Work in Progress

After 28 hours, I think I'm off to a pretty good start. I'm still learning the system, changing color schemes and layouts to my liking, working out the kinks in the HTML code. You'll note that I now have a counter, courtesy of Sitemeter, and a search engine, courtesy of Google. The counter works, the search engine doesn't. I think it may just be that Google hasn't indexed this website yet, so hopefully it will start working on its own in a day or two. If not, I'll have to fix it.

As for the counter, it seems okay so far. Looking at the visit statistics, I'm responsible for a plurality of the visits and the vast majority of page views (if it says rr.com, it's probably me). That's not too surprising as I've been bouncing off the website quite often as I edit and tweak it.

All in all, the blog is shaping into something I can work with, with all the tools and utilities I need to run it. In another week or two, it'll either be running smoothly or I will have abandoned the whole project. Right now, I'm thinking the former is more likely.

Christianity and the Nanny State

Joe Carter responds to Matthew Yglesias's thoughts on Christian libertarianism with sarcasm. I'd like to address it more seriously. Here is what Matthew said:

At a different New America event I heard one guy briefly discuss his "Christian libertarian" outlook in response to Amy Sullivan's Christian liberalism. Basically, he said, all this stuff liberals (and particularly religious liberals) say about the moral imperative to aid the poor, etc. is all quite true. That's why he thinks he has a duty to live his life virtuously by giving time, money, etc. to helping others. When he does this, he does a good deed personally, and provides help to a second person. If, however, he were to try and force me to give my money to help someone else, that would not be a virtuous act on his part or on mine. Christian compassion is all well and good, but using the state as a surrogate Robin Hood is not.

Now I don't agree with that at all. Indeed, I think it's roughly the reverse of correct. Cultivating personal virtue, whether in myself or in others, is irrelevant. The key is to help those in need by hook or by crook and, indeed, in the ideal set-up everyone would just act selfishly and the mechanisms of the state would ensure that our selfish behavior winds up serving the general interest. Like Adam Smith's invisible hand, but with progressive taxation.

Nevertheless, it's a viewpoint worth noting, because liberals have a somewhat deplorable tendency to simply assume that the only cogent reason for opposing government action to alleviate suffering is an indifference to suffering. In fact, however, what's at issue really is the role of the state. We liberals do not, at the end of the day, endorse Robin Hood like behavior on the part of private citizens so we, too, see an important distinction between state and non-state action, albeit a different distinction.

Now I am not a libertarian, and I think there are times when the state is the only agent capable of alleviating suffering, when only it can mobilize the necessary resources in a timely manner, and it is thus appropriate to use the state. However, I think that those times are few and far between. In most circumstances, when there is a choice between the state and a private institution, I think the state is less efficient, less capable, less personal, and less compassionate than the private institution would be.

But that merely addresses the specific of why I'd rather have some vague, faceless institution helping people than some vague, faceless state entity. I think there's a bigger problem with Yglesias's thinking, and that's theological. I think his perspective is, in fact, the opposite of God's.

God is capable, pretty much all monotheists agree, of solving all the world's problems. Well, why doesn't He? Why does He let people suffer? Why let them doubt when He can prove his existence? Why act out His compassion through the Church, through fallible, corruptible human agents rather than doing the job Himself? In Reaching for the Invisible God, Philip Yancey expresses his belief that it is because God is more concerned with our faith than our happiness. He is more interested in our relationship with Him and with each other than in making sure all our physical wants are met. What Matthew Yglesias is proposing would deny people the need for each other, and the opportunity to serve that need. I think that his "ideal set-up [where] everyone would just act selfishly and the mechanisms of the state would ensure that our selfish behavior winds up serving the general interest" is the opposite of what God sees as ideal.

Update: Changed the wording to make it more clear that the block quote is what Matthew Yglesias said, not my response to it. Plus I capitalized Church.

Update: I spent a lot of time attacking Yglesias's view of the role of the state, but in doing that I glossed over the last paragraph, which I think is the main point of the post. I just wanted to make it clear that I appreciate that he takes the effort to understand and respect other opinions. And while I strongly disagree with his opinion on theological grounds, I don't think he is insincere in what he said. I'll also give him the benefit of the doubt on his ideal set-up. I think what he is describing is a system that would care for the poor even if everyone is selfish, not that he wants a system which encourages everyone to be selfish. I'm just not sure the two can really be separated. You don't learn compassion and self-sacrifice if no one needs them from you.

A few questions for Mr. Kerry

John Kerry's Vietnam record consists not only of his honorable service in the war, but also of his activities afterward, when he testified before Congress about the "war crimes committed in Southeast Asia." (Thanks to Hugh Hewitt) He was quite adamant about the barbarity of US soldiers, describing the testimony of soldiers in the Winter Soldier Investigation:

I would like to talk on behalf of all those veterans and say that several months ago in Detroit we had an investigation at which over 150 honorably discharged, and many very highly decorated, veterans testified to war crimes committed in Southeast Asia. These were not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command. It is impossible to describe to you exactly what did happen in Detroit - the emotions in the room and the feelings of the men who were reliving their experiences in Vietnam. They relived the absolute horror of what this country, in a sense, made them do.

They told stories that at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Ghengis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.

This does raise a number of interesting questions that I would like to ask John Kerry.

• Do you stand by the accusations you made before Congress in your 1971 testimony?
• Were these accusations consistent with your own experiences in Vietnam?
• If so,
• Did you witness war crimes?
• Did you report those war crimes as required by the Uniform Code of Military Justice?
• If not,
• Why were you so convinced that these crimes were "committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command"?
• Why repeatedly include yourself by saying things such as "we feel because of what threatens this country, not the reds, but the crimes which we are committing that threaten it, that we have to speak out"?
• According to your own words, you interacted with upwards of one hundred and fifty self-proclaimed war criminals. There is no statute of limitations on war crimes. Do you intend to prosecute these criminals? Why or why not?
• Since you claimed that these crimes were committed with "full awareness of officers at all levels of command," who else do you intend to prosecute?

Hugh Hewitt has asked whether Kerry's past has anything to do with the present. In response, James Lileks has said " I don?t care what John Kerry said when he was 25. I care about what John Kerry says today ...about what he said when he was 25." Since I'm only 29, I don't have Lileks's experience of a radical change of my own opinions in my 30s. But I do believe that people can change, so I won't make an argument that Kerry's past statements condemn him as long as he can explain that he has changed since the time he made those statements. I would like to know whether he still stands by the discredited Winter Soldier Investigation. The best path for him to take is to claim that he believed it then, but later realized his error. This makes him look gullible, and he should explain how experience has made him more skeptical. If he never believed it, then he was a liar, and he needs to explain how experience has made him more honest. If he still believes it, then he should be pressing for war crime charges against not only the people he met in Detroit, but against hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people currently and formerly in the military, and he needs to explain how experience has made him more tolerant of war crimes.

New Post: I've posted more on the Winter Soldier Investigation above.

Webcomics

Since I mentioned a few already, I decided to put a list of webcomics I read in my sidebar. What are webcomics? In short, they are comic strips published on the web. There's more to it than that, however. Because they are published exclusively on the web, they keep their entire archives online. Aside from meaning that you have several years worth of comics available to read immediately, it also means that it's easier for the artist to create long, complex storylines which refer to incidents occuring weeks, months, or even years previously, since the reader has ready access to the previous events. Thus webcomics tend to be serial comic strips like Prince Valiant or Mary Worth--comics which I never read because I could never figure out what was going on. If they had online archives, maybe I would have. In any case, because of the importance of reading the archives in order to understand the current storyline, the links on the sidebar link to the very first comic in the archives, with the "(today)" link pointing to today's strip. These are not the only webcomics I read; I chose to highlight these because they are some of my favorites, plus they met my criteria of being daily strips, regularly updated (although some of the artists occasionally take short vacations), and in reasonably good taste. Here's a quick overview:

Sluggy Freelance by Pete Abrams-- My favorite these days. It's about a boy, his mad scientist buddy, and his homicidal bunny. We meet these folks, the male half of the cast, the first week. Rounding out the cast are the women: a man-eating alien, a hyperactive ferret, the magic-addicted ex-girlfriend, and the obligatory "normal" castmember, who's only a little cursed.

Day by Day by Chris Muir -- This one's the least serial, more gag-a-day. It's like Doonesbury, only funnier and conservative.

It's Walky! by David Willis-- It starts as a normal college comic strip. Then the aliens arrive. Don't worry, the artwork gets better in time.

College Roomies from Hell!!! by Maritza Campos -- This also starts as a normal college strip, but the supernatural stuff starts much sooner. The artwork in this one gets much better with time.

General Protection Fault by Jeffrey T. Darlington -- This starts as a normal software company strip, and then... you know the drill.

Schlock Merenary by Howard Tayler -- This starts as a normal far-future, intergalactic mercenary strip, and then... well, actually, it doesn't get much weirder than that.

Day by Day needs your help to get syndicated

Day by Day, a daily political cartoon by Chris Muir, is looking to get syndicated. I intend to make that happen, using my vast Internet audience of myself and, if he drops by again, Jay Manifold of A Voyage to Arcturus. If that works, I intend to do the same for Sluggy Freelance and General Protection Fault. You're welcome, guys.

Dave Barry for President!

Dave Barry has published an important position paper, also known as his weekly humor column. I think we can all support his political efforts, knowing that his views, whatever they are, are just like ours.

New Post: It's not quite in the same vein, but a Barry/Kerry story up above.

Thus Ends the First Day of Blogging...

I've just started this blog and already I have two substantive posts. Cool. Of course, both posts were things I had been thinking about for a while, and part of the reason I started the blog was so I'd have somewhere to put them.

Of course, I have other things I'd like to post: questions I'd like to ask Kerry about his testimony before Congress 30 years ago, the ability of the US to apply military force to other trouble spots (e.g., North Korea, Syria, and Iran) while still engaged in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the Bush National Guard controversy. Alas, I'll need to do some research before commenting on those. And then I have yet to discuss anything related to theology or quantum computation, the latter being the only thing I'm professionally qualified to discuss (assuming that a doctoral degree really makes me qualified). Between these items, I probably have enough material to have a fairly productive first week. I have no idea what I'll write after that, but I'll try to post something every day.

Well, so far I've only edited each of my posts five or six times. I need to set up a policy for corrections. Generally speaking, grammatical errors will be corrected as soon as I notice, with little or no notification. Substantive and/or factual errors will be corrected in updates to the original post.

Update: Like so. This applies to any correction made more than a few minutes after the original posting. If I notice a mistake right after it goes up, I may just fix the mistake without indicating it--but only if this happens right away. Updates to the original post will only be made on the same day as that post. After that, corrections will get a new post.

Conspiracy Theory Alert: I don't usually go in for conspiracy theories, but I've come up with one I'd like to share. As is expected for any proper conspiracy theory, my only evidence is plausibility and there's no way to disprove it. That said, I'd like to offer two pieces of plausibility evidence:

1. The US and Britain negotiated secretly for at least 8 months with Libya before striking a deal with Gaddafi to get rid of his WMD programs.
2. David Kay has said that he believes that some material related to Iraq's weapon programs was transported to Syria prior to the war. (Thanks to Instapundit.)

So what's the theory? Let's say Gaddafi wasn't the only one made nervous by the sudden collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime, followed by the capture of a thoroughly humiliated Hussein. Assad, after all, is much closer to the action, and is more closely associated with Hussein. It is then plausible that Assad would be interested in pursuing the same sort of deal offered to Gaddafi, may in fact be in negotiations now. This presents the possibility that Bush may know a bit more about Iraq's WMDs than Kay, which may explain his reluctance to back down from earlier statements.

This is by no means proof, or even evidence. I'm just pointing out a possibility.

New Post: More on happenings in Syria above.

Federal Marriage Amendment: I am a conservative--on social, fiscal, and national defense issues--and like most conservatives, I am not a big fan of the Federal Marriage Amendment. If you're a liberal, that "most" probably surprises you, but I believe it to be true. The Constitution is the highest law of the land, and its purpose as such is to create the guidelines by which the many and diverse other laws are enacted. Defining marriage within the Constitution stretches it beyond its purpose in the same way that the Eighteenth Amendment (beginning Prohibition) was outside the proper scope of the Constitution. On the other hand, I believe, like Donald Sensing, that the courts have long been overreaching their authority. They are certainly doing this on the matter of gay marriage. I am not in favor of gay marriage in general (to paraphrase Mark Steyn, changing over 5000 years of tradition based on 50 years of social progress strikes me as a tad shortsighted), but it wouldn't perturb me quite so much if a state legislature, elected by the people with full knowledge of their intentions, were to decide to enact gay marriage within its own state. Having it rammed down the throat of a unwilling populace by an unelected court is another matter entirely. If it takes a Constitutional amendment to prevent that, so be it.

However, I would prefer it if the amendment were not quite so specific to marriage, but addressed the problem which allowed the courts to make these decisions for us in the first place. The American system of checks and balances seems to be sorely lacking when it comes to balancing the court. Thus, I would prefer it if the amendment were to attempt to address this issue. I think it is right to worry about compromising the court's independence, about weakening the power of what is supposed to be the last defense of our freedoms. Unfortunately, the court seems less interested in our freedoms these days (see Campaign Finance Reform), so maybe it won't hurt. I'm not an expert on constitutional law, so I couldn't come up with the proper wording, but I can think of some requirements:

1. Congress would need to be able to overrule the precedent which the court sets, but not the actual ruling itself.
2. This would require at the least a supermajority in both houses of Congress to pass.


New post: I have a new post on this subject here.

After wasting hours and hours reading blogs and wishing I was doing something productive, I decided to start my own. That way I can waste hours not only reading, but also posting, which means that I am producing something, so that, by definition, I am being productive, even if what I am producing is pure drivel.