A Great Post from thesmallestminority.blogspot.com
Is the Government Responsible for Your Protection? Part 1A lot of people seem to think so. "We need more police, better enforcement," is usually the refrain you hear when crime rates go up, or a string of crimes occurs. The police tell us that we shouldn't resist when we're being robbed or raped. It's called taking the law into your own hands when you do. It's the job of the police and the justice system - branches of the government - to protect you, according to most people. Certainly according to most police chiefs and elected officials.But is it?Let me tell you a story:In the early morning hours of March 16, 1975, Carolyn Warren, Joan Taliaferro, and Miriam Douglas were asleep in their rooming house at 1112 Lamont Street, N.W. Warren and Taliaferro shared a room on the third floor of the house; Douglas shared a room on the second floor with her four-year-old daughter. The women were awakened by the sound of the back door being broken down by two men later identified as Marvin Kent and James Morse. The men entered Douglas' second floor room, where Kent forced Douglas to sodomize him and Morse raped her.Warren and Taliaferro heard Douglas' screams from the floor below. Warren telephoned the police, told the officer on duty that the house was being burglarized, and requested immediate assistance. The department employee told her to remain quiet and assured her that police assistance would be dispatched promptly. Warren's call was received at Metropolitan Police Department Headquarters at 6:23 a. m., and was recorded as a burglary in progress. At 6:26 a. m., a call was dispatched to officers on the street as a "Code 2" assignment, although calls of a crime in progress should be given priority and designated as "Code 1." Four police cruisers responded to the broadcast; three to the Lamont Street address and one to another address to investigate a possible suspect.Meanwhile, Warren and Taliaferro crawled from their window onto an adjoining roof and waited for the police to arrive. While there, they saw one policeman drive through the alley behind their house and proceed to the front of the residence without stopping, leaning out the window, or getting out of the car to check the back entrance of the house. A second officer apparently knocked on the door in front of the residence, but left when he received no answer. The three officers departed the scene at 6:33 a. m., five minutes after they arrived.Warren and Taliaferro crawled back inside their room. They again heard Douglas' continuing screams; again called the police; told the officer that the intruders had entered the home, and requested immediate assistance. Once again, a police officer assured them that help was on the way. This second call was received at 6:42 a. m. and recorded merely as "investigate the trouble" - it was never dispatched to any police officers.Believing the police might be in the house, Warren and Taliaferro called down to Douglas, thereby alerting Kent to their presence. Kent and Morse then forced all three women, at knifepoint, to accompany them to Kent's apartment. For the next fourteen hours the women were held captive, raped, robbed, beaten, forced to commit sexual acts upon each other, and made to submit to the sexual demands of Kent and Morse.Those paragraphs are taken, with the exception of a single word, "appellants," verbatim from the opinion in Warren v. District of Columbia. Carolyn Warren, Joan Taliaferro, and Miriam Douglas were the appellants in a lawsuit against the District of Columbia and its police department for failing to protect them. Fail them it did, but the court found against them. And here is its reasoning:A publicly maintained police force constitutes a basic governmental service provided to benefit the community at large by promoting public peace, safety and good order. The extent and quality of police protection afforded to the community necessarily depends upon the availability of public resources and upon legislative or administrative determinations concerning allocation of those resources. The public, through its representative officials, recruits, trains, maintains and disciplines its police force and determines the manner in which personnel are deployed. At any given time, publicly furnished police protection may accrue to the personal benefit of individual citizens, but at all times the needs and interests of the community at large predominate. Private resources and needs have little direct effect upon the nature of police services provided to the public. Accordingly, courts have without exception concluded that when a municipality or other governmental entity undertakes to furnish police services, it assumes a duty only to the public at large and not to individual members of the community. (Emphasis is mine)Note the quote: "without exception." This is not the first time someone has sued the government for not protecting them, not by a long shot. It's one of the most egregious examples, but far from the only one.So, it isn't the government's responsibility to protect "individual members of the community," that is, you and me specifically.So whose job is it?Think on that awhile. I'll come back with Part 2 where I'll discuss just why it can't be the job of government.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Relativism and Tolerance
The Myth of Relativism and the Cult of ToleranceBy Larrey Anderson
Introduction It has been twenty years since the late Allan Bloom shook the intellectual elite in this country with the opening line of The Closing of the American Mind: “There is one thing a professor can be absolutely certain of: almost every student in America believes, or says he believes, that truth is relative.” In one sentence our dirty little secret -- we believe in the truth that there is no truth -- was out.Why do we believe this? Bloom had that pegged too:
Relativism is necessary to openness; and this is the virtue, the only virtue, which all primary education for more than fifty years has dedicated itself to inculcating. Openness -- and the relativism that makes it the only plausible stance in the face of the various claims to truth and the various ways of life and kinds of human beings -- is the great insight of our times.But relativism is not a new idea. Ever since Protagoras declared, “Man is the measure of all things,” people have been attracted to relativism. Human beings are attracted to relativism -- not because it is true -- they are attracted to it because relativism is easy. I mean two things by “easy” and I mean to discuss those two things later in this essay. I will introduce them here. First, relativism is easy on the intellect. A person’s entire understanding of the entire workings of the entire universe can be stated in eight words: The truth is that there is no truth. Here is a truth, if it is true, simple enough for any simpleton. Next, relativism is easy on the conscience. If there is no truth out there then there are no values out there either; rather, the only values out there are the subjective ones that we create and put there. Thus, it is possible for us to agree to have this value as a shared value: if you let me make my values, I’ll let you make yours. The allowance by a society of the creation of conflicting values between one human being and another is, in our culture, called “tolerance.” As we will see, tolerance is one, but only one, possible moral outcome of relativism.But before we search the moral possibilities of relativism, let’s examine something a bit more basic. Let’s start with the truth. Part 1: The Myth of RelativismRelativism’s claim is that, with one exception, all things are relative. More accurately, the claim is that all things, events, and descriptions of things and events are based on the individual’s observation of those things and events. The exception to the assertion that nothing is absolute is the “fact” that all things are relative. Relativism is not just another thing or event or description; relativism claims to be the final word on the ultimate nature of every interaction of any human being with the world.If relativism is true then “truth” can no longer be defined, as it is in the dictionary, as “the true or actual state of a matter” or “conformity with fact or reality.” If relativism is true then every description of the world (except the description that all descriptions are relative) is subject to the time and location, and to the mood and bias, of the observer. Every description is subjective. If relativism is true then the only truth is that there is no truth.Until about two hundred years ago relativism was a little known corollary of the obscure theories of Epicureanism and Stoicism. Philosophers treated relativism like an iniquitous cousin -- one it was better not to be seen with -- especially in public.Relativism’s big chance came in the early part of the 19th century. Judeo-Christianity, the then prevailing philosophical explanation of human existence in Western culture, was being refuted by the application of the newly discovered scientific method. The new science proved that the world was more than a few thousand years old; it proved that man was not the center of the universe. The scientific method provided answers to some types of questions far more readily than others. It could, for example, explain how to aim and fire a cannon with amazing precision. Science could not, however, answer the much more difficult question of whether or not the firing of the cannon by one set of human beings at another set of human beings was justified.1 These abstract moral problems (e.g., when is killing a human being justified?) were the issues that relativism sought to resolve.Relativism has become popular because relativism claims to have the answers to questions like “What is justice?” Relativism has filled the gap left by the deterioration of faith in the truth of religion and the inability of science to provide quick and easy answers to the most pressing and the most difficult questions -- especially questions dealing with human interactions. To repeat, relativism is popular because it is easy. But is it true?The first difficulty we have in trying to answer that question is known in philosophy as the “problem of generality.” All of the arguments I know of which assert the truth of relativism are based on generalizations. (“All things are relative” is about as generalized as a generalization can be.) Generalizations try to say so much that they usually end up telling us very little -- or little worth knowing.2 Here is the important point: Not a single person that has ever existed has lived her life acting as if relativism were true. We live our lives by paying attention to the truth or falsity of particular statements. “You locked the keys in the car” is either true or false. We act upon the fact that it is one or the other. If it is true we call a locksmith; if it is false we look somewhere else for the keys. We do not live our lives by repeating over and over to ourselves that the world has no intrinsic characteristics, that anything and everything may be different tomorrow. We cannot live our lives acting as if all things are relative. There is another, somewhat related, problem with relativism. Once upon a time every first year philosophy student knew that relativism is self-referentially incoherent. Relativism claims that everything is relative -- but it leaves us wondering if that everything includes relativism, itself.3 The most difficult questions to answer -- not just for science, for anyone -- are questions about human interactions. In each and every mutual human exchange, the number of social, cultural, economic, behavioral, and moral variables is staggering. The social and the psychic sciences (which are the newest sciences, some of them less than a century old) have barely learned to accurately articulate such questions as, “What is justice?” or “Is there free will?” They may be centuries away from answering them.Here is the timetable so far: Human beings discovered numbers, the tools with which we make scientific predictions, over four thousand years ago. It took two thousand years before we could use those numbers to portray elementary geometric shapes like a triangle. It took two thousand more years before we could manipulate those same numbers to provide a useable, but still not totally accurate, description of gravity. Why, for heaven’s sake, would anyone think we should have a final answer to a monstrously difficult question like “What is justice?” when we don’t yet have a final reason for why our feet stick to the ground?Relativism asserts its own universality as it proclaims the relativity of all other assertions. Every other sentence ever uttered or ever to be uttered is relative to some one circumstance or another … but not this one. That’s an awful lot to swallow and an amazing number of people have swallowed it.A person may claim that relativism is true but he will never live his life as if it is true. In fact, he cannot live his life as if the truth is that there is no truth -- unless he wants to live a very short and very frustrating life. “You locked the keys in the car” is either true or false. If you want to go anywhere in your car you will figure out which one it is -- you will not argue that it is both or neither. Part II: The Cult of ToleranceIt may be fun, at a Starbuck’s or in Philosophy 101, to argue that walls aren’t “really” solid or that tables might “really” be made of ice or that all things are “really” relative but as soon as we exit the café or the classroom we either immediately return to the reality of the really real world … or we die. The car speeding down the road at us might be an illusion or it might be made of marshmallows but no sane person acts as if it is. So, at least in terms of empirical truths, we leave the “truth” of relativism in the classroom or the coffee shop or we suffer the consequences.Unfortunately, the same thing cannot be so obviously stated for moral truths. Moral relativism not only follows us out of the classroom and café; it chases us around the block. In our day and age the form of moral relativism that most pursues us is tolerance. It has not always been so.The traditional moral relativist, beginning at least as early as Thrasymachus in Plato’s Republic, was a proponent of the strongman or the dictator or, in Nietzsche’s refined phrase, “the will to power.” The traditional argument was simple: if there is no objective right and no objective wrong then might makes right and weakness is wrong. What is good is what the strongest proclaims to be the good -- what he wills to be the good. What is good is an “overman,” a dictator who knows how to use his will to and for power.4 Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin, and Mao were all “supermen” who attempted to impose their “will to power” on the masses.In the middle of the 19th century the notion of tolerance, as an alternative to the traditional strongman approach to moral relativism, started to gain acceptance. Two things paved the way for this acceptance. (1) Democracy in the United States was proving to be politically viable and writers like Alexis de Tocqueville were spreading the word. America’s founding fathers appeared to have finally found a way for large numbers of people to govern themselves. These self-governing people could have cared less about a relativism that gave them another dictator or king.5 (2) But, these same self-governing people might have been interested in a moral relativism for the masses because, around this time, Darwin and other scientists were demolishing myths like creationism that had served as pillars of the Christian faith.At this critical juncture, belief in Christianity was shaky but still widespread. If there were a form of moral relativism that mimicked the central themes of Christianity (love thy neighbor, judge not, etc.), there would be a huge number of educated people waiting and willing to entertain the idea. If that same idea were both easy to understand and attractive to the masses … it could be a grand slam. History was ripe for the appearance of the cult of tolerance.The first use of “tolerance” in its current form, as diversity and openness to the life choices of others, was offered in 1859 (the same year that Charles Darwin published The Origin of Species) by John Stuart Mill in Chapter 3 of On Liberty:
Such are the differences among human beings in their sources of pleasure, their susceptibilities of pain, and the operation on them of different physical and moral agencies, that unless there is a corresponding diversity in their modes of life, they neither obtain their fair share of happiness, nor grow up to the mental, moral and aesthetic stature of which their nature is capable. Why then should tolerance, as far as the public sentiment is concerned, extend only to tastes and modes of life which extort acquiescence by the multitude of their adherents.Sorry for the gobbledygook but I didn’t write it. Once you start reading explanations for and defenses of tolerance, you will find out, as I have, that almost all of them are illogical. Let’s look closely at this one because it was, essentially, the first one and is, probably, the most important one.Notice that the first sentence actually says exactly the opposite of what it seems to say. It seems to say that human happiness depends on a diversity of modes of life so that human nature may be fulfilled. Mill misleads us by using the plural form throughout the first clause of the first sentence. (“Such are [plural] the differences [plural] among human beings [plural] in their [plural] sources [plural, etc.]”) In the second half of the sentence “diversity” and “nature” are both written in the singular to make it appear as if “diversity” is the stabilizing and determining principle of human “nature.” But what the sentence must mean -- the only thing it can mean if it is a rational statement -- is that there is no such thing as a shared human nature, that each human being has an absolutely specialized nature of his or her own.If Mill had been honest (and not trying to sucker wavering Christians) he would have written something like this:
Such is the difference between me and everyone else in my pleasure, in my susceptibility of pain and in how I want different physical and moral agents to react to me, that unless I can live my life anyway that I want to, I will not be happy nor fulfill that nature which is uniquely mine.Read Mill’s original sentence again. The only way that it makes any sense at all is if it applies to each individual human being; it only makes sense if every human being is radically free and radically different from every other human being because each has had unique experiences of either pleasure or pain from similar sources.So the first step in understanding the cult of tolerance is grasping the fact that it is grounded in a very egocentric view of human existence. When I insist that others be free to pursue their goals and desires, I necessarily reserve that same privilege for myself. “Let all others be whatever they will be,” sounds vaguely Christian and quite progressive but it also, and necessarily so, means “Let me do whatever I want to do” -- which is exceedingly selfish and utterly immature.The second step in understanding the cult of tolerance is to see how it mimics Christianity by pretending to be non-judgmental. Christianity teaches that it is wrong to judge others. The cult of tolerance seems to teach the same thing. But the reasons each of them gives for not judging others are vastly different. Christianity teaches that there is one, and only one, way of living that is moral: the Christian life is the moral life. Christians acknowledge that a perfect Christian life is (depending upon the particular brand of Christianity) either very difficult or impossible (at least without God’s help).The Christian is commanded not to judge her brother -- not because there are no moral rules held by Christianity to be both universal and objective, there are plenty of them -- she is commanded not to judge her brother because it is highly unlikely that either she or her brother have reached the point of perfection in their lives when either of them would be able to judge the other.In other words, Christianity sees and acknowledges an important truth about moral judgments: objective and accurate moral judgments are hard to get right most of the time and impossible to get right all of the time. The Christian is told not to judge, not because there is nothing to judge, she is told not to judge because it is doubtful that she is qualified to judge. This is a vastly different moral position than those found in the cult of tolerance.Roughly speaking, the cult of tolerance has two kinds of adherents (1) the multiculturalists and (2) the politically correct. Each of these sects within the cult of tolerance offers its own reasons for why we should not judge others. These reasons conflict, not only with the Christian reason, they conflict with each other.One of these conflicting reasons is the raison d’être of the multicultural branch of the cult. The other reason, which we have already encountered and will get back to in a minute, is the explanation espoused by the politically correct sect. The multiculturalist claims that we should not judge others because moral values are culturally relative; i.e., what is right in one society may be wrong in another. This is what Mill seems to be hinting at in the second half of the quotation from On Liberty we saw above. Right and wrong are traditional values that change as societies change and that vary from one society or culture to another. The concept of right and wrong is, itself, parochial. The enlightened multiculturalist understands that his culture’s values are just as arbitrary as his neighbor’s. If pressed for an explanation for why he follows his culture’s mores, he will tell you he chooses to obey them as an obeisance to his tradition -- that and nothing else.Notice how condescending this person’s attitude is -- not just to his own culture -- to every culture. Every intelligent and committed Christian, Hindu, Moslem, or Jew (Buddhist’s are a slightly different story) that follows the moral teaching of her religion, not only believes that her values are objectively valid, she can offer arguments, with varying degrees of cogency, for their validity. (Notice also that many of these values and arguments are the same from religion to religion. This fact should tell us something.)The multiculturalist, in effect, pats the believer on the head and says, “Aren’t you a clever little girl! You claim you have reasons for your ‘right’ and your ‘wrong.’ ‘Objective reasons?’ You call them ‘objective reasons?’ That’s so nice. But I’m too busy to hear them right now. Now go run and play with those people with those other beliefs and those other ‘objective’ reasons; but be sure not to upset anybody.”Of the major religions, Christianity is the most susceptible to this rendition of the siren song of tolerance because it prides itself on not judging others. If the Christian does object, either to the argument of, or to her treatment by, the multiculturalist, she is likely to hear something like this, “You are judging me and judging your fellow human beings. And you call yourself a Christian?” Most Christians simply don’t have an answer for the multicultural branch of the cult of tolerance.6 The cult of tolerance is Christianity without the guilt, without the work; it is Christianity without the faith, the hope, and the love. The cult of tolerance is selfishness disguised as Christianity.Christianity commands, in effect, “Do not judge, least you err, and are then objectively judged by God for that error.” The politically correct branch of the cult of tolerance presents itself as a watered down version of Christian morality. The politically correct members of the cult of tolerance threaten, “Do not judge because there is no objective morality by which you can judge and if you do judge we have subjectively agreed to judge you for your judging.” In other words, political correctness goes beyond multiculturalism in as much as the politically correct sect demands that we abandon our traditions and accept a new social contract based upon the “fact” that there are no objective moral standards.Unlike traditional moral relativism where the strongman rules because “might makes right,” politically correct moral relativism claims to be democratic. In truth, it is far from it. Tolerance, in its politically correct guise, is the imposition of a standardless standard upon the masses.In a frightening way this standard is self-enforcing and self-reinforcing; i.e., the standardless standard of politically correct moral relativism asserts itself as both the strongman of traditional moral relativism and the strongman’s precept that “might makes right.” Political correctness reinforces itself by enforcing itself as the ultimate moral concept upon the masses. It does this by prohibiting the practice of any standard that challenges its legitimacy and its supremacy.Prayer in public school is a classic example. If moral standards were determined democratically (we voted on which principles were right and which were wrong), then, at least in the United States, a brief portion of every child’s school day would be spent in some kind of prayer. In surveys, Americans consistently and overwhelmingly approve of school prayer. Nevertheless, there is not a public school in the United States in which the administrators do not get highly nervous if a student so much as nods her head in a manner that might be construed as a prayer.Some conservative pundits blame this on “liberal judges” but a careful review of the legal decisions regarding prayer in school shows a hodge-podge approach by the courts. Prayer is not allowed in America’s schools for one reason: Not enough Americans want to expend the energy to challenge the reign of political correctness; and because they do not, the Christian command to “love thy neighbor” slowly deteriorates into the politically correct cop-out of “leave thy neighbor alone.” If some children pray then some other children might be offended. Therefore, nobody prays and nobody is offended.This is how political correctness reinforces itself as the standard of behavior by enforcing itself as the standardless standard of behavior. This is what happens when a society agrees to a social contract to have no social contract -- the society leaps into a cultural vortex which spins down and down into a moral black hole. This brings us to the fourth and final step in understanding the cult of tolerance; in some ways this is the most important step; it is also the most difficult step to explain: Members of the cult of tolerance defend and justify their position with emotional, as opposed to rational, arguments.There are members of the cult of tolerance who actually feel that tolerance is grounded in love and respect for others. They feel that toleration is equivalent to understanding. I know there are such people -- lots of them -- some of them capable of an impassioned defense of these feelings. And while they may believe that their defense of tolerance is some sort of rational construct, when you push them, as I have pushed them, you will discover that they are actually defending their feelings. They almost never offer a logical argument for their assertion that tolerating another person or another culture is the same as understanding that person or culture. They would be hard pressed to do so because toleration is not understanding.Here is an example: to “understand” Islam by “practicing” it for a few days (this is now a requirement in some of America’s public schools) is to understand very little. Instead it is to feel -- rather, it is to pretend to feel -- what a Moslem feels when he practices the ceremonies that make up his religion.If I want to understand Islam I do not pretend to be a Moslem for a few days, then stop the pretense, and then claim that I understand Islam because I have playacted the role of a Moslem. Such behavior cannot lead to understanding. Such behavior might make me feel a little better about myself -- without taking the much more difficult step of actually understanding either Islam or myself.Like it or not, a Moslem performs Islamic rituals because he believes that Islam is true and that the practice of the prescribed rituals will bring him closer to God and to the truth. If I want to understand Islam I must start by accepting the fact that the Moslem believes this.Remember, the keys are either in the car or they are not. This is the form that truth takes in real life. The difference between the examples of car keys and Islam is this: truths like car key locations are very simple and easily decided, whereas, truths of morality and religion are not. Most people just do not like moral complexity. Those who enter the cult of tolerance avoid the difficult process of making an actual choice and get to feel good about it.Moslems, like Mormons, Catholics, Moonies, and Jews, are what they are -- not because of what they wear or what they eat -- they are what they are because of what they believe to be true. They may be wrong in those beliefs; but unless we understand that they believe what they believe is true … we do not understand them at all.In short, those who claim that tolerance leads to understanding have not thought through what it means to understand. Those who have joined the cult of tolerance have opted, as human beings are inclined to do, for very simple answers to life’s most important and most complex questions.Almost all of us -- including, I believe, all but the most deluded members of the cult -- know what tolerance really is. We’ve known it most of our lives. We’ve known it ever since the moment our mothers told us we had to go outside and play with that pain in the rear of a little sister; we’ve known it ever since we wanted a bike for our birthday but got a little red wagon with which, we were told, we could haul that same sister; we’ve known it ever since that very same sister was always getting into our stuff when she had no reciprocal stuff worth getting into.That is tolerance -- which, by the way, comes from the Latin tolerãre -- a word that means “to suffer” or “to bear.” Real tolerance is never easy. It is not often fun. But it is real, as real as finding your car keys. It is just a lot harder ... to bear.Larrey Anderson is a writer, a philosopher, and submissions editor for American Thinker. His latest award-winning novel is The Order of the Beloved . His memoir, Underground : Life and Survival in the Russian Black Market, has just been released.1. The science that refuted some of the basic tenets of religion was grounded in a brand new methodology of verifiable experimentation -- and experiments take time. So, at least initially, science was unable to answer the very questions it had shown that religion had gotten wrong. As an example, although the first geologists could prove that the earth was older than the approximately twelve thousand year old estimate of the Bible, their own estimates of the earth’s beginning were notoriously off. They had not yet collected enough data to give an accurate date. Eventually, science gives answers, but it does not give quick or easily determined answers.2. Statements such as “All things are relative” or “The truth is that there is no truth” cannot be, what Poincarè termed, “real generalizations.” I.e., they are not generalizations whose veracity might eventually be secured by direct observation. What, exactly, are we looking for in our observations that could confirm or deny these statements of relativism? (Cf. the statement “All swans are black.”) Statements like “All things are relative” suffer from what is called “the paradox of confirmation.” This is true (of all statements like “All things are relative”) from every viewpoint of induction that I have seen, including those of J. Nicod, J.M. Keynes, R. Carnap, D. Stove, and even Karl Popper.3. Every statement of relativism leads, sooner or later, to a logical paradox that is very similar to what is known in philosophy as Russell’s paradox. Named after the British philosopher, Bertrand Russell, the paradox goes like this: Nearly all classes of things are not themselves members of the class. For example, the class of cows is not a cow. Nevertheless, if we generalize, and speak of a class as a class, then a class can be a member of itself. The class of classes is a class. (Picture the Russian matryoshkas -- those nesting dolls.) The question Russell then posed was: Is the class, of all classes that are not members of themselves, a member of itself? If yes, then no, and if no, then yes. Voilà! Paradox.4. The “will to power” was a crucial doctrine for both Nietzsche and Heidegger -- the two “world class” philosophers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Nietzsche consistently railed against the “herd morality” of tolerance while he argued that any new morality must be based on a will to power. Heidegger apparently believed so much in the übermensch that he joined Hitler’s Nazi party.5. This is part of the reason that nobody bothered to read Nietzsche until after his teaching was reconstructed, having first been “deconstructed,” by the left. Nietzsche’s true teaching is demonstrably undemocratic and radically right wing.6. Unfortunately, the Moslems do. Islam may be the most clannish, the most brutish, and the least sophisticated of all the major religions, but its adherents are not all idiots. Many are smart enough to understand when they are being placated and insulted in the same breath. Some are ruthless enough to do something about it. Unlike Christians, who when slapped in the face are directed to turn the other cheek, Moslems are directed to slap back -- and slap hard.Those who contend that it is conservative Christians and conservative Jews which cause the Moslems to hate the West need to look at Anzar Nafisi’s Reading Lolita in Tehran or go to MEMRI.org and read the sermons and interviews of “moderate” Moslem clerics like Sheikh Abd al-Muhsin al-Abikan. The problem intellectual Moslems have with the West is the moral nihilism that they claim has infected our culture as a direct result of multiculturalism. I wonder how many staff members at the state department have read that memo?
Introduction It has been twenty years since the late Allan Bloom shook the intellectual elite in this country with the opening line of The Closing of the American Mind: “There is one thing a professor can be absolutely certain of: almost every student in America believes, or says he believes, that truth is relative.” In one sentence our dirty little secret -- we believe in the truth that there is no truth -- was out.Why do we believe this? Bloom had that pegged too:
Relativism is necessary to openness; and this is the virtue, the only virtue, which all primary education for more than fifty years has dedicated itself to inculcating. Openness -- and the relativism that makes it the only plausible stance in the face of the various claims to truth and the various ways of life and kinds of human beings -- is the great insight of our times.But relativism is not a new idea. Ever since Protagoras declared, “Man is the measure of all things,” people have been attracted to relativism. Human beings are attracted to relativism -- not because it is true -- they are attracted to it because relativism is easy. I mean two things by “easy” and I mean to discuss those two things later in this essay. I will introduce them here. First, relativism is easy on the intellect. A person’s entire understanding of the entire workings of the entire universe can be stated in eight words: The truth is that there is no truth. Here is a truth, if it is true, simple enough for any simpleton. Next, relativism is easy on the conscience. If there is no truth out there then there are no values out there either; rather, the only values out there are the subjective ones that we create and put there. Thus, it is possible for us to agree to have this value as a shared value: if you let me make my values, I’ll let you make yours. The allowance by a society of the creation of conflicting values between one human being and another is, in our culture, called “tolerance.” As we will see, tolerance is one, but only one, possible moral outcome of relativism.But before we search the moral possibilities of relativism, let’s examine something a bit more basic. Let’s start with the truth. Part 1: The Myth of RelativismRelativism’s claim is that, with one exception, all things are relative. More accurately, the claim is that all things, events, and descriptions of things and events are based on the individual’s observation of those things and events. The exception to the assertion that nothing is absolute is the “fact” that all things are relative. Relativism is not just another thing or event or description; relativism claims to be the final word on the ultimate nature of every interaction of any human being with the world.If relativism is true then “truth” can no longer be defined, as it is in the dictionary, as “the true or actual state of a matter” or “conformity with fact or reality.” If relativism is true then every description of the world (except the description that all descriptions are relative) is subject to the time and location, and to the mood and bias, of the observer. Every description is subjective. If relativism is true then the only truth is that there is no truth.Until about two hundred years ago relativism was a little known corollary of the obscure theories of Epicureanism and Stoicism. Philosophers treated relativism like an iniquitous cousin -- one it was better not to be seen with -- especially in public.Relativism’s big chance came in the early part of the 19th century. Judeo-Christianity, the then prevailing philosophical explanation of human existence in Western culture, was being refuted by the application of the newly discovered scientific method. The new science proved that the world was more than a few thousand years old; it proved that man was not the center of the universe. The scientific method provided answers to some types of questions far more readily than others. It could, for example, explain how to aim and fire a cannon with amazing precision. Science could not, however, answer the much more difficult question of whether or not the firing of the cannon by one set of human beings at another set of human beings was justified.1 These abstract moral problems (e.g., when is killing a human being justified?) were the issues that relativism sought to resolve.Relativism has become popular because relativism claims to have the answers to questions like “What is justice?” Relativism has filled the gap left by the deterioration of faith in the truth of religion and the inability of science to provide quick and easy answers to the most pressing and the most difficult questions -- especially questions dealing with human interactions. To repeat, relativism is popular because it is easy. But is it true?The first difficulty we have in trying to answer that question is known in philosophy as the “problem of generality.” All of the arguments I know of which assert the truth of relativism are based on generalizations. (“All things are relative” is about as generalized as a generalization can be.) Generalizations try to say so much that they usually end up telling us very little -- or little worth knowing.2 Here is the important point: Not a single person that has ever existed has lived her life acting as if relativism were true. We live our lives by paying attention to the truth or falsity of particular statements. “You locked the keys in the car” is either true or false. We act upon the fact that it is one or the other. If it is true we call a locksmith; if it is false we look somewhere else for the keys. We do not live our lives by repeating over and over to ourselves that the world has no intrinsic characteristics, that anything and everything may be different tomorrow. We cannot live our lives acting as if all things are relative. There is another, somewhat related, problem with relativism. Once upon a time every first year philosophy student knew that relativism is self-referentially incoherent. Relativism claims that everything is relative -- but it leaves us wondering if that everything includes relativism, itself.3 The most difficult questions to answer -- not just for science, for anyone -- are questions about human interactions. In each and every mutual human exchange, the number of social, cultural, economic, behavioral, and moral variables is staggering. The social and the psychic sciences (which are the newest sciences, some of them less than a century old) have barely learned to accurately articulate such questions as, “What is justice?” or “Is there free will?” They may be centuries away from answering them.Here is the timetable so far: Human beings discovered numbers, the tools with which we make scientific predictions, over four thousand years ago. It took two thousand years before we could use those numbers to portray elementary geometric shapes like a triangle. It took two thousand more years before we could manipulate those same numbers to provide a useable, but still not totally accurate, description of gravity. Why, for heaven’s sake, would anyone think we should have a final answer to a monstrously difficult question like “What is justice?” when we don’t yet have a final reason for why our feet stick to the ground?Relativism asserts its own universality as it proclaims the relativity of all other assertions. Every other sentence ever uttered or ever to be uttered is relative to some one circumstance or another … but not this one. That’s an awful lot to swallow and an amazing number of people have swallowed it.A person may claim that relativism is true but he will never live his life as if it is true. In fact, he cannot live his life as if the truth is that there is no truth -- unless he wants to live a very short and very frustrating life. “You locked the keys in the car” is either true or false. If you want to go anywhere in your car you will figure out which one it is -- you will not argue that it is both or neither. Part II: The Cult of ToleranceIt may be fun, at a Starbuck’s or in Philosophy 101, to argue that walls aren’t “really” solid or that tables might “really” be made of ice or that all things are “really” relative but as soon as we exit the café or the classroom we either immediately return to the reality of the really real world … or we die. The car speeding down the road at us might be an illusion or it might be made of marshmallows but no sane person acts as if it is. So, at least in terms of empirical truths, we leave the “truth” of relativism in the classroom or the coffee shop or we suffer the consequences.Unfortunately, the same thing cannot be so obviously stated for moral truths. Moral relativism not only follows us out of the classroom and café; it chases us around the block. In our day and age the form of moral relativism that most pursues us is tolerance. It has not always been so.The traditional moral relativist, beginning at least as early as Thrasymachus in Plato’s Republic, was a proponent of the strongman or the dictator or, in Nietzsche’s refined phrase, “the will to power.” The traditional argument was simple: if there is no objective right and no objective wrong then might makes right and weakness is wrong. What is good is what the strongest proclaims to be the good -- what he wills to be the good. What is good is an “overman,” a dictator who knows how to use his will to and for power.4 Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin, and Mao were all “supermen” who attempted to impose their “will to power” on the masses.In the middle of the 19th century the notion of tolerance, as an alternative to the traditional strongman approach to moral relativism, started to gain acceptance. Two things paved the way for this acceptance. (1) Democracy in the United States was proving to be politically viable and writers like Alexis de Tocqueville were spreading the word. America’s founding fathers appeared to have finally found a way for large numbers of people to govern themselves. These self-governing people could have cared less about a relativism that gave them another dictator or king.5 (2) But, these same self-governing people might have been interested in a moral relativism for the masses because, around this time, Darwin and other scientists were demolishing myths like creationism that had served as pillars of the Christian faith.At this critical juncture, belief in Christianity was shaky but still widespread. If there were a form of moral relativism that mimicked the central themes of Christianity (love thy neighbor, judge not, etc.), there would be a huge number of educated people waiting and willing to entertain the idea. If that same idea were both easy to understand and attractive to the masses … it could be a grand slam. History was ripe for the appearance of the cult of tolerance.The first use of “tolerance” in its current form, as diversity and openness to the life choices of others, was offered in 1859 (the same year that Charles Darwin published The Origin of Species) by John Stuart Mill in Chapter 3 of On Liberty:
Such are the differences among human beings in their sources of pleasure, their susceptibilities of pain, and the operation on them of different physical and moral agencies, that unless there is a corresponding diversity in their modes of life, they neither obtain their fair share of happiness, nor grow up to the mental, moral and aesthetic stature of which their nature is capable. Why then should tolerance, as far as the public sentiment is concerned, extend only to tastes and modes of life which extort acquiescence by the multitude of their adherents.Sorry for the gobbledygook but I didn’t write it. Once you start reading explanations for and defenses of tolerance, you will find out, as I have, that almost all of them are illogical. Let’s look closely at this one because it was, essentially, the first one and is, probably, the most important one.Notice that the first sentence actually says exactly the opposite of what it seems to say. It seems to say that human happiness depends on a diversity of modes of life so that human nature may be fulfilled. Mill misleads us by using the plural form throughout the first clause of the first sentence. (“Such are [plural] the differences [plural] among human beings [plural] in their [plural] sources [plural, etc.]”) In the second half of the sentence “diversity” and “nature” are both written in the singular to make it appear as if “diversity” is the stabilizing and determining principle of human “nature.” But what the sentence must mean -- the only thing it can mean if it is a rational statement -- is that there is no such thing as a shared human nature, that each human being has an absolutely specialized nature of his or her own.If Mill had been honest (and not trying to sucker wavering Christians) he would have written something like this:
Such is the difference between me and everyone else in my pleasure, in my susceptibility of pain and in how I want different physical and moral agents to react to me, that unless I can live my life anyway that I want to, I will not be happy nor fulfill that nature which is uniquely mine.Read Mill’s original sentence again. The only way that it makes any sense at all is if it applies to each individual human being; it only makes sense if every human being is radically free and radically different from every other human being because each has had unique experiences of either pleasure or pain from similar sources.So the first step in understanding the cult of tolerance is grasping the fact that it is grounded in a very egocentric view of human existence. When I insist that others be free to pursue their goals and desires, I necessarily reserve that same privilege for myself. “Let all others be whatever they will be,” sounds vaguely Christian and quite progressive but it also, and necessarily so, means “Let me do whatever I want to do” -- which is exceedingly selfish and utterly immature.The second step in understanding the cult of tolerance is to see how it mimics Christianity by pretending to be non-judgmental. Christianity teaches that it is wrong to judge others. The cult of tolerance seems to teach the same thing. But the reasons each of them gives for not judging others are vastly different. Christianity teaches that there is one, and only one, way of living that is moral: the Christian life is the moral life. Christians acknowledge that a perfect Christian life is (depending upon the particular brand of Christianity) either very difficult or impossible (at least without God’s help).The Christian is commanded not to judge her brother -- not because there are no moral rules held by Christianity to be both universal and objective, there are plenty of them -- she is commanded not to judge her brother because it is highly unlikely that either she or her brother have reached the point of perfection in their lives when either of them would be able to judge the other.In other words, Christianity sees and acknowledges an important truth about moral judgments: objective and accurate moral judgments are hard to get right most of the time and impossible to get right all of the time. The Christian is told not to judge, not because there is nothing to judge, she is told not to judge because it is doubtful that she is qualified to judge. This is a vastly different moral position than those found in the cult of tolerance.Roughly speaking, the cult of tolerance has two kinds of adherents (1) the multiculturalists and (2) the politically correct. Each of these sects within the cult of tolerance offers its own reasons for why we should not judge others. These reasons conflict, not only with the Christian reason, they conflict with each other.One of these conflicting reasons is the raison d’être of the multicultural branch of the cult. The other reason, which we have already encountered and will get back to in a minute, is the explanation espoused by the politically correct sect. The multiculturalist claims that we should not judge others because moral values are culturally relative; i.e., what is right in one society may be wrong in another. This is what Mill seems to be hinting at in the second half of the quotation from On Liberty we saw above. Right and wrong are traditional values that change as societies change and that vary from one society or culture to another. The concept of right and wrong is, itself, parochial. The enlightened multiculturalist understands that his culture’s values are just as arbitrary as his neighbor’s. If pressed for an explanation for why he follows his culture’s mores, he will tell you he chooses to obey them as an obeisance to his tradition -- that and nothing else.Notice how condescending this person’s attitude is -- not just to his own culture -- to every culture. Every intelligent and committed Christian, Hindu, Moslem, or Jew (Buddhist’s are a slightly different story) that follows the moral teaching of her religion, not only believes that her values are objectively valid, she can offer arguments, with varying degrees of cogency, for their validity. (Notice also that many of these values and arguments are the same from religion to religion. This fact should tell us something.)The multiculturalist, in effect, pats the believer on the head and says, “Aren’t you a clever little girl! You claim you have reasons for your ‘right’ and your ‘wrong.’ ‘Objective reasons?’ You call them ‘objective reasons?’ That’s so nice. But I’m too busy to hear them right now. Now go run and play with those people with those other beliefs and those other ‘objective’ reasons; but be sure not to upset anybody.”Of the major religions, Christianity is the most susceptible to this rendition of the siren song of tolerance because it prides itself on not judging others. If the Christian does object, either to the argument of, or to her treatment by, the multiculturalist, she is likely to hear something like this, “You are judging me and judging your fellow human beings. And you call yourself a Christian?” Most Christians simply don’t have an answer for the multicultural branch of the cult of tolerance.6 The cult of tolerance is Christianity without the guilt, without the work; it is Christianity without the faith, the hope, and the love. The cult of tolerance is selfishness disguised as Christianity.Christianity commands, in effect, “Do not judge, least you err, and are then objectively judged by God for that error.” The politically correct branch of the cult of tolerance presents itself as a watered down version of Christian morality. The politically correct members of the cult of tolerance threaten, “Do not judge because there is no objective morality by which you can judge and if you do judge we have subjectively agreed to judge you for your judging.” In other words, political correctness goes beyond multiculturalism in as much as the politically correct sect demands that we abandon our traditions and accept a new social contract based upon the “fact” that there are no objective moral standards.Unlike traditional moral relativism where the strongman rules because “might makes right,” politically correct moral relativism claims to be democratic. In truth, it is far from it. Tolerance, in its politically correct guise, is the imposition of a standardless standard upon the masses.In a frightening way this standard is self-enforcing and self-reinforcing; i.e., the standardless standard of politically correct moral relativism asserts itself as both the strongman of traditional moral relativism and the strongman’s precept that “might makes right.” Political correctness reinforces itself by enforcing itself as the ultimate moral concept upon the masses. It does this by prohibiting the practice of any standard that challenges its legitimacy and its supremacy.Prayer in public school is a classic example. If moral standards were determined democratically (we voted on which principles were right and which were wrong), then, at least in the United States, a brief portion of every child’s school day would be spent in some kind of prayer. In surveys, Americans consistently and overwhelmingly approve of school prayer. Nevertheless, there is not a public school in the United States in which the administrators do not get highly nervous if a student so much as nods her head in a manner that might be construed as a prayer.Some conservative pundits blame this on “liberal judges” but a careful review of the legal decisions regarding prayer in school shows a hodge-podge approach by the courts. Prayer is not allowed in America’s schools for one reason: Not enough Americans want to expend the energy to challenge the reign of political correctness; and because they do not, the Christian command to “love thy neighbor” slowly deteriorates into the politically correct cop-out of “leave thy neighbor alone.” If some children pray then some other children might be offended. Therefore, nobody prays and nobody is offended.This is how political correctness reinforces itself as the standard of behavior by enforcing itself as the standardless standard of behavior. This is what happens when a society agrees to a social contract to have no social contract -- the society leaps into a cultural vortex which spins down and down into a moral black hole. This brings us to the fourth and final step in understanding the cult of tolerance; in some ways this is the most important step; it is also the most difficult step to explain: Members of the cult of tolerance defend and justify their position with emotional, as opposed to rational, arguments.There are members of the cult of tolerance who actually feel that tolerance is grounded in love and respect for others. They feel that toleration is equivalent to understanding. I know there are such people -- lots of them -- some of them capable of an impassioned defense of these feelings. And while they may believe that their defense of tolerance is some sort of rational construct, when you push them, as I have pushed them, you will discover that they are actually defending their feelings. They almost never offer a logical argument for their assertion that tolerating another person or another culture is the same as understanding that person or culture. They would be hard pressed to do so because toleration is not understanding.Here is an example: to “understand” Islam by “practicing” it for a few days (this is now a requirement in some of America’s public schools) is to understand very little. Instead it is to feel -- rather, it is to pretend to feel -- what a Moslem feels when he practices the ceremonies that make up his religion.If I want to understand Islam I do not pretend to be a Moslem for a few days, then stop the pretense, and then claim that I understand Islam because I have playacted the role of a Moslem. Such behavior cannot lead to understanding. Such behavior might make me feel a little better about myself -- without taking the much more difficult step of actually understanding either Islam or myself.Like it or not, a Moslem performs Islamic rituals because he believes that Islam is true and that the practice of the prescribed rituals will bring him closer to God and to the truth. If I want to understand Islam I must start by accepting the fact that the Moslem believes this.Remember, the keys are either in the car or they are not. This is the form that truth takes in real life. The difference between the examples of car keys and Islam is this: truths like car key locations are very simple and easily decided, whereas, truths of morality and religion are not. Most people just do not like moral complexity. Those who enter the cult of tolerance avoid the difficult process of making an actual choice and get to feel good about it.Moslems, like Mormons, Catholics, Moonies, and Jews, are what they are -- not because of what they wear or what they eat -- they are what they are because of what they believe to be true. They may be wrong in those beliefs; but unless we understand that they believe what they believe is true … we do not understand them at all.In short, those who claim that tolerance leads to understanding have not thought through what it means to understand. Those who have joined the cult of tolerance have opted, as human beings are inclined to do, for very simple answers to life’s most important and most complex questions.Almost all of us -- including, I believe, all but the most deluded members of the cult -- know what tolerance really is. We’ve known it most of our lives. We’ve known it ever since the moment our mothers told us we had to go outside and play with that pain in the rear of a little sister; we’ve known it ever since we wanted a bike for our birthday but got a little red wagon with which, we were told, we could haul that same sister; we’ve known it ever since that very same sister was always getting into our stuff when she had no reciprocal stuff worth getting into.That is tolerance -- which, by the way, comes from the Latin tolerãre -- a word that means “to suffer” or “to bear.” Real tolerance is never easy. It is not often fun. But it is real, as real as finding your car keys. It is just a lot harder ... to bear.Larrey Anderson is a writer, a philosopher, and submissions editor for American Thinker. His latest award-winning novel is The Order of the Beloved . His memoir, Underground : Life and Survival in the Russian Black Market, has just been released.1. The science that refuted some of the basic tenets of religion was grounded in a brand new methodology of verifiable experimentation -- and experiments take time. So, at least initially, science was unable to answer the very questions it had shown that religion had gotten wrong. As an example, although the first geologists could prove that the earth was older than the approximately twelve thousand year old estimate of the Bible, their own estimates of the earth’s beginning were notoriously off. They had not yet collected enough data to give an accurate date. Eventually, science gives answers, but it does not give quick or easily determined answers.2. Statements such as “All things are relative” or “The truth is that there is no truth” cannot be, what Poincarè termed, “real generalizations.” I.e., they are not generalizations whose veracity might eventually be secured by direct observation. What, exactly, are we looking for in our observations that could confirm or deny these statements of relativism? (Cf. the statement “All swans are black.”) Statements like “All things are relative” suffer from what is called “the paradox of confirmation.” This is true (of all statements like “All things are relative”) from every viewpoint of induction that I have seen, including those of J. Nicod, J.M. Keynes, R. Carnap, D. Stove, and even Karl Popper.3. Every statement of relativism leads, sooner or later, to a logical paradox that is very similar to what is known in philosophy as Russell’s paradox. Named after the British philosopher, Bertrand Russell, the paradox goes like this: Nearly all classes of things are not themselves members of the class. For example, the class of cows is not a cow. Nevertheless, if we generalize, and speak of a class as a class, then a class can be a member of itself. The class of classes is a class. (Picture the Russian matryoshkas -- those nesting dolls.) The question Russell then posed was: Is the class, of all classes that are not members of themselves, a member of itself? If yes, then no, and if no, then yes. Voilà! Paradox.4. The “will to power” was a crucial doctrine for both Nietzsche and Heidegger -- the two “world class” philosophers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Nietzsche consistently railed against the “herd morality” of tolerance while he argued that any new morality must be based on a will to power. Heidegger apparently believed so much in the übermensch that he joined Hitler’s Nazi party.5. This is part of the reason that nobody bothered to read Nietzsche until after his teaching was reconstructed, having first been “deconstructed,” by the left. Nietzsche’s true teaching is demonstrably undemocratic and radically right wing.6. Unfortunately, the Moslems do. Islam may be the most clannish, the most brutish, and the least sophisticated of all the major religions, but its adherents are not all idiots. Many are smart enough to understand when they are being placated and insulted in the same breath. Some are ruthless enough to do something about it. Unlike Christians, who when slapped in the face are directed to turn the other cheek, Moslems are directed to slap back -- and slap hard.Those who contend that it is conservative Christians and conservative Jews which cause the Moslems to hate the West need to look at Anzar Nafisi’s Reading Lolita in Tehran or go to MEMRI.org and read the sermons and interviews of “moderate” Moslem clerics like Sheikh Abd al-Muhsin al-Abikan. The problem intellectual Moslems have with the West is the moral nihilism that they claim has infected our culture as a direct result of multiculturalism. I wonder how many staff members at the state department have read that memo?
California's Suicide
Accounting for California’s Suicideby Victor Davis HansonTribune Media Services
What went wrong in California? I think we can all agree on at least three observations.First, California is by nature the most richly endowed region in the world. Nowhere else is there so much fertile land, watered by gravity-fed winter runoff from the majestic Sierra. California has ample supplies of oil and natural gas. Millions of acres of timber abound in its coastal and mountain forests. Temperate climate and weather allow outdoor activity almost year round. The coastline is over 1300 miles long — with two of the great natural ports of the world at Los Angeles and San Francisco Bay.Second, prior can-do generations of Californians created an unparalleled infrastructure of dams, canals and hydroelectric generation that once provided the state with ample energy, irrigation and recreation. Its three-tier higher education system — 110 junior colleges, 23 state universities, and 10 University of California campuses — once ensured a literate populace.We associate Hollywood with the world's motion picture industry. Napa Valley tops the wines of France. The Silicon Valley fueled the high-tech revolution that gave us Apple, Google, Hewitt-Packard, Intel and Yahoo. Millions of tourists each year flock to Disneyland, Death Valley, Kings Canyon, Lake Tahoe, San Francisco and Yosemite.California remains America's richest farming state, leading the nation in fresh fruit, vegetable, nut and dairy production. In other words, the present generation enjoyed quite a head start on their lives through the work and investment of often forgotten predecessors.The final observation we can agree on is that something has gone drastically wrong in the state in the last two decades.California managed to achieve all at once the nation's highest sales and income tax rates — and yet also the largest annual state deficit. So far under Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's tenure, state spending grew 34.9 percent, well beyond inflation and population that increased only 21.5 percent. And yet the governor often prevented the state Legislature from spending even more it didn't have.The budgets of Medi-Cal, the state-run health program for the poor, are out of control. Prison costs increased about 50 percent in less than a decade, and now claim almost 10 percent of state spending — almost as much as higher education.The state is in its third year of drought. Billions of dollars of agricultural production are threatened by water cut-offs. Yet California hasn't build a major dam or canal in years.Biannual state proposition initiatives, often put on the ballot by narrow special interests, allowed voters to vote for additional entitlements and benefits without providing the money to pay for them. Yet Californians are not an informed electorate, as the state's mediocre high schools experience 30 percent dropout rates.More than half a million aliens are caught each year trying to enter California's southern border illegally. Some estimates put illegal alien state residents at 3 million, a population that may cost the state's taxpayers more than $13 billion per year for services.California has the worst credit rating in the nation. It has the fourth highest unemployment rate and the second highest home foreclosure rate, thanks to enormously inflated prices due in part to complicated building regulations, high labor costs, and often Byzantine land-use restrictions. California's net state-to-state migration loss was higher than every other state. Most reports suggest that those who are leaving the state are far more highly educated than those entering it.If we can agree that Californians have somehow squandered a rich natural and inherited wealth, what were the root causes of this collective suicide?Critics disagree. Some cite expanding but inefficient state government, out of control state pensions and oppressive taxes. Or is the problem costly prisons and astronomical rates of incarceration, illegal immigration, unchecked welfare, and oppressive regulation and environmental restrictions?All these may be true. But less discussed is the common culprit: a weird sort of utopian mindset. Perhaps because have-it-all Californians live in such a rich natural landscape and inherited so much from their ancestors, they have convinced themselves that perpetual bounty is now their birthright — not something that can be lost in a generation of complacency.Californians count on the wealth of farming but would prefer their rivers to remain wild rather than tapped. They like tasteful redwood decks but demand someone else fell their trees for the wood. Californians drive imported SUVs but would rather that you drill for oil off your shores than they off theirs. They pride themselves on their liberal welfare programs, but drive out with confiscatory taxes the few left to pay for them.Californians expect cheap imported labor to tend their lawns and clean their houses, but are incensed at sky-high welfare and entitlement costs that accompany illegal immigration. Lock 'em up, they say — but the state is bankrupted by new prisons, constant inmate lawsuits and unionized employees.In short, after Californians sue, restrict, mandate, obstruct and lecture, they also get angry that there is suddenly not enough food, fuel, water and money to act like the gods that they think they have become.
©2009 Victor Davis Hanson
What went wrong in California? I think we can all agree on at least three observations.First, California is by nature the most richly endowed region in the world. Nowhere else is there so much fertile land, watered by gravity-fed winter runoff from the majestic Sierra. California has ample supplies of oil and natural gas. Millions of acres of timber abound in its coastal and mountain forests. Temperate climate and weather allow outdoor activity almost year round. The coastline is over 1300 miles long — with two of the great natural ports of the world at Los Angeles and San Francisco Bay.Second, prior can-do generations of Californians created an unparalleled infrastructure of dams, canals and hydroelectric generation that once provided the state with ample energy, irrigation and recreation. Its three-tier higher education system — 110 junior colleges, 23 state universities, and 10 University of California campuses — once ensured a literate populace.We associate Hollywood with the world's motion picture industry. Napa Valley tops the wines of France. The Silicon Valley fueled the high-tech revolution that gave us Apple, Google, Hewitt-Packard, Intel and Yahoo. Millions of tourists each year flock to Disneyland, Death Valley, Kings Canyon, Lake Tahoe, San Francisco and Yosemite.California remains America's richest farming state, leading the nation in fresh fruit, vegetable, nut and dairy production. In other words, the present generation enjoyed quite a head start on their lives through the work and investment of often forgotten predecessors.The final observation we can agree on is that something has gone drastically wrong in the state in the last two decades.California managed to achieve all at once the nation's highest sales and income tax rates — and yet also the largest annual state deficit. So far under Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's tenure, state spending grew 34.9 percent, well beyond inflation and population that increased only 21.5 percent. And yet the governor often prevented the state Legislature from spending even more it didn't have.The budgets of Medi-Cal, the state-run health program for the poor, are out of control. Prison costs increased about 50 percent in less than a decade, and now claim almost 10 percent of state spending — almost as much as higher education.The state is in its third year of drought. Billions of dollars of agricultural production are threatened by water cut-offs. Yet California hasn't build a major dam or canal in years.Biannual state proposition initiatives, often put on the ballot by narrow special interests, allowed voters to vote for additional entitlements and benefits without providing the money to pay for them. Yet Californians are not an informed electorate, as the state's mediocre high schools experience 30 percent dropout rates.More than half a million aliens are caught each year trying to enter California's southern border illegally. Some estimates put illegal alien state residents at 3 million, a population that may cost the state's taxpayers more than $13 billion per year for services.California has the worst credit rating in the nation. It has the fourth highest unemployment rate and the second highest home foreclosure rate, thanks to enormously inflated prices due in part to complicated building regulations, high labor costs, and often Byzantine land-use restrictions. California's net state-to-state migration loss was higher than every other state. Most reports suggest that those who are leaving the state are far more highly educated than those entering it.If we can agree that Californians have somehow squandered a rich natural and inherited wealth, what were the root causes of this collective suicide?Critics disagree. Some cite expanding but inefficient state government, out of control state pensions and oppressive taxes. Or is the problem costly prisons and astronomical rates of incarceration, illegal immigration, unchecked welfare, and oppressive regulation and environmental restrictions?All these may be true. But less discussed is the common culprit: a weird sort of utopian mindset. Perhaps because have-it-all Californians live in such a rich natural landscape and inherited so much from their ancestors, they have convinced themselves that perpetual bounty is now their birthright — not something that can be lost in a generation of complacency.Californians count on the wealth of farming but would prefer their rivers to remain wild rather than tapped. They like tasteful redwood decks but demand someone else fell their trees for the wood. Californians drive imported SUVs but would rather that you drill for oil off your shores than they off theirs. They pride themselves on their liberal welfare programs, but drive out with confiscatory taxes the few left to pay for them.Californians expect cheap imported labor to tend their lawns and clean their houses, but are incensed at sky-high welfare and entitlement costs that accompany illegal immigration. Lock 'em up, they say — but the state is bankrupted by new prisons, constant inmate lawsuits and unionized employees.In short, after Californians sue, restrict, mandate, obstruct and lecture, they also get angry that there is suddenly not enough food, fuel, water and money to act like the gods that they think they have become.
©2009 Victor Davis Hanson
Kalashnikitty T-Shirts
It's That Time AgainKalashnikitty time! Eric is doing another run of that popular classic.
OK, guys and gals, I have gotten a lot of emails in the past few months about people wanting Kalashnikitty shirts and have decided to do up another run. I will be taking orders until Sunday, April 12 and the order with my shirt maker will go in on Monday April 13. I should have the shirts in my hands and shipping out by the last week of April and they will ship out immediately by Priority Mail. Occasionally things get delayed or sped up depending on his inventory, workload, shipping issues, etc. - but I'm giving myself enough time this time to hopefully get around these occasional issues.Here's the procedure for getting the shirts (this makes it a LOT easier for me to track and ship these things ASAP)Email me, erickelly1@verizon.net with the following:1 - Number and sizes you want - sizes are Child's Medium, Child's Large, Adult Small, Adult Medium, Adult Large, Adult XL, Adult 2XL, and Adult 3XL.2 - Your name and address3 - How you would like to pay for them (Check, Money Order, Paypal)TWO color choices this time around! - the classic light ash grey (very nice) - shirts are high-quality, do not fade or shrink, long lasting, very soft. Image is screen printed, NOT iron on or transfers. I've never gotten an email from any of my previous customers saying, "The shirt shrunk, faded, looks horrible after 3 months, etc." - these really are quite nice shirts.I talked to my shirtmaker and he said he might be able to do this on a BLACK shirt - this has been requested by a lot of you over the years. He's working up a graphic for me (since the current outline of the graphic is black and wouldn't look right on a black shirt) - I think we may got with a white outline that will be a little wider and slightly different looking than the current white inside the graphic. As soon as I know and have an idea as to how it will look I'll let you know.The extra cost of a black shirt will be $2.50 - this is due to the shirt "shells" in black costing more and the initial new setup of doing another plate for these.Let me know if you would like your shirts in regular (ash-grey) or the new black.Pricing - I have, in the past 7 years, never raised the price, even though my cost has gone up. I'm STILL not raising the price yet - even though shipping has gone up, I'm going to eat that since you all have been so great to me over the years and I want to make these available to as many people as I can.Any size up to XL is $20, 2XL is $21.50 and 3XL is $22.00. As noted, black is $2.50 extra, regardless of size.Shipping via 2-3 day Priority Mail with Delivery Confirmation is $5.00 for 1 shirt, and an extra $2.50 per shirt after that.Check, MO, or Paypal is good for payments. If using Paypal, add 4% to the total payment, including the shipping.** When you email me your order, include your full name and mailing address. I will email you back with the total.Below are some pictures of the graphic and some happy customers wearing them. Thanks again to everyone and spread the word!
Just a reminder: I AM NOT INVOLVED IN THE MANUFACTURE, SALE, OR SHIPPING OF THESE SHIRTS - I just provide Eric advertising space because A) I think they're cute, and B) they give GFWs PSH.Your contact for anything having to do with these shirts is Eric.If you're worried about quality or delivery, rest assured - he's been doing this for a while. No complaints yet!
OK, guys and gals, I have gotten a lot of emails in the past few months about people wanting Kalashnikitty shirts and have decided to do up another run. I will be taking orders until Sunday, April 12 and the order with my shirt maker will go in on Monday April 13. I should have the shirts in my hands and shipping out by the last week of April and they will ship out immediately by Priority Mail. Occasionally things get delayed or sped up depending on his inventory, workload, shipping issues, etc. - but I'm giving myself enough time this time to hopefully get around these occasional issues.Here's the procedure for getting the shirts (this makes it a LOT easier for me to track and ship these things ASAP)Email me, erickelly1@verizon.net with the following:1 - Number and sizes you want - sizes are Child's Medium, Child's Large, Adult Small, Adult Medium, Adult Large, Adult XL, Adult 2XL, and Adult 3XL.2 - Your name and address3 - How you would like to pay for them (Check, Money Order, Paypal)TWO color choices this time around! - the classic light ash grey (very nice) - shirts are high-quality, do not fade or shrink, long lasting, very soft. Image is screen printed, NOT iron on or transfers. I've never gotten an email from any of my previous customers saying, "The shirt shrunk, faded, looks horrible after 3 months, etc." - these really are quite nice shirts.I talked to my shirtmaker and he said he might be able to do this on a BLACK shirt - this has been requested by a lot of you over the years. He's working up a graphic for me (since the current outline of the graphic is black and wouldn't look right on a black shirt) - I think we may got with a white outline that will be a little wider and slightly different looking than the current white inside the graphic. As soon as I know and have an idea as to how it will look I'll let you know.The extra cost of a black shirt will be $2.50 - this is due to the shirt "shells" in black costing more and the initial new setup of doing another plate for these.Let me know if you would like your shirts in regular (ash-grey) or the new black.Pricing - I have, in the past 7 years, never raised the price, even though my cost has gone up. I'm STILL not raising the price yet - even though shipping has gone up, I'm going to eat that since you all have been so great to me over the years and I want to make these available to as many people as I can.Any size up to XL is $20, 2XL is $21.50 and 3XL is $22.00. As noted, black is $2.50 extra, regardless of size.Shipping via 2-3 day Priority Mail with Delivery Confirmation is $5.00 for 1 shirt, and an extra $2.50 per shirt after that.Check, MO, or Paypal is good for payments. If using Paypal, add 4% to the total payment, including the shipping.** When you email me your order, include your full name and mailing address. I will email you back with the total.Below are some pictures of the graphic and some happy customers wearing them. Thanks again to everyone and spread the word!
Just a reminder: I AM NOT INVOLVED IN THE MANUFACTURE, SALE, OR SHIPPING OF THESE SHIRTS - I just provide Eric advertising space because A) I think they're cute, and B) they give GFWs PSH.Your contact for anything having to do with these shirts is Eric.If you're worried about quality or delivery, rest assured - he's been doing this for a while. No complaints yet!
This will be my first post on my blog. It therefore seems appropriate to feature the man who inspired me to begin this blog, someone whom I admire very much, Robert Stacy McCain.
Having promised an appropriate celebration of passing the 1-million-visitors Site Meter threshold Friday, I will do so by sharing the secret of my success. It's the Underpants Gnome Theory of Blogging:
Phase 1: Get a Blogspot account.
Phase 2: ?
Phase 3: One million visitors!Obviously, the key here is Phase 2, which has been exceptionally disorganized. Some guys work smart. Some guys work hard. Some guys are just incredibly lucky.The perceptive blog consumer will notice that posts here don't have all those little thingies (Digg, etc.) the way some other blogs do. This is not because I disdain such methods of traffic enhancement, but because I'm such a primitive Unfrozen Caveman Blogger I can't figure that stuff out. It's the same reason I'm still on a Blogspot platform, rather than switching to a custom-designed Wordpress format. Blogspot is so simple that even I can figure it out, and if they'd just offer a few more templates -- hey, guys, how about a template with variable-width sidebars on both sides? -- I might be able to fake that custom-designed elegance, too. I understand basic HTML, but Javascript no can do, and I'm too cheap to shell out the bucks for geek services.Lacking advanced, sophisticated technological gee-whizzery, I have been forced to employ astonishingly crude Web 0.1 methods of traffic-enhancement, namely:
Write stuff people might want to read; and
Compulsively e-mail my posts to bloggers who might possibly consider linking me.Astonishingly crude, but also surprisingly effective. And so we come to Rule 1, the Prime Directive so to speak:
1. Shameless Blogwhoring.I'm amazed that Instapundit, Michelle Malkin, Ace of Spades and the Hot Air crew haven't declared a fatwa against me for the way I relentlessly fill their inboxes with blogwhoring e-mails like Arnold Horshack trying to get Mr. Kotter's attention: "Ooh! Ooh! Ooh!"However, the smart newcomer to the 'sphere doesn't just suck up to big-traffic bloggers who can throw him major traffic (although he does that with a single-minded fanaticism), he also sucks up sideways and downward, to bloggers who might not be able to throw 10,000 hits a day, but who are nonetheless valued contributors to the blogging community.Little Miss Attila is my favorite example of the "valued contributors" category. Her best recent month was 24K visits in October, but she's been around the 'sphere a long time, is much beloved, and it is bad kharma not to link her. Every so often, while on the hunt for good stuff to blog about, I'll go over to LMA, find something good she's blogging about and link it. Why? Because, among various non-kharmic reasons, she has done the same for me, which brings me to Rule 2:
2. The Full Metal Jacket Reach-AroundMaybe you're not a fan of Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket, and I'm not saying you should be. But the psychotic drill sergeant gives a notorious rant in which he colorfully expresses an important life principle: When someone does you a favor, find an opportunity to return the kindness.Reciprocal linkage is the essential lubricant that makes the blogosphere purr with contentment. If somebody's throwing you traffic, you should either (a) give them a link-back update, or at a minimum (b) keep them in mind for future linkage. Because you don't want to end up on the wrong end of a kharmic unbalance in the 'sphere, where you're always taking and never giving.Every beginning blogger confronts the Zero Hour. You've been blogging steadily for a week or two, sending around e-mails, trackbacking where you can, trying to develop some kind of regular traffic. And then, late one night, you think you might have finally composed your first Instalanche-worthy post and you e-mail it to Glenn Reynolds. You go to bed like a 7-year-old kid on Christmas Eve, then wake up at 4 a.m. and check your Site Meter to discover that your latest hourly traffic is . . . ZERO.At which point, you want to swallow a handful of sedatives, wash it down with a quart of bleach, slit your wrists and stick your head in the oven. You are a complete and utter failure.I've never forgotten the Zero Hour, and if I've become slightly less conscientious about reciprocal linkage since then, God forgive me, but I do try. In the midst of a traffic upswing, not all linkage is noticeable on Site Meter, so I check Technorati, which shows linkage regardless of traffic level. And thank you Dad29, thank you Joe Kristan, thank you, Andrea Shea King, thank you Jimmie Bise, thank you William Teach. Damn my lazy thoughtlessness, but please don't doubt my gratitude.Now that we've scratched the surface of technique, let's address the tricky little subject of content with Rule 3:
3. MemeorandumDid somebody say "lazy thoughtlessness"? The easiest place to find blog fodder is Memeorandum, which has an algorithmic formula that automatically updates to tell you what the hot topics are in the 'sphere.I especially like their "Featured Posts," sort of a random grab-bag of stuff that will occasionally feature some lefty shooting off his mouth in pure idiotic moonbat mode. Grab that sucker by the neck and give him the Mother Of All Fiskings, with enough vitriolic ad hominem to make sure he never forgets it. Because buddy, the lefties will turn right around and do it to you if you ever rate "Featured Post" status, and there's nothing like a vicious flame war to earn your spurs in the 'sphere. Which brings me to Rule 4:
4. Make Some EnemiesWe'll have none of your "bipartian civility" around here, you sissy weaklings. This here is the Intertoobs, and we're As Nasty As We Wanna Be. The fact that The Moderate Voice has turned into a reliable vessel for DNC talking points should tell you all you need to know about the fate of bipartisanship in the blogosphere.At the same time, however, don't confuse cyber-venom with real-world hate. Maybe Ace of Spades really would like to go upside Andrew Sullivan's head with a baseball bat, I don't know. But at some point you understand it's just blogging about politics, and you start wondering if maybe it shares a certain spectator-friendly quality with pro wrestling. For all we know, Ace is spending weekends at Sully's beach shack in Provincetown. (Next on Blogging Heads TV: Can "Bears" and Ewoks Be "Just Friends"?)Some readers might remember when I first kicked Conor Friedersdorf in the knee for "insufficient cynicism." Conor is, in real life, a nice guy. But he's also (a) young, and (b) as earnest as John Boy Walton. So I got into a habit, when he was at Culture11, of kicking him in the knee with some regularity. It's the Fraternity Initiation Principle: Pledges must be abused by their elders, and learn to be properly respectful, or else one day the ambitious little monsters will strangle us in our sleep. (Cf., my suggestion that George Freaking Will should be air-dropped on Jalalabad from a C-130.)A couple days ago, hunting around for a reason to link my friend Russ Smith's SpliceToday, I happened upon a column by Russ's young minion, Andrew Sargus Klein, offering a particularly insipid argument for federal arts funding. Now, having been born and raised a Democrat, and arguably having never outgrown my obnoxious youthful arrogance, I can actually relate to Klein's insipid argument. Stupid is as stupid does, and when I was 25, I might well have written something equally stupid. But the boy will never outgrow his stupidity unless he gets whomped on the head some.Easy as it would have been to ignore Klein, I hit upon the delightfully fun idea of laying into him in Arkansas knife-fight mode: If you're going to cut a man, eviscerate him. So I quickly composed a hyperbolic ad hominem rant, with the thoughtfully civil title, "Andrew Sargus Klein is an arrogant elitist douchebag." I forward-dated the post for Friday morning, and sent Russ an e-mail to the effect of, "Hey, hope you don't mind me abusing your office help a little bit. Nothing like a flame-war to build traffic. Don't let on to Klein that I'm just funnin' around with him."I'd hoped to bait Klein himself into a response. However, before that could happen -- as if intent on illustrating how to make a fool out of yourself by taking this stuff too seriously -- one of Klein's friends offered up a comment:
Andrew Klein may be arrogant and elitist but he could craft logical arguments around your bumbling hypocrisy all day and night.Of course I never bother "craft[ing] logical arguments," sweetheart. It's a freaking blog. If you want logic, subscribe to a magazine or buy a book. Pardon my double-entendre, Lola Wakefield, but people come here for the cheesecake. Logical arguments are a dime a dozen on the Internet, but sexy hotness . . . well, that reminds me of Rule 5:
5. Christina HendricksOr Anne Hathaway or Natalie Portman or Sarah Palin bikini pics. Rule 5 actually combines four separate principles of blogospheric success:
A. Everybody loves a pretty girl -- It's not just guys who enjoy staring at pictures of hotties. If you've ever picked up Cosmo or Glamour, you realize that chicks enjoy looking at pretty girls, too. (NTTAWWT.) Maybe it's the vicious catty she-thinks-she's-all-that factor, or the schadenfreude of watching a human trainwreck like Britney Spears, but no one can argue that celebrity babes generate traffic. Over at Conservative Grapevine, the most popular links are always the bikini pictures. And try as I might to make "logical arguments" for tax cuts, wouldn't you rather watch Michelle Lee Muccio make those arguments?
B. Mind the MEGO factor -- All politics all the time gets boring after a while. Observant readers will notice that the headlines at Hot Air often feature silly celebrity tabloid stuff and News Of The Weird. Even a stone political junkie cannot subsist on a 24/7 diet of politics. The occasional joke, the occasional hot babe, the occasional joke about a hot babe -- it's a safety valve to make sure we don't become humorless right-wing clones of those Democratic Underground moonbats.
C. Sex sells -- Back when I was blogging to promote Donkey Cons (BUY TWO!), I accidentally discovered something via SiteMeter: Because the subtitle of the book is "Sex, Crime, and Corruption in the Democratic Party," we were getting traffic from people Googling "donkey+sex." You'd be surprised at the keyword combinations that bring traffic to a political blogger who understands this. Human nature being what it is, the lowest common denominator is always there, even if it's sublimated or reverse-projected as puritanical indignation, which brings us to . . .
D. Feminism sucks -- You can never go wrong in the blogosphere by having a laugh at the expense of feminists. All sane people hate feminism, and no one hates feminism more than smart, successful, independent women who've made it on their own without all that idiotic "Sisterhood Is Powerful" groupthink crap. And if you are one of those fanatical weirdos who takes that Women's Studies stuff so seriously that you're offended by Stephen Green's sexist objectification of Christina Hendricks and her mighty bosom -- well, sweetheart, to paraphrase Rhett Butler: "You should be offended, and often, and by someone who knows how."So, there you have it: Five Rules For Getting a Million Hits On Your Blog. There are probably another two dozen rules, but I'm too lazy to think of what they are right now. And to be honest, if it weren't for that old picture of me in a Speedo, I'd probably still be 20,000 hits shy of the million mark. Some of us are just . . . blessed with exceptional modesty. And some guys get the steak knives.UPDATE: Probably special mention should be made of Kathy "Five Feet of Fury" Shaidle, who never heard of a fair fight. She's one of those people you don't want angry at you. A ninja blackbelt in Rule 4, when she goes at an antagonist, it's a knee in your groin and an elbow in your eye. However, she also keeps the customers satisfied with some naughty pinup hotness. (Rule 5!) That rare creature: A Canadian we like.UPDATE II: Linked at Conservative Grapevine.
Having promised an appropriate celebration of passing the 1-million-visitors Site Meter threshold Friday, I will do so by sharing the secret of my success. It's the Underpants Gnome Theory of Blogging:
Phase 1: Get a Blogspot account.
Phase 2: ?
Phase 3: One million visitors!Obviously, the key here is Phase 2, which has been exceptionally disorganized. Some guys work smart. Some guys work hard. Some guys are just incredibly lucky.The perceptive blog consumer will notice that posts here don't have all those little thingies (Digg, etc.) the way some other blogs do. This is not because I disdain such methods of traffic enhancement, but because I'm such a primitive Unfrozen Caveman Blogger I can't figure that stuff out. It's the same reason I'm still on a Blogspot platform, rather than switching to a custom-designed Wordpress format. Blogspot is so simple that even I can figure it out, and if they'd just offer a few more templates -- hey, guys, how about a template with variable-width sidebars on both sides? -- I might be able to fake that custom-designed elegance, too. I understand basic HTML, but Javascript no can do, and I'm too cheap to shell out the bucks for geek services.Lacking advanced, sophisticated technological gee-whizzery, I have been forced to employ astonishingly crude Web 0.1 methods of traffic-enhancement, namely:
Write stuff people might want to read; and
Compulsively e-mail my posts to bloggers who might possibly consider linking me.Astonishingly crude, but also surprisingly effective. And so we come to Rule 1, the Prime Directive so to speak:
1. Shameless Blogwhoring.I'm amazed that Instapundit, Michelle Malkin, Ace of Spades and the Hot Air crew haven't declared a fatwa against me for the way I relentlessly fill their inboxes with blogwhoring e-mails like Arnold Horshack trying to get Mr. Kotter's attention: "Ooh! Ooh! Ooh!"However, the smart newcomer to the 'sphere doesn't just suck up to big-traffic bloggers who can throw him major traffic (although he does that with a single-minded fanaticism), he also sucks up sideways and downward, to bloggers who might not be able to throw 10,000 hits a day, but who are nonetheless valued contributors to the blogging community.Little Miss Attila is my favorite example of the "valued contributors" category. Her best recent month was 24K visits in October, but she's been around the 'sphere a long time, is much beloved, and it is bad kharma not to link her. Every so often, while on the hunt for good stuff to blog about, I'll go over to LMA, find something good she's blogging about and link it. Why? Because, among various non-kharmic reasons, she has done the same for me, which brings me to Rule 2:
2. The Full Metal Jacket Reach-AroundMaybe you're not a fan of Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket, and I'm not saying you should be. But the psychotic drill sergeant gives a notorious rant in which he colorfully expresses an important life principle: When someone does you a favor, find an opportunity to return the kindness.Reciprocal linkage is the essential lubricant that makes the blogosphere purr with contentment. If somebody's throwing you traffic, you should either (a) give them a link-back update, or at a minimum (b) keep them in mind for future linkage. Because you don't want to end up on the wrong end of a kharmic unbalance in the 'sphere, where you're always taking and never giving.Every beginning blogger confronts the Zero Hour. You've been blogging steadily for a week or two, sending around e-mails, trackbacking where you can, trying to develop some kind of regular traffic. And then, late one night, you think you might have finally composed your first Instalanche-worthy post and you e-mail it to Glenn Reynolds. You go to bed like a 7-year-old kid on Christmas Eve, then wake up at 4 a.m. and check your Site Meter to discover that your latest hourly traffic is . . . ZERO.At which point, you want to swallow a handful of sedatives, wash it down with a quart of bleach, slit your wrists and stick your head in the oven. You are a complete and utter failure.I've never forgotten the Zero Hour, and if I've become slightly less conscientious about reciprocal linkage since then, God forgive me, but I do try. In the midst of a traffic upswing, not all linkage is noticeable on Site Meter, so I check Technorati, which shows linkage regardless of traffic level. And thank you Dad29, thank you Joe Kristan, thank you, Andrea Shea King, thank you Jimmie Bise, thank you William Teach. Damn my lazy thoughtlessness, but please don't doubt my gratitude.Now that we've scratched the surface of technique, let's address the tricky little subject of content with Rule 3:
3. MemeorandumDid somebody say "lazy thoughtlessness"? The easiest place to find blog fodder is Memeorandum, which has an algorithmic formula that automatically updates to tell you what the hot topics are in the 'sphere.I especially like their "Featured Posts," sort of a random grab-bag of stuff that will occasionally feature some lefty shooting off his mouth in pure idiotic moonbat mode. Grab that sucker by the neck and give him the Mother Of All Fiskings, with enough vitriolic ad hominem to make sure he never forgets it. Because buddy, the lefties will turn right around and do it to you if you ever rate "Featured Post" status, and there's nothing like a vicious flame war to earn your spurs in the 'sphere. Which brings me to Rule 4:
4. Make Some EnemiesWe'll have none of your "bipartian civility" around here, you sissy weaklings. This here is the Intertoobs, and we're As Nasty As We Wanna Be. The fact that The Moderate Voice has turned into a reliable vessel for DNC talking points should tell you all you need to know about the fate of bipartisanship in the blogosphere.At the same time, however, don't confuse cyber-venom with real-world hate. Maybe Ace of Spades really would like to go upside Andrew Sullivan's head with a baseball bat, I don't know. But at some point you understand it's just blogging about politics, and you start wondering if maybe it shares a certain spectator-friendly quality with pro wrestling. For all we know, Ace is spending weekends at Sully's beach shack in Provincetown. (Next on Blogging Heads TV: Can "Bears" and Ewoks Be "Just Friends"?)Some readers might remember when I first kicked Conor Friedersdorf in the knee for "insufficient cynicism." Conor is, in real life, a nice guy. But he's also (a) young, and (b) as earnest as John Boy Walton. So I got into a habit, when he was at Culture11, of kicking him in the knee with some regularity. It's the Fraternity Initiation Principle: Pledges must be abused by their elders, and learn to be properly respectful, or else one day the ambitious little monsters will strangle us in our sleep. (Cf., my suggestion that George Freaking Will should be air-dropped on Jalalabad from a C-130.)A couple days ago, hunting around for a reason to link my friend Russ Smith's SpliceToday, I happened upon a column by Russ's young minion, Andrew Sargus Klein, offering a particularly insipid argument for federal arts funding. Now, having been born and raised a Democrat, and arguably having never outgrown my obnoxious youthful arrogance, I can actually relate to Klein's insipid argument. Stupid is as stupid does, and when I was 25, I might well have written something equally stupid. But the boy will never outgrow his stupidity unless he gets whomped on the head some.Easy as it would have been to ignore Klein, I hit upon the delightfully fun idea of laying into him in Arkansas knife-fight mode: If you're going to cut a man, eviscerate him. So I quickly composed a hyperbolic ad hominem rant, with the thoughtfully civil title, "Andrew Sargus Klein is an arrogant elitist douchebag." I forward-dated the post for Friday morning, and sent Russ an e-mail to the effect of, "Hey, hope you don't mind me abusing your office help a little bit. Nothing like a flame-war to build traffic. Don't let on to Klein that I'm just funnin' around with him."I'd hoped to bait Klein himself into a response. However, before that could happen -- as if intent on illustrating how to make a fool out of yourself by taking this stuff too seriously -- one of Klein's friends offered up a comment:
Andrew Klein may be arrogant and elitist but he could craft logical arguments around your bumbling hypocrisy all day and night.Of course I never bother "craft[ing] logical arguments," sweetheart. It's a freaking blog. If you want logic, subscribe to a magazine or buy a book. Pardon my double-entendre, Lola Wakefield, but people come here for the cheesecake. Logical arguments are a dime a dozen on the Internet, but sexy hotness . . . well, that reminds me of Rule 5:
5. Christina HendricksOr Anne Hathaway or Natalie Portman or Sarah Palin bikini pics. Rule 5 actually combines four separate principles of blogospheric success:
A. Everybody loves a pretty girl -- It's not just guys who enjoy staring at pictures of hotties. If you've ever picked up Cosmo or Glamour, you realize that chicks enjoy looking at pretty girls, too. (NTTAWWT.) Maybe it's the vicious catty she-thinks-she's-all-that factor, or the schadenfreude of watching a human trainwreck like Britney Spears, but no one can argue that celebrity babes generate traffic. Over at Conservative Grapevine, the most popular links are always the bikini pictures. And try as I might to make "logical arguments" for tax cuts, wouldn't you rather watch Michelle Lee Muccio make those arguments?
B. Mind the MEGO factor -- All politics all the time gets boring after a while. Observant readers will notice that the headlines at Hot Air often feature silly celebrity tabloid stuff and News Of The Weird. Even a stone political junkie cannot subsist on a 24/7 diet of politics. The occasional joke, the occasional hot babe, the occasional joke about a hot babe -- it's a safety valve to make sure we don't become humorless right-wing clones of those Democratic Underground moonbats.
C. Sex sells -- Back when I was blogging to promote Donkey Cons (BUY TWO!), I accidentally discovered something via SiteMeter: Because the subtitle of the book is "Sex, Crime, and Corruption in the Democratic Party," we were getting traffic from people Googling "donkey+sex." You'd be surprised at the keyword combinations that bring traffic to a political blogger who understands this. Human nature being what it is, the lowest common denominator is always there, even if it's sublimated or reverse-projected as puritanical indignation, which brings us to . . .
D. Feminism sucks -- You can never go wrong in the blogosphere by having a laugh at the expense of feminists. All sane people hate feminism, and no one hates feminism more than smart, successful, independent women who've made it on their own without all that idiotic "Sisterhood Is Powerful" groupthink crap. And if you are one of those fanatical weirdos who takes that Women's Studies stuff so seriously that you're offended by Stephen Green's sexist objectification of Christina Hendricks and her mighty bosom -- well, sweetheart, to paraphrase Rhett Butler: "You should be offended, and often, and by someone who knows how."So, there you have it: Five Rules For Getting a Million Hits On Your Blog. There are probably another two dozen rules, but I'm too lazy to think of what they are right now. And to be honest, if it weren't for that old picture of me in a Speedo, I'd probably still be 20,000 hits shy of the million mark. Some of us are just . . . blessed with exceptional modesty. And some guys get the steak knives.UPDATE: Probably special mention should be made of Kathy "Five Feet of Fury" Shaidle, who never heard of a fair fight. She's one of those people you don't want angry at you. A ninja blackbelt in Rule 4, when she goes at an antagonist, it's a knee in your groin and an elbow in your eye. However, she also keeps the customers satisfied with some naughty pinup hotness. (Rule 5!) That rare creature: A Canadian we like.UPDATE II: Linked at Conservative Grapevine.
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