To what can my support of the Rabbi Elon Israeli Initiative Peace Plan be compared to? Like two women who were told that the infant on the table before them is the long lost child of one of them, only it is not certain which one is the true mother. Surely if the baby were at risk of falling off the table, no matter which mother could reach the child before it were harmed, surely then both mothers
I was pleasantly surprised to see that my post on Will Wilkinson’s proposal for liberal/libertarian alliance drew some interest. My thanks to Will Wilkinson for his response, and to Robert Kaercher for making it one of the links of the day when he was guest editor at Strike the Root. I’ll probably have some more thoughts on this later, but for now I just want to hit a main point and give a
Michael van der Galien has one of the strongest arguments seen so far against the Bush Dog Campaign which started at Open Left, especially as it comes from a moderate right of center blogger as opposed to the many attacks from the far right. Michael makes some excellent points, but unfortunately also buys into many of the false claims of the right with regards to the war and the liberal blogosphere.
The Bush Dog Campaign’s goal is to put pressure on Democratic House members who have supported conservative measures in order to pass more progressive legislation:
And so, you may have noticed a lot of chatter about ‘Bush Dog’ Democrats over the past few days. That’s not an accident. We’ve been working to identify the group of conservative Democrats in the House who are holding back progressives from being able to effectively govern. These are concentrated in two main caucuses, the Blue Dog Caucus and the New Democrat caucuses. Blue Dogs consider themselve
Wrapping oneself snugly in the garments of a particular ideology allows one to be uncritical of their own assumptions. While a person, group, or nation may be enviably efficient and rational about process and instrumental, technical knowledge and methods, they could simultaneously be blind and unreasoning about inhuman ideological methods and goals. Witness the holocaust, [...]
Wrapping oneself snugly in the garments of a particular ideology allows one to be uncritical of their own assumptions. While a person, group, or nation may be enviably efficient and rational about process and instrumental, technical knowledge and methods, they could simultaneously be blind and unreasoning about inhuman ideological methods and goals. Witness the holocaust, [...]
Now, finally, after laboring under "the tyranny of the urgent" for far too long, I reenter the blogosphere with some short, topically arranged excerpts from Pope Benedict XVI's recent "Address to the Participants in the International Congress on Natural Moral Law." For the full text of the speech, click here.HUMAN FREEDOM IS A FUNDAMENTAL APPLICATION OF NATURAL LAW"Another fundamental application of the subject is freedom. Yet taking into account the fact that human freedom is always a freedom shared with others, it is clear that the harmony of freedom can be found only in what is common to all: the truth of the human being, the fundamental message of being itself, exactly the lex naturalis."And how can we not mention, on one hand, the demand of justice that manifests itself in giving unicuique suum and, on the other, the expectation of solidarity that nourishes in everyone, especially if they are poor, the hope of the help of the more fortunate?"In these values are expressed unbreak
"...Most people are surprised to learn that there are real, stable differences in personality between conservatives and liberals—not just different views or values, but underlying differences in temperament. Psychologists John Jost of New York University, Dana Carney of Harvard, and Sam Gosling of the University of Texas have demonstrated that conservatives and liberals boast markedly different home and office decor. Liberals are messier than conservatives, their rooms have more clutter and more color, and they tend to have more travel documents, maps of other countries, and flags from around the world. Conservatives are neater, and their rooms are cleaner, better organized, more brightly lit, and more conventional. Liberals have more books, and their books cover a greater variety of topics. And that's just a start. Multiple studies find that liberals are more optimistic. Conservatives are more likely to be religious. Liberals are more likely to like classical music and jazz, conser
