Ed Hudgins

Yuri’s Night Out: Celebrating 55 Years of Humans in Space
By Edward Hudgins

Space enthusiasts mark April 12^th as “Yuri’s Night Out,” a celebration of the first human in space: Yuri Gagarin orbited the Earth in 1961.

But Gagarin’s trip was courtesy of the Soviet government, which was hostile to the individual liberty that is the mark of civilization. Gagarin’s flight was still an achievement that marked a monumental turning point in human history and reflected values actually held in common by many in East and West, values that are, sadly, under siege in our world today.

The dream of space travel

While political and military concerns drove the Cold War race into space and to the Moon, many of the men and women involved were motivated by the goals of exploration and knowledge. America no doubt reached the Moon before the Soviet Union in part because our society was more open and free. Both sides had technical failures. But the dictatorial Soviet system meant few in the space program would speak truth to leadership.

Indeed, Gagarin himself was scheduled as the backup astronaut on a mission to dock two capsules in space, ordered by Soviet boss Brezhnev to mark the 50^th anniversary of the communist takeover of Russia. Gagarin and his colleagues knew the capsules were death traps, but those who questioned orders found themselves demoted or worse. Cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov died when his failing craft crashed back to earth.

Ultimately, the Soviet’s socialist economy and closed political system collapsed under its own contradictions. At the same time, the socialistic left’s belief in technological modernity collapsed as well.

The modernist aspiration of the old left

Karl Marx celebrated the Industrial Revolution’s production of immense wealth. (He was profoundly wrong in his belief that capitalists in market economies reaped the lion’s share of that wealth by exploiting workers.) This belief in the power of technology was a hallmark of the old left.

Soviet leaders sought to modernize... (Continue reading here.)

Regulators Drive Away Hyperloop Transport at Hyperspeed
By Edward Hudgins

April 6, 2016 -- In 2013, uber-entrepreneur Elon Musk open sourced his idea for a Hyperloop transportation system that could cut a six hour car or train trip between cities down to 30 minutes, faster than even most airline flights. But Knut Sauer, an executive for Hyperloop Technologies, Inc., says "The regulatory environment in the U.S. isn't friendly" and "That's why I believe the first Hyperloop will not be in the U.S."

Hyperloop’s transportation revolution

Musk developed the concept of a system that would transport individuals in pods or bullet coaches through tubes resembling the pneumatic tubes used at drive-thru banks. The time, costs, and energy savings of this technology could revolutionize transportation. Since he offered the idea to all comers, companies and university research groups are now competing to develop the best plans for bring such systems from science fiction to future fact.

Meanwhile, at both the state and federal levels, regulatory red tape and bureaucracies tie us to a slower, costlier, and inefficient present.

In an interview with Tech.Mic, Sauer explained that "There's a lot of interest, but no one can override the democratic system you have in the U.S." He added: “We cannot afford having a five-year back-and-forth process.” His company, Hyperloop Technologies, is based in California, where regulators have been delaying a plan for a $70 billion bullet train between LA and San Francisco. That system, which will suck up public financing, is a huge waste of money and cannot be justified in terms of the number passengers it will serve (few) or the speed of transit it will offer (slow). So perhaps delay is a good thing.

But those same regulators are also delaying any private alternative.
 

Does Hyperloop have a Future in America?

And we see Sauer’s prediction coming true. Dirk Ahlborn, the CEO of Sauer’s competition, Hyperloop Transportation Technologies, ... (Continue reading here.)

Minimum Wage Reveals Warped Leftist Values
By Edward Hudgins

April 5, 2016 -- When Gov. Jerry Brown signed a law requiring all employers to pay workers at least $15 per hour, he unbelievably acknowledged that “Economically, minimum wages may not make sense.” This statement reveals the depravity of leftist ideology and highlights the need for friends of freedom to fight those who would rob us of our liberty on moral grounds.

Minimum wages create economic harm

Economists have long pointed out the serious adverse effects of raising the minimum wage. Just recently Andy Puzder, the CEO of the Carl’s Jr. hamburger chain said, "With government driving up the cost of labor, it's driving down the number of jobs," and "You're going to see automation not just in airports and grocery stores, but in restaurants." He added that "If you're making labor more expensive, and automation less expensive—this is not rocket science."

Rapidly advancing technologies are stepping in to take advantage of government stupidity. We can expect in the future that burger-flippers will not be low-paid or even not-too-poorly paid teenagers in after-school jobs. They will be machines.

Minimum wages not only cause businesses to cut back on the number of workers or worker hours and perhaps go to robots. It deprives young people of the opportunity to learn the personal workplace habits they will need to get better-paying jobs in the future. And the vast majority of minimum wage workers are not single heads of families. They are students, part-time workers, and the like.

The moral ugliness of egalitarianism

So if the economic damage of minimum wage hikes is clear, what could compel Gov. Brown to sign the bill and for leftists from Bernie to Hillary to make $15 per hour a policy promise?

Brown explained that “Morally and socially and politically, [minimum wages] make every sense because it binds the community together and makes sure that parents can take care of their kids.” Of course, Brown’s claim about helping parents care for kids is made false by his admission that such laws make no economic sense—unless he means that parents who are unemployed ... (Continue reading here.)

Marguerite -- Movie Review
By Edward Hudgins

April 4, 2016 --

Sometimes you might tell a little white lie because you don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings. But the lies often end in tragedy. 

This is the theme of the French film Marguerite, now in American theaters. Marguerite offers a sometimes amusing but ultimately painful “the emperor has no clothes” tale of a would-be

singer who is so shielded from her own lack of talent that the ending can only be opera-tragic.
 

Singer with no talent

The film, based on a true story, opens in France in 1920 where a private charity recital is being staged at the chateau of wealthy Baroness Marguerite Dumont (Catherine Frot, playing a character whose name seems borrowed from Groucho Marx’s hapless leading lady). As the patron of the local Amadeus society, she has put herself on the program to sing to raise money. She butchers the “Queen of the Night” aria from Mozart’s Magic Flute. She doesn’t know how bad she is; she really can’t hear herself.

We gather her audience has been exposed to such travesties before, but she is the patron and it is for a good cause. They dutifully applaud her. Her husband, a developer facing financial problems, makes sure he has car problems as an excuse for arriving only after the terrible screeching ends.

Lucien Beaumont (Sylvain Dieuaide), a newspaper reviewer, and his artist friend Kyrill Von Priest (Aubert Fenoy) have snuck into the invite-only affair and witnessed the farce. But writing a bad review seems too easy. So at Kyrill’s urging, Lucien decides to praise her to the skies. She’s a great new voice!

Opera is Marguerite’s love, her life. She has a thousand musical scores. She has her trusty butler and piano accompanist Madelbos (Denis Mpunga) photograph of her with costumes and  props she has collected from her favorite works. He knows she can’t sing but is devoted to protecting her from ridicule.
 

Nihilism destroying values

When Marguerite reads Lucien’s review she is thrilled and visits him and Kyrill with thoughts of taking her singing into the wider world. Lucien is having second thoughts about the encouragement he’s given her, but Kyrill invites her to perform at a gathering he’s arranging at a small club. Why would he do such a thing?

Kyrill has pulled together an audience of businessmen, workers, solders, and a general cross-section of society. He comes on stage to loudly denounce every group represented there. As some boo and begin walking out, he has Marguerite come out in a white robe on which he projects a movie of World War I’s carnage as she does a horrendous rendition of the “Marseillaise,” the French national anthem.

Those familiar with Ayn Rand’s novel The Fountainhead will see the similarity between the nihilist Kyrill, who wants to destroy all values, and that novel’s character Ellsworth Toohey. The latter villain, who like Lucien writes a newspaper column, wants to tear down the great and the beautiful, and does so by praising the mediocre and the ugly.

But Marguerite does not see this. And Lucien, while feeling guilt, cannot bring himself to tell her the truth. She thinks the problem was the audience and decides to book an opera house and give a recital for Paris sophisticates.
 

Will no one tell the truth?

Though her husband is hardly faithful or attentive to her, he has enough love for her to dread the thought of her making a fool of herself before the world. But he finds it difficult to tell her the truth. He hopes a voice coach he convinces her to bring in to help her prepare for her recital will tell her how awful she sounds. However ... (Continue reading here.)

Obama Says Israel’s Prosperity Obstructs Peace
By Edward Hudgins

March 31, 2016 --

President Obama seems to blame the continuing Israeli-Palestinian conflict on, of all things, Israel’s prosperity. Not only is Obama wrong. If he understood the moral source of Israel’s affluence, he’d understand the avenue to peace.
 

Israel's economic strength 

Asked at a town hall meeting about that conflict, the president replied that “in some ways because Israeli society has been so successful economically, it has I think from a position of strength been less willing to make concessions. On the other hand, the Palestinians because of weakness have not had the political cohesion and organization to enter into negotiations and feel like they can get what they need.”

Is Obama right? To answer this question, we need to step back and look at some basic facts.
 

The values of Israel

Jews began coming to what was then Turkish-governed (later British-governed) Palestine in the late 1880s. Those from Eastern Europe were escaping the ghettos into which they were confined and subjected to periodic pogroms. Those from Western Europe saw continued anti-Semitism and their legal rights of citizenship as too tenuous a protection for their lives. The fears of those Zionists were proven all too right by Hitler and his henchmen. After World War II, Holocaust survivors sought refuge in Palestine.

Once in Palestine, Jews worked what some called a miracle. They purchased land, created settlements, introduced advanced agricultural and irrigation practices, and literally made the desert

bloom. They founded Tel Aviv as a modern, Westernized city. Indeed, today Israeli firms and entrepreneurs are cutting-edge techno-leaders: “Silicon Wadi” is that country’s equivalent of Silicon Valley.

In other words, the two top values defining Israeli society are life and productive achievement.
 

The values of Palestinians

When Israel declared itself a country per a United Nations resolution, David Ben Gurion promised the new state “will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants... (Continue reading here.)

Celebrating Andy Grove of Intel
By Edward Hudgins

March 30, 2016 -- If you’re reading this piece, checking email, visiting Facebook, or tweeting, give a silent thanks in part to Andy Grove.

Andy Grove was one of the founders of Intel, the company that invented the microprocessor—the "computer-on-a-chip" that runs most of the communication, information, and entertainment devices that make up our modern world. Grove, who recently passed away, was a techno-achiever who helped create that world.
 

Andy Grove escaped death

Grove’s success at Intel began with his success at literally escaping death. He was born András Gróf, a Jewish boy in Hungary in 1936. When fascists took over his country, he was forced to wear a Star of David and was destined for extermination. Fortunately, he and his mother hid in a neighbor's home, thus escaping the Holocaust. . . only to face a harsh new communist regime after the war. When Soviet tanks brutally put down a popular revolt against Red rule in 1956, he escaped by walking out of Hungary into Austria. He then made his way to New York City with $20 and the clothes on his back.

In the land of the free, he earned a PhD in chemical engineering at U.C. Berkeley, and in 1963 went to work for Bob Noyce and Gordon Moore at Fairchild Semiconductor. Noyce, Fairchild’s president, was the co-inventor of the integrated circuit (the chip) which would replace bulkier transistors. In July 1968, Noyce and Moore raised $25 million and co-founded Intel, the name implying "integrated electronics." Grove and his fellow Hungarian refugee, Les Vadasz, were their first two employees.
 

Andy Grove’s managerial achievement

At Intel, Noyce was the big-picture visionary. The silicon substrate in the integrated chip he co-invented gave rise to the name Silicon Valley. In 1971 three Intel engineers invented the microprocessor—the CPU in your device today. Moore led Intel's R&D, while Grove oversaw Intel's manufacturing. (Continue reading here.)
 

Disney’s Zootopia Teaches Kids about Inept Government

By Edward Hudgins

March 29, 2016 -

The popular Disney kid-flick Zootopia does something unusual for Hollywood: it takes a swipe at government.  

The cartoon film is set in a city where all animals, the minority predators and the majority herbivores, seemingly live in peace and harmony. But a string of disappearances leads a rookie bunny cop to enlist the help of a hustler fox to help her solve the mystery.

Sloth slow bureaucrats

The heroes must act fast and need to run a license plate. They rush into the Department of Motor Vehicles only to see it is staffed by sloths, an entire room full of them, sitting behind their desks, moving very, very, very slowly. The fast-talking bunny, quick as a rabbit, gives a clerk, ironically named Flash, the plate number. She watches in frustration as seconds pass and the sloth’s finger slowly rises, stops, and then slowly, oh-so-slowly, descends to the keyboard. One. Painful. Letter. At. A. Time.

When I saw the film with my five-year-olds, the adults in the theater howled with laugher. They’ve all been through it before. Perhaps some of the elders in the audience with their grandkids remembered the old Bob and Ray “Slow Talkers of America” routine.

Consciousness raising against government bureaucrats

Let’s hope the scene is a consciousness-raising experience for adults. Visits to the DMV... (Continue reading here.)

Brussels in the War for Civilization

By Edward Hudgins

March 24, 2016 --

In the aftermath of the March 22 Islamist attacks in Brussels you’ll hear legitimate discussions about security measures, immigration policy, and Obama’s moral cowardice in refusing to identify “Islamists” as the problem. But the underlying cause—philosophy—should be the ultimate focus of our attention.
 

Western attitudes toward Muslims

The discussions after each attack like the one in Brussels always center on Muslims and Islam. Many say “Not all Muslims are Islamists or terrorists,” or “I work with many fine Muslims,” or “We need to ally with Kurds, Turks, and other nice Muslims to defeat ISIS and Al Qaida.” Some—Donald Trump most loudly—argue for keeping Muslims—or at least those from Syria—out of the United States until we can sort out who’s dangerous. And Trump echoes other when he asserts that "Islam hates us."

Most of these views center on political concerns: Will more Muslims in a country lead to an increase in acts of terror or violence, and calls for repression in order to accommodate Muslims' sensitivities? Will not criticizing Islam or Muslim culture best ensure that Muslims respect the liberty of others?

But politics is a reflection of underlying values, reinforced by institutions and culture. The political regimes in Western Europe—and, most notably, in North America— are based on the Enlightenment.
 

Our Enlightenment civilization

Our civilization is based on a recognition of the power of human reason to understand the world and to guide our lives. See Isaac Newton!

Our civilization is based on the freedom of individuals in society to think, speak, and inquire freely. See Voltaire!

Our civilization is based on the recognition that individuals are ends in themselves, that we each have our own goals and dreams, and in society with others we should have the right to do as we please, dealing with our fellows based on mutual consent. See John Locke!

Our civilization is based on the notion that the purpose of government is to protect the liberty of each individual. See America’s Founders!

Our civilization is based on separation of church and state. See the U.S. Constitution.

That’s why Ayn Rand called the United States, “in its original founding principles, the only moral country in the history of the world.”
 

Muslims and modernity

Those who take Islam most seriously... (Continue reading here.)

He had a heart attack, You can read details if you wish on Rebecca Reale's Facebook page and express condolences to her there. Here's the link: https://www.facebook.com/rebecca.reale?fref=ts

Donald Heath RIP

We note in sorrow the recent death of Donald Heath. Don joined the staff as our director of operations, 1992-98, leaving a successful position in sales at IBM in Canada. In those early years, he put our business affairs on a professional basis; and he designed the program format for the Summer Seminar that we continue using to this day. He moved on to work for the Reason Foundation, but his commitment to and passion for the advance of Objectivist was undying. With his beloved Rebecca Reale, he attended the 2015 Atlas Summit where his enthusiasm, charm, wit, and insight helped make the event special.

Don was a bright light in our universe. We will post a remembrance soon on the TAS site, and we invite memories and photos all who knew him.

David Kelley

Krugman Endorses Theft Via Funny Money
By Edward Hudgins

March 26, 2016 --

In his latest column entitled “Crazy About Money,” Paul Krugman goes after Sen. Ted Cruz and House Speaker Paul Ryan for their endorsement of a return to the gold standard. But who is crazy?

The idea of a return to the gold standard disturbs him especially because the GOP gentlemen seem to have gotten it from Ayn Rand. (He even links right here to The Atlas Society as proof of this nefarious connection!) I wish they got all their policies from that source! But more important than debating Krugman’s economic errors is highlighting his moral errors.
 

The gold standard didn’t cause the Great Depression

Krugman argues that there is a consensus among economists that returning to the gold standard is a bad idea. Rather, he believes that it is better to allow the federal government through

the Federal Reserve to control the money supply. For example, he says many economists believe “that a destructive focus on gold played a major role in the spread of the Great Depression.”

Wrong! The newly-created Fed in the U.S. after World War One was able to inflate the currency, that is, print up dollar bills, because those bills were no longer strictly tied to a certain amount of gold. The goal at that time was, in part, to bring the exchange rate of the dollar with the British pound and other currencies into line with the rates that existed before the War, when currencies were tied to gold. They inflated the dollar—the Florida land boom and ‘20s stock boom resulting—and when they hauled back on the money supply. . . Pop went the markets!

Krugman forgets that Britain and North America industrialized in the 19th century, experiencing growth as fast as in the 20th, while basing their monies in gold. Of course, a bigger picture issue is that what we need is a free banking and monetary system. Then people will choose the best money for them: gold-backed, bitcoin, or perhaps suddenly trusty Federal Reserve notes.
 

Government can cheat and steal

When the government forces individuals to abandon gold as a currency and exercises control over money, the medium of exchange, the deeper problem is a moral one.

First, political control of money usually is part of a fundamental evasion of reality. Pandering politicians think they can get something for nothing... (Continue reading here.)

It's dark and cold outside with a mixture of freezing rain and snow. But I sit inside with my wife and children, warm and under bright lights. All of my lights are on in recognition of Human Achievement Hour. I celebrate the technology that lights up our lives and our world, making it a fit place for humans because we humans created it!

Celebrate Human Achievement Hour
By Edward Hudgins

March 18, 2016 --

If you want to celebrate human progress, you can light up the world, symbolically and literally, at Human Achievement Hour. On Saturday, March 19 between 8:30 and 9:30pm, turn on all your lights and post photos of your enlightened act!

The Competitive Enterprise Institute each year spearheads this observance so that people around the world can pay tribute to the human innovations that allow us to live better, fuller lives.

. The occasion highlights especially the importance of energy in improving the lives of all people.
 

The future is today

There is so much to celebrate! By every standard, life is materially better. Thanks to modern medical and health practices, global life expectancy over the past century has doubled. In the industrialized world, the vast majority of us have heated and air conditioned homes. We have inexpensive and healthy food, and refrigeration to preserve it. We have labor-saving devices like washing machines that free up women especially from hours of drudgery. We can travel to any place on earth in less than a day. We can communicate directly with billions and have access to the wealth of human knowledge instantly.

In the future, things could be even better. We’ve seen just in the past few years technologies that have allowed the blind to see, bionic devices that have allowed the lame to walk, and genetic engineering that has cured cancers!

This is the future of which billions of people in the past could not even have conceived. The billion who are still terribly poor in the present wish it would be their future.
 

The dark threat of environmentalism

But there is a darkening of these bright skies, and it’s coming from the culture. For example, in recent years environmental groups have promoted Earth Hour... (continue reading here.)

How to Counter Socialists about Social Security
By Edward Hudgins

March 16, 2016 -- Five years ago at the hospital, the joy of holding my newborn daughters in my arms was momentarily disrupted when I was asked to free up a hand to fill out the forms for their Social Security cards.

This memory came flooding back when I encountered a leftist social media meme picturing a Social Security card that reads “Do you have one of these? Congratulations! You’re a card-carrying socialist!” Another meme reads “If you don’t like socialism then take a stand. Reject your Social Security benefits. Reject your Medicaid and Medicare when you get sick.”

You might think these are propagated by trolls trying to make leftists look like real dimwits. But given that so many young people, most no doubt victims of government schooling, support Bernie Sanders, we know this scary-stupid is for real. So how to push back?

First, you don’t opt into Social Security or these other government “social insurance” programs. You’re literally born into them. To be employed legally and to do much else, you need this government ID number.

Second, the government takes money out of your paycheck against your will for Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and Unemployment Compensation. It’s coercive: you have no choice. If you don’t let the government take your money, it will come after you with guns to get it.

Third, if there were no social security, the vast majority of workers would see their pay rise around 15%, because the wage taxes employers pay to Social Security come off worker's pay in the end, too. If the worker took that money and invested it over a 40-year working lifetime, the market returns, if they followed historical patterns, would provide at least as good benefits as social security does, and in many if not most cases a lot better.

Fourth, there is no money in the Social Security trust fund... (Continue reading here.)

Will Trump Boycott Grocery Stores for Their Unfair Trade?
By Edward Hudgins

March 10, 2016 --

Donald Trump’s stump thump against Mexico is that it runs a $58 billion annual trade surplus with the United States. Trump somehow thinks this leaves America the poorer.

He claims that it is out of that money, presumably sitting in some giant vault in Tijuana, that Mexico will pay for the border fence he wants to build to keep immigrants from entering the United States illegally. Trump’s pronouncements only demonstrate how he keeps facts and reason from entering his thoughts and, how he would keep Americans from making their own free choices in a free market.
 

International free trade is win-win

Trump’s very language reveals a glaring error concerning trade. Mexico and America do not trade. Mexicans and Americans do. Mexicans have $58 billion more in cash (pieces of paper with George Washington’s picture on them or the equivalent credits on bank ledgers) and Americans have $58 billion more in goods (electrical equipment, Trump-themed apparel).

And Trump doesn’t bother to ask, what are those Mexicans supposed to do with those pieces of paper? If they don’t spend them in America, they’ve got nothing but useless paper. So the Mexican trade surplus also means that Mexicans are investing an equivalent amount in America, helping the U.S. economy grow.

Further, the fundamental nature of trade between individuals is a win-win situation. Someone who buys an orange Donald hat for $20 to show his support for the former host of “The Apprentice” values the hat more than the twenty. And the manufacturer in Mexico who has a warehouse full of said head gear prefers the $20.

If The Donald slaps a 30% tariff on all goods coming from Mexico, maybe his starry-eyed supporters would shell out $26, the higher cost of the hat. But a poor mother with five kids seeing the price of a pair of shoes jump from $20 to $26 might be hard-pressed to afford the extra $30 she’d need to cover the feet of all her five little ones. But Trump doesn’t care. He wants to get rid of that pesky trade imbalance and what better way than to discourage that mom from buying Mexican-made shoes for her family! On the other hand, maybe he will notice when Mexican investors pull out of his latest golf resort or skyscraper projects, because his policies have destroyed their profits.
 

Trump’s grocery store trade deficit

If Trump is so against trade deficits, he should have a serious problem in his own household. Trump no doubt runs a huge trade deficit with his grocery store. He gives them piles of money when he buys food—no doubt top-priced cuisine—but the store never buys anything from him. Maybe he should boycott it. Maybe we should all boycott our local grocery stores lest we be victims of a trade deficit. Maybe if elected president, Trump will slap a 30 percent “grocery tariff” on everything that those stores try to sell to we poor, exploited schleps until those stores start purchasing stuff from us. (Continue reading here.)

Happy Future Day!
By Edward Hudgins

Stand up for optimism about the future today!

Transhumanism Australia, a non-profit that promotes education in science and technology, has marked March 1 as “Future Day.” It wants this day celebrated worldwide as a time “to consider the future of humanity.” If all of us made a habit of celebrating our potential, it could transform a global culture mired in pessimism and malaise. It would help build an optimistic world that is confident about what humans can accomplish if we put our minds and imaginations to it.
 

The Future is Bright

The information and communications technology that helps define and shape our world was, 40 years ago, a vision of the future brought into present reality by visionaries like Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. The exponential growth of the power of semiconductors allowed entrepreneurs to create one new industry and cutting-edge good product and service after another.

Today, we are at exponential takeoff points in biotech, nanotech, and artificial intelligence. For example, the cost of sequencing a human genome was $100 million in 2001, $10 million in 2007, but it costs only a few thousand dollars today. Steve Jobs created the first Apple computers in his garage. Biohackers similarly housed could transform our lives in the future in ways that still seem to most folks like science fiction; indeed, the prospect of “curing death” is no longer a delusion of madmen but the well-funded research projects in the laboratories of the present.

For a prosperous present and promising future a society needs physical infrastructure—roads, power, communications. It needs a legal infrastructure—laws and political structures that protect the liberty of individuals so they can act freely and flourish in civil society. And it requires moral infrastructure, a culture that promotes the values of reason and individual productive achievement.
 

Future “Future Days”

We should congratulate our brothers “Down Under” for conceiving of Future Day. They have celebrated it in Sydney with a conference on the science that will produce a bright tomorrow. We in America... (Finish reading here.)

The Declaration of Independence states the moral purpose and aim of government which the Constitution sought to operationalize. Every political regime is based on moral premises of some sort, usually unstated. Our Founders stated those principles right out. If a regime is not based on those principles, it is not morally legitimate.

The Supreme Court, Scalia, and Restoring the Constitution
By Edward Hudgins

February 15, 2016 --

Antonin Scalia is dead. Will the Constitution die with him? The passing of this conservative Supreme Court Justice has set off a political firestorm in a year already burning with conflict. GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell is vowing not to consider an Obama-nominated replacement. He prefers to wait until after the election when he hopes a Republican will occupy the White House. GOP presidential candidates echo his call. But if they’re true friends of freedom, they will tie this appointment to what should be the central theme of the election: the restoration of the Constitution.
 

Imperfect balance on the Supreme Court

For many years, the Supreme Court has been balanced, with four left-liberals, four sort-of conservatives, and a swing vote—usually Justice Anthony Kennedy. It’s an imperfect balance. For example, Chief Justice John Roberts, a conservative, twice upheld Obamacare for reasons more in accord with an anything-government-does-goes ideology. Scalia was the intellectual anchor of the conservative wing: with him gone, the balance is gone, too.

Scalia’s replacement is now a major election year issue. Democrats argue that it is the president’s duty under the Constitution to make this appointment and that the Republicans would be “obstructionist” and “playing politics” by not allowing the Senate to vote on his choice. But during George W. Bush’s administration, Democrat Sen. Chuck Schumer argued against having hearings for that president’s court nominees. Republican Sen. Marco Rubio argues that a lame duck president should not nominate a court replacement. But if the president were a Reagan, Rubio would likely argue differently. Rubio’s lame “lame-duck” argument ignores the key idea that friends of freedom should make the defining issue of this election.
 

Defend the Constitution to project liberty

America’s Founders were clear in the Declaration of Independence that we are each endowed “certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men.” But they also understood that government is the greatest threat to liberty. Thus, they wrote a Constitution with checks and balances, federalism, and a Bill of Rights to restrain government.

But over the past century those individual liberties have been eroded as government has grown in scope and size beyond the purpose of the Constitution. The system is now a corrupt, crony mess. Indeed, we can ask the question, is the U.S. government still morally legitimate? Is it time for revolution? There is still a democratic process, however imperfect, by which government can be reformed without resort to arms. And as a practical matter, fighting would simply leave one arrested or dead in any case.

In recent years, the Supreme Court has stopped some of the worst abuses. Recently, for example, in District of Columbia v. Heller the court struck down government restrictions on the Second Amendment right to gun ownership; Scalia wrote the majority opinion. In Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission the court struck down government attempts to limit political speech. Both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have vowed to appoint justices who will reimpose such limits on liberty.

So while the court’s opinions are a mixed bag, were the court to become dominated by leftist ideologues, an important defense of the Constitution would be removed.
 

Restoring the Constitutional republic

All friends of freedom and, especially, Republicans campaigning for president should tie a replacement for Scalia to the broader goal of restoring the Constitutional republic. They should point out to citizens that the Constitution is a document of limited and enumerated powers. Article I, Sec. 8 spells out the powers of the U.S. government. The Tenth Amendment declares that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Most of what the federal government does today falls outside of its defined powers, but left-liberals on the Supreme Court have ignored this amendment, treating the Constitution as an open-ended grant of power to government.

But most conservatives cannot make a consistent case for the Constitution... (Continue reading here.)

Let's try some Thug Notes.  

Tried it and it didn't work. Also tried Youtube embed.

Can't insert youtube video and can't delete this post. Ignore.

Jonathan - I'm looking at ways to do just that! That's my meaning of "real-world philosophical medicine"  There's a place for academic discussion, but in the real world, friends of freedom need to present an integrated and inspiring vision of the world as it can be and should be, and to offer particular examples that will make real the economic and social dysfunction as well as immorality of the current system as well as positive possibilities of the alternative. Rhetoric, broadly defined, is the the skill most needed in this pursuit!

None of the current GOP candidates meet our criteria as total friends of freedom. This is why I suggest a grassroots strategy. Politicians more often than not say what they think their audiences want to hear. Trump understands that his base of support want to hear that he will come in, kick asses and smash the current corrupt system. Trump is less of a friend of freedom than most of the other candidates. But while the others point out that he is not in sync with his supporters on many issues, he also knows that this doesn't matter too much. His supporters will overlook inconsistencies because they see all the other candidates as weak, programmed, or whatever.

If alternative audiences ask for a different message, there's a chance that the other candidates could pick up on this. Also, there is a greater chance of influencing local candidate in local elections.

The battle continues ...

New Hampshire Primary Socialist Alarm

By Edward Hudgins

February 11, 2016 -- Bernie Sanders’s big win in the New Hampshire primary should set off alarm bells for Republicans struggling against Donald Trump and for all who value liberty.

Sanders probably won’t become president, but the socialist ideology on which his movement rests is metastasizing. We must fight it with real-world philosophical medicine.
 

Sanders open about socialism

Sanders is an unabashed and full-throated socialist—he likes to add the adjective “democratic”—who beat Hillary Clinton handily by 60% to 39% in New Hampshire. He pretty much tied her in Iowa, too, and is pulling even with her in national polls. It’s true that most of Hillary’s policies and certainly those of President Obama fall into the same category. But most Democrats feel the need to call themselves “Progressives,” to deny they’re socialists, and to claim that they simply want to help people. This crypto-socialist pose goes back to President Franklin Roosevelt who insisted he wanted to “save” the capitalist system even as he constructed the modern welfare state.

Sanders makes no apologies. His central message is that inequality must be eliminated, that the “rich” are responsible for our economic ills, and that they must be made to pay their “fair share.” Never mind that the top 1% of earners whom he demonizes shoulder nearly 40% of the federal income tax burden and the top 10% cover 70% of the bill. Never mind that even expropriating all the taxable income of the 1% would not cover his proposed $19 trillion spending increase for one year. (Math isn’t Bernie’s specialty.) And like all who put equality of condition first, Sanders would have all people be poor and equal rather than have all be more prosperous if it meant that some would end up substantially more prosperous than others.
 

Socialist appeal

In New Hampshire over 80% of voters under 29 years old voted for Sanders. This should not have come as a total surprise. A 2011 Pew survey found that only 46% of young people under 29 years old had a positive reaction to the word “capitalism” while 47% found it cold and hard. By contrast, 49% got good vibes from the word “socialism” while only 43% found it hard to swallow. By the way, the word “progressive,” which Bernie also wears, garnered a 67% positive response.

Pointing out that Sanders or even Obama are socialists does little except to alert us to the need to fight on a different battlefield and with different weapons.
 

America’s deep divisions

America’s divisions today are deeper than in many decades. The mass protests over the Vietnam War had a specific target. It also was accompanied by challenges to the status quo that actually sought liberty for blacks, women, and gays. And the ‘60s offered excuses for sex, drugs, and rock and roll. But most Baby Boomers settled into a system of private property and something resembling a free market system, albeit with a growing welfare state.

The fact that Sanders gains such support as an open socialist points to a fundamental shift in the value base of the country. Let’s grant that some of Sanders’ support comes from an understandable revulsion toward Hillary Clinton, the Queen of Cronyism, who disingenuously claims to be tough on the “one percent” that she and Bill are a part of and on the Wall Street bankers who’ve bankrolled her operation.

But several generations since the 1960s have been indoctrinated with authoritarian, left-wing dogmas... (read further here)