Are we allergic to capitalism?

Seriously. It seems like the yahoos that claim to speak for "black america" have instilled an irrational fear of the market. I notice this a lot. The arguements label anyone who isn't in favor of every random nanny state idea thrown out there is a racist or a Tom, when their rationale makes some of the most bigoted assumptions about us that I could possibly think of. They never explain why it is they think we can't suceed in the market when virtually every other ethnic group has their "piece", as if they suggest we're hard-wired to fail.

IMO, these are the REAL racists.

Values: Relative or non-relative? My opinion...

Note: this came about as a result of a previous topic on a message board I frequent.

"I think of it like this:

99.99% of values can't be concretely proven or disproven, but they can be lifted or lowered on the totem pole of usefulness. To use an example...say that you deeply value getting free porn on the net. To you, free porn is something to be charished beyond measure. Now, if you fire up some file-sharing program and end up with a large cache of videos that get you off well, then your value is for the moment justified, since you got what you wanted. If instead you end up downloading a bunch of viruses, then your deep respect for free porn just got you screwed, and for the moment seems less smart. However, life is not all one direction or the other, so eventually you get back to normal either way.

That other .01% is only the most BASIC of basic value that human beings have: value of their own lives and control of such. Outside of this "I am living, and would like to remain so" base, the rest is a debate that will never be won or lost."

Putting the principle I'll call The 1/10000th Undebateable to work on more serious topics, the result is this:

-"female circumcision" like what is practiced in the middle east is wrong. It's forced, so it violates the rule.
-Imprisoning people for speaking out against their government is wrong.
-celebrating your sons 18th birthday by buying him weed is not really "wrong", just stupid. Now if you FORCE him to smoke it, then it's wrong.
-homosexuality is not wrong. Beating the crap out of people for being gay IS wrong.

You get the idea.

Re: my hoped-for result of the election; Deroy Murdock basically agrees.

America is getting back to normal again.

Why do I say this? It's simple really: look at the news. People actually are wasting the time to give a shit about the latest celebrity run-in with the law. Could you have imagined a year ago that the public would be willing to hear newsanchors yap about Winona Ryder stealing clothes? Or that they'd be willing to fill newstime with it? It's safe to admit, we can waste time again.

This doesn't mean we should though.

People have a habit of feeling TOO safe, and when they feel too safe, they get overconfident. And when that happens, they become oblivious. Oblivious to important decisions made regarding their rights. If we don't wish to blow it, then we have to be able to remain vigilant and be unafraid to question authority. If not, then we won't have anyone to blame but ourselves in the end. Maintaining a free country is a lot of work, there is no such thing as a "day off".

Some quick news:


-According to Greenspan, the US economy has hit a "soft patch". Oh well, at least it isn't a briar patch...


-Sadaam: "fine, you win. Inspectify the realm of my dictatorness." So the UN keeps a shred of it's relevance, and why? Because we threatened to kill this guy if they didn't do as we said. Personally, if it weren't for the inevitable human toll from a war, the thought of "international law" still being available in it's current incantation would make me wonder if maybe it would've been better if he'd said no, so the charade could end. But then that'd be dismissing lives as unimportant compared to geopolitical cock-fighting, so best to accept this result and move on...


-coalition of states agrees on trying to...tax online purchases!?!?!? Someone out there tell me why the hell this makes any sense at all, PLEASE. The internet is beyond even the concept of state lines or national boundaries, this type of imposition is defeating the purpose.