Bush and his Father

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

I consider the LP stance on immigration far too permissive.

In a perfect world, what purpose would borders serve? I myself believe that anyone who wants to come here to work and better their lives should be welcome, but I recognize that there are dangerous factions we must try to keep out.

[andyfox]

As you know, I have a problem with the good vs. evil thinking. This doesn't deny the evilness of people who think flying planes into buildings is a good thing.

What is does is to gloss over history and politics and social issues and make everything seem dependent on the fact that the other side is bad simply because it is the other side. It also leads to "either you're with us or you're against us" thinking. Both of these things can be destructive and counter-productive to our goals of trying to thwart the other side. We saw this in the Cold War. Those who wanted to do anything to the left of where we wanted them to be (for example, land reform or support labor unions) were demonized as Communists and a lot of harm was done that both hurt the people in the countries involved and came back to haunt us later on. It led to actions which demonized us in the eyes of many people in the world and made the Soviet Union appear as heroic. Not an easy thing to have done.

I know politicians like to deal in black and white; shades of gray don't sell well. So I know the black and white case that is usually made to sell a war is usually two parts PR to one part truth. And I know Bush likes to play the amiable dunce, the simple down-home guy ala Harry Truman. But the world is a complex and complicated place and a policy that pretends we're not an empire and simply going about doing the right thing all the time can lead to trouble. And has.

[MMMMMM]

I do not disagree with those points.

It appears a balance is required, between self-criticism and resisting those who follow pernicious ideologies and would do us ill. That balance must not be static, though: it must be adjustable in accordance with the circumstances.

Don't be staring at your navel when the enemy is training his sights on you, but neither forget to glance at it occasionally when you can afford the luxury. That's my take on it all.

[ACPlayer]

It's time to get god out of our foreign policy

.. and domestic policies.

[andyfox]

"Don't be staring at your navel when the enemy is training his sights on you, but neither forget to glance at it occasionally when you can afford the luxury."

I expect to see this, along with "hypocrisy is the handmaiden of tyranny" in the next Bartlett's Familiar Quotations. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[MMMMMM]

Please document them both. Maybe we'll start our own Book of Quotations. [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

[MMMMMM]

There is actually something to be said for the concept of considering that our most inalienable rights inhere from God rather than from men--even if you don't believe in God.

Considering all rights as being derived from our fellow humans, those rights can more easily be swept away, than if we consider those rights as intrinsic to our natures and to whatever concept of God we might acknowledge.

God doesn't necessarily have to be the Creator, or be endowed with all the attributes humans commonly ascribe God (which tend to give rise to contradictory philosophical speculations).

Somewhere in the Bible, it says God is a Spirit. My loose personal interpretation of that is that God is the Spirit of love, of forgiveness, of kindness, and is also entertwined with the mysterious creative force or spark.

Jesus says that whatsoever ye have done to my smallest children or creatures, ye have also done unto me. If you consider that in the most general sense, I think you will see the point.

As all this relates to our legally guaranteed rights, I think it is a more certain, less mutable guarantee, if we hold that those rights are instrinsic rather than derived merely from human agreement. And I think that that little spark, or soul, or whatever, which is within all of us, and which is like God (or even like that which an atheist might consider to be a hypothetical conception of God), would approve of such rights being an intrinsic birthright rather than merely in passing.

[andyfox]

I would imagine that's what Jefferson had in mind when he said that the rights are inalienable, derived from the creator, rather than from the actions of man. That he was merely codifying that which is "natural."