’s all about the Republican party elites or establishment types, the puppet masters who are controlling the whole campaign (and campaigns in previous years, giving us Dole and McCain) for their own nefarious purposes, which have nothing to do with conservative ideals but are the absolute antithesis of them. And fake conservative Romney is supposedly their new front man.
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I would have thought that Rush Limbaugh was one of these influential Republican elites, but I noticed in a couple of comments around the blogosphere that people were quoting him on the bad faith scheming of the Republican establishment, the ones who wanted Romney and didn’t want Newt.

I commented:

The GOP overlords hold that Newt Romney will lose to Obama.

Newt will polarize down-ballot, possibly even inspiring more loons like Angle and O’Donnell to win their races. The GOP elite loses control of the Senate, either outright or by the election of TEA people wearing the GOP jersey. The establishment depends on compliance.

Neo-neocon and I had a lengthy back-and-forth in the comments to her post about what Romney might do as President.

She made an excellent case for his credentials as a manager. I hold he is not what most people think of as a “manager”. He’s a consultant, somebody that managers hire. And worse to me, he abandoned initmate hands-on consulting to become a finance guy, somebody who works with bankers to manage debt and leverage.

From my comment that puts a frame around my perspective on President Romney:

I need to make a better case based on a distinction between finance and economics. I do not mean to draw a definition so narrow that few can qualify. But I DO want to disqualify those who feel that managing money is more important than managing real resources. I like battlefield generals, not headquarters generals.

My response to Cobb:

Those men in those edifices were wiser than I thought. I wanted to be Prometheus. But common men are fools, and fire is too much power for them.

By luck, guile, or self-delusion, I survived. I now understand that knowledge is amoral. And as men we are called to be moral. To choose is to be human.

The atheists, too, want to be Prometheus. But they have little guidance for the choices of a real life. It works in only abstract. Murder, for example, is wrong even to the godless. That conclusion requires no genius and comes with little risk.

One of the Chicago Boyz, with a nom de blog of Lexington Green, figured out what Glenn Beck’s Restoring Honor rally was all about:

Beck is building solidarity and cultural confidence in America, its Constitution, its military heritage, its freedom. This is a vision that is despised by the people who have long held the commanding heights of the culture. But is obviously alive and kicking.

Beck is creating positive themes of unity and patriotism and freedom and independence which are above mere political or policy choices, but not irrelevant to them. Political and policy choices rest on a foundation of philosophy, culture, self-image, ideals, religion. Change the foundation, and the rest will flow from that.

Craig Newmark has an excellent post about the inherent flaws in government regulation of commerce, and those who put their faith in regulators (re-quoting his quotes…go read the whole thing):

…it’s hard to think of a recent disaster in the business world that wasn’t abetted by inept regulation. Mining regulators allowed operators like Massey Energy to flout safety rules. Financial regulators let A.I.G. write more than half a trillion dollars of credit-default protection without making a noise. The S.E.C. failed to spot the frauds at Enron and WorldCom, gave Bernie Madoff a clean bill of health…

TJIC suggests that a rise in out-of-wedlock births correlates to a decline in civilization.

A commenter counters that marriage, which makes births “legitimate”, is a function of class and custom. Civilization has progressed even as legitimacy fluctuated, so the correlation does not mean what TJIC thinks it means.

I chimed in:

It’s not the state endorsement [of formal marriage] that matters. That endorsement, like the religious endorsement, strongly suggests that the parties have considered the depth of the obligation they are entering. The religious sanction still usually means the parties have deeply considered their choice. The underlying issue is personal integrity.

A Facebook friend, KL, posted the following status update:

KL is so tired of hearing about atheists molesting children, blowing people up, forming malitias in order to kill cops attending a funeral, etc. Er wait...

I commented:

The atheists spent most of the previous century murdering millions of peasants and eradicating Jews. It’s about time the religious types got in on the evil.

KL:

Stalin took the place of the deity and Hitler was a Catholic.

Conductor:

Don’t forget Mao and Pol Pot. Atheists win the body count by tens of millions.

KL:

Neo-neocon didn’t have the stomach to watch last night’s State of the Union address. I endured the whole thing. Setting aside the particulars of the implicitly contradictory wish list Barry set forth, I think the current President is cracking up.

He has lost his slickness, even with the teleprompter. His demeanor struck me as similar to the Seinfeld character George Costanza when caught in his own web of lies. Barry would make a joking jab, then smile a bit too big, as if he was looking for approval. His speaking style, when not in full campaign mode, is full of odd pauses. Last night, what was odd became awkward.

I read many excellent commentaries regarding September 11th, eight years after. Over at Daily Excuse, the chief procrastinator set aside excuses and called us to action:

Time flies and life goes on but we must always remember what happened that day. No longer did America remain safe from terrorism. Freedom is wonderful and precious but can be very expensive. So while we are out there wondering how we can retain our "natural beauty" or chose what church or movie theater or restaurant we want to go to remember that we here are very lucky and we need to protect and cherish that freedom. And we need to honor all those people who have died for the cause of freedom here and elsewhere.

My contribution to the discussion of LET THEM FAIL, at Café Hayek:

In several comments I sense a confusion between “wealth” and “money”.

The original post uses effective rhetoric. Saying “we’re going to run out of money” slams the idea home.

Following are excerpts from the StarTribune's comment section on an Associated Press story titled McCain equates earmarks with corruption even though Palin is seeking earmarks herself.

First, a bit of AP’s reporting for context: