I’ve been a news and talk radio listener for years, from conservative talk to NPR and the BBC. NPR mainly reflects the views of the Left, with some of the talk shows refusing to include guests with a non-statist point of view. For instance, while they sometimes do have conservatives, they are statist conservatives such as the ones coming from the Heritage and other Washington “think tanks.” No libertarians or otherwise people challenging the establishment statist quo, such as a Ron Paul, Tom Woods or Lew Rockwell, so it seems.
But I’m writing this now to express my continuing disappointment in the so-called conservatives and their uninformed (but well-meaning) listeners and all the conservative-statist guests they sometimes have on. Once again these people have high hopes that some new political candidate will get in the Presidency and things will be better. That is because they are either terribly ignorant of the past or they do know the history but nevertheless maintain their denial and rationalization for a system that can never be “reformed” and they keep on trying anyway.
Their hero Ronald Reagan expanded the size and power of the federal government and raised taxes after the famous “Reagan tax cuts” and signed the first trillion-dollar budget with a lot of pork. Their faux conservative hero should have thrown that budget back at Congress and told them, “Cut out the damn pork!” at the very least. And yes, shut down the government!
FedGov continued to expand after the 1994 “Republican Revolution,” and more after the 2000 election and throughout the 2000s with a Republican President and Republican Congress. The 2010 sweeping in of Tea Party conservatives did nothing for liberty, and the 2014 elections of even more of them did nothing as well.
So their cognitive dissonance and denial is just amazing now. It’s like no matter how intelligent these people are, they never learn. However, I really enjoy hearing them disagree with each other, such as the current Presidential candidates tearing each other apart. And on talk radio, some of the talkers such as Dennis Prager and Steve Deace sound like they HATE Donald Trump, but some of the others such as Jeff Kuhner and Michael Savage sound like they LOVE The Donald. Yech.
Steve Deace endorsed the vicious collectivist warmonger Ted Cruz, yet nevertheless continues to speak of morality, and so on. So, when collectivist Ted Cruz wants to order the “carpet bombing” of whole territories which includes murdering innocent human beings including children, I guess that sure is someone to endorse when promoting “morality.” Yup. And Deace is also one of those who is obsessed with the marriage issue, as is Michael Savage. They want the State to continue to be empowered to “allow” heterosexual couples to marry under the State’s sanctified authority, and to disallow homosexuals to marry. That is one issue on which the conservatives truly worship secular government power, control and authority. The real solution is to get the State out of the picture entirely. Marriage and contracts are private matters.
Among the conservatives and nationalists’ many problems is their naive acceptance of an authoritarian collectivist system including a compulsory monopoly government (that is doomed to collapse at some point, because it violates important principles of liberty, such as the ideas of self-ownership and self-determination, non-aggression, and private property). Another major problem they have is their arrogant belief in “American Exceptionalism” which blinds them of the morality of the aforementioned principles. And they have a blind love of authority, especially uniformed, armed authority. What this means is they are not totally enthusiastic about the right of the people to defend themselves against aggression and the right of the people to keep and bear arms. But they are enthusiastically supportive of the right of the government and its police and military to be armed and have artificial authority over the people whether all the people consent to that or not. That’s today’s conservatives, or most of them anyway: nationalists, collectivists, and authoritarians. And hypocrites where morality preaching, advocating “liberty” and “limited government” are concerned.
Some of the aforementioned conservative talk radio personalities like to refer to morality and “good vs. evil.” They often refer to murderers and abortion as typical conservatives do. However, they have cognitive dissonance, or they psychologically rationalize or just look the other way when it comes to the murders and murderers they tend to support, such as politicians who start wars of aggression. Because today’s conservatives are collectivists and nationalists — and “American Exceptionalists” — they tend to rationalize government murder as “collateral damage,” and so on. For example, President Harry Truman ordered the atomic bombings of civilian populations in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, killing over 100,000 innocent human beings, while with full knowledge that the Japanese were already surrendering. And this was after Truman and his predecessor FDR ordered the bombings of civilian centers in Tokyo killing another 100,000 innocents. “Well, we had to do what we had to do, to end the war,” and so on, they say. No, “we” didn’t have to murder innocent human beings.
It is evil to target innocent human beings, war or not. But the “Exceptionalists” continue to defend such evils of the past and present, including the Bush and Obama wars.
And currently Barack Obama’s CIA continues to murder innocents overseas in Pakistan, Yemen, and other areas with their remote-controlled drones, and all that does is provoke those foreigners to retaliate. And it isn’t “collateral damage,” as they are targeting the innocents, they target weddings and funerals, and they target the people who run out to help the ones who have been blown up by the CIA murder-bombs. The government-worshipers rationalize immoral atrocities committed by their rulers.
And history really is important, you know. In 1991 President George H.W. Bush ordered the war of aggression against Iraq. This included the bombing and destruction of civilian water and sewage treatment facilities, which caused the Iraqis to have to use untreated water, which led to high rates of disease and the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent people mostly children, by the year 2000. And it was intentional, by the way, as reported by even the mainstream media then, according to James Bovard. One Air Force strategist noted in a 1995 Airpower Journal article that “A key example of such dual-use targeting was the destruction of Iraqi electrical power facilities in Desert Storm…. [Destruction] of these facilities shut down water purification and sewage treatment plants. As a result, epidemics of gastroenteritis, cholera, and typhoid broke out, leading to perhaps as many as 100,000 civilian deaths and a doubling of the infant mortality rate.” According to Bovard, the strategist “concluded that the U.S. Air Force has a ‘vested interest in attacking dual-use targets’ that undermine ‘civilian morale’.”
Hmm, let’s target civilian water supplies to deliberately sicken and kill them and hope they will get rid of their leader that we don’t like. That’s not psychopathic and sadistic, but civilized, and moral.
So, elder Bush started a war of aggression against Iraq in 1991, bombed civilian infrastructure and caused hundreds of thousands of deaths, leading up to 9/11. His invasions and intrusions, deaths and destruction also included setting up U.S. military bases in areas that were considered sensitive to Muslims who didn’t like such occupations (in addition to the pre-9/11 destruction of Iraq).
And it isn’t just the Presidents, their Secretaries of Defense (sic) and State, and their military bureaucrats who have been committing all the atrocities by ordering them, but as Laurence Vance has pointed out, those more directly responsible for the murders and destruction have been the soldiers, the bombardiers, and so on, who actually carried out the physical acts of destruction and murder they committed. And that is a good explanation for all the military suicides: guilty consciences. Despite the military’s brainwashing soldiers to suppress their moral conscience, which apparently conservatives are good at, the soldiers who have murdered innocent human beings know that what they have done is very wrong and immoral and that they have acted criminally and out of evil and not out of good. It is difficult or impossible for the conservative American Exceptionalist warvangelicals to acknowledge all that, because to do so might lead them to acknowledge that the U.S. government’s wars of aggression and mass murders overseas have been immoral and have gone against what America was supposed to stand for.
But conservatives and perhaps most Americans, indoctrinated with heavy doses of propaganda day after day by the mainstream media, “support the troops.” Of course, had a foreign government and military invaded and bombed the hell out of New York City’s or Detroit’s water system and electrical supply, that’s different because we’re America, say the “Exceptionalists,” but those are Iraqis, after all (i.e. sub-human). God forbid the conservatives should actually believe in the Golden Rule. And their view of patriotism is: Support our government, right or wrong. Support immorality.
And then 9/11 happened in response to the U.S. military’s occupations, invasions and bombings. The propagandists said it was for other reasons. And because conservatives don’t believe in personal responsibility, or acknowledging that actions have consequences, it was better that their Left-influenced impatient and short-sighted mentality not consider the ten years previous to 9/11 and the criminal actions of their own government. And after 9/11, rather than withdrawing criminally invasive and trespassing U.S. forces from those overseas areas that are not U.S. territories, George W. Bush the Junior Bush started new wars on Iraq and Afghanistan, neither of which had anything to do with 9/11, and increased the bombings, the murders and destruction, and provocations overseas. Many propagandized and gullible people actually believe that Iraq started the war, and that those foreigners began the aggressions. They really believe those things!
So, it would be better if conservatives weren’t so irrational, because if they could drop the syrupy emotionalism, the flag-waving “Exceptionalism” stuff and their nationalistic collectivism then maybe they can progress a little bit. Speaking of “progressing,” the “progressives” — at least most of them, anyway — are beyond help, in my view.
Another thing with most conservatives is their blind defense of government police. The local government police is definitely one big example of socialism that conservatives approve of, and love with all their hearts. Yes, a compulsorily government-monopolized function is an example of “socialism,” which is what government police is, as is the national security state that conservatives love. Until President Obama or President Hillary sics the police or military on those dissenting politically incorrect conservatives, that is. In that case, they will not like the government police or military so much.
And I agree with the talk radio crowd in their criticism of Black Lives Matter or any groups or individuals who call for or commit acts of violence against government police. If an officer is just there, sitting in his cruiser munching on the donuts and hasn’t harmed anyone, then you leave him alone. Just as any decent person should do with anyone else. However, when government police act criminally against innocents, then I don’t hear conservatives speaking out against such injustices, such immoral acts of criminality. And yes it is happening all the time, criminal cops bullying, brutalizing, assaulting, and murdering innocent human beings. As I mentioned in a recent post, just read articles by William Grigg, Radley Balko, Glenn Greenwald, and the CATO police misconduct blog, to get an idea of what’s going on.
As I stated, it’s wrong to shoot or otherwise harm innocent people, including government police who are just there minding their own business and not bothering anyone. I try not to think like a collectivist, as most conservatives (and most people really) tend to do. But what if government police officers are beating up on innocent people, or otherwise directly threatening their lives, do the people have a right to defend themselves? If police break into the wrong house or apartment, as they often do, or into your home and you know you’ve done nothing wrong, do you have a right to shoot the invaders to protect yourselves and your families? I would guess that most conservatives will defer to the government police, probably even if they were the unfortunate targets.
Obedience to authority is the conservatives’ thing, just as with the Left. Not absolute moral law, which includes the right to defend yourself against aggression.
And that authoritarianism is what connects the conservatives, nationalists and collectivists to Islam, believe it or not. The word “Islam” translates to “submit,” as in submit your independence, your self-rule, your spirit, your freedom, your will, to Islamic or Islamic government authority or to Muhammad, or Allah. And the conservatives also strongly believe in submission to authority, such as government bureaucrats, government police, and government military. They might object to such a characterization, and say that they believe in the family and that children must submit to parental authority, and that they believe in church or Christianity and that you must submit to Jesus’s authority, but not to the government. But their droolingly blind support for government police and military that we see on a daily basis proves otherwise.
One more thing is the conservatives approval of government taxation of the people. Well if you want to live in our society you have to pay taxes, after all. And that means involuntarily in the absence of a voluntary contract.
Sorry. Taxation is robbery. It is the government (that only a particular percentage of the people approve of and consent to, anyway) ordering you to fork over your earnings, your wealth, or they will throw you in a cage. No different from a robber, a gangster. So taxation is criminal, and is imposed by a criminal enterprise. But like the statists on the Left, the conservatives approve of this way of life, thus showing that they have no idea what true morality is all about.
And also, without involuntary taxation, none of the unconstitutional, immoral and criminal government programs, schemes, and wars would take place, because no one in his right mind would voluntarily participate in funding them.
So I’ll keep on masochistically listening to conservative talk radio along with NPR and BBC, and the conservative talkers will keep on living in their little fantasy worlds, pretending that the current democratic system of compulsory government monopoly can ever be “reformed,” if we can only get the “right people” in office. Maybe I have some hope that some of them will eventually realize that compulsory monopoly government is inherently flawed and inherently criminal. But I think that’s unrealistic on my part. It is probably also unrealistic to hope that they will ever drop their arrogant “Exceptionalism” and their love of uniformed armed authority.
Perhaps miracles can happen.
Scott Lazarowitz's Blog 