Suspicion Confirmed!

As if there was ever any doubt, the Global Warmistas have revealed their true agenda of using the allegation of anthropogenic climate change to increase government control over our lives through new regulations and taxes:

The ultimate control freak fantasy

And the global warming beat goes on.... From the Scotsman:

A RAFT of new green taxes on flights, cars and wasteful household appliances is being considered by ministers.

In a leaked letter to the Chancellor, David Miliband, the Environment Secretary, has proposed a package of environmental taxes meant to encourage people to use public transport, buy smaller cars and fly less. These include charges on petrol-guzzling cars, road pricing, a £5 levy on airline travel in Europe and £10 for longer-haul flights, and higher charges for dumping waste in landfills.

What a wonderful way to control and tax everything! All while convincing the populace it’s for their own good and that of the planet. The ultimate control freak fantasy. What genius! The Chinese must love this. Should leave more oil for them.

Dennis Sevakis 10 30 06

ht american thinker

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

Ignoring History

ΛΕΟΝΙΔΑΣ is from time to time chided by his liberal and even libertarian friends as being an adherent to the "war party". What his friends appear to ignore is the fact that a study of human history reveals that the planet has never enjoyed a prolonged era of "peace" that has not been the result of either military conquest or a will to militarily "defend the gates from the barbarians." Expecting otherwise is to expect or hope for that which has never occurred i.e. porcine aerobats or spotless leopards.

For most of human history, the life and survival of the tribes and nations (tribes writ large) have always been too precarious and vulnerable to the barbarians at the gates, or across the river, for pacifism and indolence to flourish, and the Warriors of every tribe in history have been most highly esteemed because it was they, fighting and defeating the tribes' enemies, who made the life and survival of the individuals and the tribe, and the avoidance of death and slavery, possible.
In the 20th century, perhaps for the first time in history, at least for the first time on so large a scale, we - Americans, Western Europeans - have perverted Liberal Democracy by eschewing the Warrior tradition (if tradition is, as Chesterton observed, "the democracy of the dead," the vote of our ancestors as to how things should be understood and done). Perhaps in a combination of revulsion and horror at the massive slaughter of World War II and the vaster slaughter that the weapons of today can inflict, and the achievement of a prosperity in America, and Western Europe, and most of what was once the British Empire, unprecedented in history, we have lulled ourselves into a lovely fantasy of "peace," as if by wanting it we could have it, the triumph of wishful thinking over historic reality.
"In a recent op-ed piece in the Brussels newspaper De Standard (23 October) the Dutch (gay and self-declared humanist) Oscar Van Den
Boogaard . . . says that to him coping with the Islamization of Europe is like 'a process of mourning.' He is overwhelmed by 'a feeling of
sadness.' 'I am not a warrior,' he says, 'but who is? I have never learned to fight for my freedom. I was really good at enjoying it.'"
Some cultures hew far closer than we to the old tribal ways, ideas, ideologies, and visions of conquest by force and fighting, and the growing movement of Jihadism embraces those traditions with a vengeance. We face an implacable marriage of religious fervor and tribal Warriorism in the tide of Jihadism that harbors only disdain and contempt for all peace other than the its own peace of its own imposition that follows conquest and subjugation, the peace of submission, the peace of Islamic domination and hegemony.
Van Den Boogaard may not think of himself as a Warrior, but the Jihadis who strategize and bomb to conquer Iraq and Somalia, Israel and Egypt and America, Bali and Spain and England do. They are the Warriors of Allah, who is greatly pleased by their martyrdom, who greatly rewards them in Paradise, and, like the Warriors of past centuries, they are the most highly exalted among their own peers and within their own culture. If Europe and America are to defend, protect, and perpetuate, our own distinct cultures and freedoms, we will have to leave our child-like peace fantasies behind...

At least until Muslims adopt [the words of John Lennon's composition of] "Imagine" as the 6th Pillar of Islam.

We are a long way from a majority of our population waking up to the reality of the threat which confronts western culture.

Update:

The anti-war movement has been with man all his existence. Its latest iteration denies the existence of the warrior in man. To their disciples man is peaceful and all must turn their back on war and like solutions. Unfortunately the “peaceniks” and I don’t mean that pejoratively are not storming the mosques with their mantra of peace. In fact they are trying in every way to help the Muslim warriors to blunt the efforts of the American warriors to peacefully settle the matter. They are actively working to deter our intelligence gathering capabilities and offering surrender to the opponent’s warriors as a solution to man’s age-old proclivities. That doesn’t work as history has taught us; man does not keep his word if he can conquer you with superior force; with military or a spiritually-based belief.

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

Those Lying Warmistas

The global warmistas are fond of citing "borehole" evidence from various locations on the planet to support their bogus claims of "catastrophic" anthropogenic changes in Earth's climate. They routinely ignore contrary data in order to further their agenda of increasing government regulation of human activity:

Three Centuries of Ground Surface Temperature Change in Southern Canada Reference:
Majorowicz, J.A., Safanda, J., Harris, R.N. and Skinner, W.R. 1999. Large ground surface temperature changes of the last three centuries inferred from borehole temperatures in the Southern Canadian Prairies, Saskatchewan. Global and Planetary Change 20: 227-241.

What was done:
The authors present new proxy temperature records for the past three centuries that were extracted from borehole temperature-depth logs obtained at ten sites scattered throughout southern Saskatchewan, Canada. Data from the latter potion of the record were compared to observed surface temperature measurements over the last 100 years.

What was learned:
The temperature proxies indicate the existence of a relatively cool period throughout most of the 18th and 19th centuries. Then, from about 1820 to present, temperatures rose between 2.5 and 3.0°C, suggesting to the authors that "the last major warming event [which is still going on] began in the 18th-19th century."

What it means:
According to the authors, "the significance of this record is that it suggests almost half of the warming occurred prior to 1900, before the dramatic buildup of atmospheric greenhouse gases." Hence, if something other than greenhouse gases caused the first half of the most recent global warming event (in which we are still imbedded), something other than greenhouse gases may be responsible for the second half of the warming as well.

source
Reviewed 1 September 1999

Multiculturism=Suicide Pact?

At [the heart of the multicultural debate] is the question of where tolerance should end and the old adage, "When in Rome, do as the Romans", should kick in. While tolerance is certainly a positive virtue that should be strived for, it cannot be a cultural suicide pact. A culture that is tolerant of those who are intolerant of its freedoms is ripe for destruction, and bit by bit will see all it values eroded. And radical Islam knows this. Just as an Australian wouldn't go to Saudi Arabia to wear a bikini on the beach and drink beer in the corner pub, those who see the proper role of women as subservient, anonymous and under cover should not expect a postmodern secular democracy such as Britain or Australia to accommodate these beliefs. Australians, who quite properly want their daughters, sisters, wives and mothers to be able to achieve anything, are right to feel uncomfortable about religiously mandated coverings and the limits they imply. We do not allow practices such as female genital mutilation simply because they are practiced by an immigrant "other". Disappointingly, those who have traditionally been a positive force for the liberation of women against oppression in other spheres have here largely been silent on the question of Islam's beliefs concerning half of humanity.

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Enviro/Green Religion

The evidence keeps mounting that the the Enviro/Green movement is more religion than science.

John A. Baden: "Is Ethanol a Pure Green Elixir?"

Those of us committed to Green causes often respond more strongly to symbolic values than to careful analysis. Recycling offers a clear example. The environmental value of recycling depends on time- and place-specific circumstances. It almost always makes both ecological and economic sense to recycle aluminum and other metals. Often this holds for paper, only occasionally for plastic and glass. Recycling plastic and glass often consumes more resources than it saves... [in California the taxpayers will take up the slack]

Here’s CU’s [Consumer Union's] evaluation of ethanol. First, the energy content of ethanol is low when compared with gasoline or diesel. While diesel contains around 140,000 Btu per gallon, and gasoline 115,000 Btu, denatured ethanol contains only 78,000 Btu per gallon. We can’t cheat physics. These numbers translate into low fuel mileage.

CU tested a new Chevy Tahoe. “In highway driving (on 85 percent ethanol), gas mileage decreased from 21 to 15 mpg; in city driving, it dropped from 9 to 7.” In marked contrast, we have two old diesel ranch trucks that weigh a ton more than the new Tahoe and each gets 20+ mpg on the highway at 65 mph.

We can grow the feed-stocks for ethanol -- but I’d feel a bit guilty for using it. And not only for the subsidies built into its production.

Let’s consider one among many egregious ethanol subsidies. Flexible fuel vehicles (FFVs) are designed to run on either gasoline or a blend of 85 percent ethanol and 15 percent gas, E85. Automotive manufacturers receive generous fuel-economy credits for each FFV built -- even if it never runs on E85. This credit enables them to build more large SUVs that burn more gas than ethanol replaces. This is a perverse but predictable outcome of political forces.

The cellulosic ethanol touted by both Greens and President Bush may be a worse one for Third World ecosystems. What could be wrong with using carbohydrates to replace hydrocarbons? Here are some unintended consequences foretold by Peter Huber, an MIT engineering Ph.D.: “To improve on wood-burning fires, or grass-eating cows, perfect the cellulose-splitting enzyme. Then watch what 7 billion people will do to your forests and your grasslands.”

h/t: Dick McDonald

Racisism

In London, an elderly driver who had a heart attack careened into a bus. Here you had a dying man, people trying to save him and police trying to clear the scene. Meanwhile, black youths at the scene just wanted to fight the cops. They shouted, ‘Who cares — it’s just a white man’.
”The incident confirmed my suspicion that some of those who keep talking about “Dead White Males,” meaning basically every great Western thinker in history, are actually lamenting the fact that not all white males are, well, dead.
- - - - - - - - - -
We have watched Mexicans who were illegally in US cities quite openly shouting racist slogans against the majority white population, with little or no reaction from the media. Yet Americans who want to strengthen border controls against Mexico are denounced as “racists.” Why?

I have heard two explanations for this one-sided focus on white racism only. The first one is that white people are more racist than non-whites, a claim I find highly dubious in the 21st century. The other is that we should focus mainly on white racism because “white people are so powerful.” But are whites always powerful? [the official position of most "civil rights" groups and university diversity departments] We are, demographically speaking, a rapidly shrinking global minority. We are even a shrinking percentage of the population in the West.

I have a right to preserve my culture, too, even though I have blue eyes, and cannot see anything “racist” in not wanting my children to become a persecuted minority in their own country through mass immigration. That you are denounced as a White Supremacist for just stating the obvious shows how deeply entrenched and internalized this anti-white bias has become.

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ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

Ignorance! A bargain at $40,000.00 per year

By Jeff Jacoby:

``If a nation expects to be ignorant and free," Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1816, ``it expects what never was and never will be." If he was right, American freedom is headed for a cliff. [Intercollegiate Studies Institute] was startled to find that at almost one-third of the schools surveyed, seniors actually scored lower than freshmen. Either the seniors forgot what they had known when they entered as freshmen, the report concludes, ``or -- more ominously -- were mistaught by their professors." And where was this civic dumbing-down concentrated? Overwhelmingly at the most selective universities among the 50 surveyed, including Yale, Duke, Georgetown, Brown, and Berkeley.

For as much as $40,000 a year, students at such schools can count on full exposure to every reigning value of political correctness, from diversity to secularism to gay rights to global warming. But they may leave at the end of four years knowing even less about America's history and civic institutions than they did when they arrived.

As Jefferson observed, the survival of democratic liberty requires an educated public. Have we still got one? ``We . . . take as axiomatic," the American Political Science Association's Task Force on Civic Education warned in 1998, ``that current levels of political knowledge, political engagement, and political enthusiasm are so low as to threaten the vitality and stability of democratic politics in the United States." Civic apathy, especially among the young, is now the norm. Most college students don't vote, don't involve themselves in political campaigns, and don't follow public affairs.
In light of what the ISI has learned it may be a good thing.

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What the Welfare State Hath Wrought

From the L.A Times:

1. 40% of all workers in L.A. County (L.A. County has 10 million people) are working for cash and not paying taxes. This was because they are predominantly illegal immigrants, working without a
green card.

2. 95% of warrants for murder in Los Angeles are for illegal aliens.
3. 75% of people on the most wanted list in Los Angeles are illegal
aliens.
4. Over 2/3 of all births in Los Angeles County are to illegal alien
Mexicans on Medi-Cal, whose births were paid for by taxpayers.
5. Nearly 25% of all inmates in California detention centers are
Mexican nationals here illegally.
6. Over 300,000 illegal aliens in Los Angeles County are living in
garages.
7. The FBI reports half of all gang members in Los Angeles are most
likely illegal aliens from south of the border.
8. Nearly 60% of all occupants of HUD properties are illegal.
9. 21 radio stations in L.A. are Spanish speaking.
10. In L.A. County 5.1 million people speak English. 3.9 million
speak Spanish (10.2 million people in L.A.County).
(All the above from the Los Angeles Times)
Less than 2% of illegal aliens are picking our crops, but 29% are on
welfare.
Over 70% of the United States' annual population growth (and over 90%
of California, Florida, and New York) results from immigration.
The cost of immigration to the American taxpayer in 1997 was, (after
subtracting taxes immigrants pay), a NET $70 BILLION a year, [Professor
Donald Huddle, Rice University]. The lifetime fiscal impact (taxes paid
minus services used) for the average adult Mexican immigrant is a NEGATIVE
number.
29% of inmates in federal prisons are illegal aliens.

If they can come to this country to demonstrate by the
thousands, Why can't they take charge over the corruption in their own
country? [probably gun control laws?]
We are a bunch of fools for letting this continue.
THE U.S. VS MEXICO: On February 15, 1998, the U.S. and Mexican soccer
teams met at the Los Angeles Coliseum. The crowd was overwhelmingly
pro-Mexican even though most lived in this country. They booed during the
National Anthem and U.S. flags were held upside down. As the match
progressed, supporters of the U.S. team were insulted, pelted with
projectiles, punched and spat upon. Beer and trash were thrown at the U.S.
players before and after the match. The
coach of the U.S. team, Steve Sampson said, "This was the most painful
experience I have ever had in this profession."

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

How Can This Be?

Let's review some facts. Recently North Korea tested what has turned out to be a nuclear bomb and promised further testing soon. The chattering class on both ends of the political spectrum pointed accusing fingers at each other to assign blame. The "right wingers" blamed the Clinton administration for negotiating an end to the norks' program in return for providing aid in the form of two nuke plants as well as other goodies. The ink was not dry on the "agreement" before the norks were cheating. The left wingers (Clintons et al) immediately blamed Bush for insisting on 6 power talks and not negotiating with Kimmie bilaterally (translation: buying him off with more goodies) A few days ago China sends a "delegation" to Pyongyang to confer with Kimmie and afterwards it returns to China THE SAME DAY. The following day Kimmie announces he "regrets the atomic test and has no plans for further tests". He also states that he is considering returning to the negotiating table. What gives? Can it be that Bush was correct in not opening the candy store for the norks? Allah forfend! Hold your breath waiting for this gem of a story to make the front page of the New York Times.

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

Commuter's Dream Car

For those of you who sometimes encounter that "idiot" driver during your commute to or from the office. British Ferret, Rolls-Royce engine, 25-gal. gas tank, full-time 4WD, 60mph, Browning M1919 .30 machine-gun… doesn’t get much better than that, really.

shamelessly stolen from: Kim DuToit

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

Exit Visas for U.S. Citizens?

I think we can file this one under: BOHICA (bend over, here it comes again)

Should you have to ask for permission from the government before you are allowed to get on a plane or cruise ship? ("Mother, may I?")

The USA Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has proposed that airlines cruise lines, and operators of all other ships and planes -- including charter flights, air taxis, fishing vessels, etc. -- be required to get individual permission (”clearance”) from the DHS for each passenger on all flights or ocean voyages to, from, or via the USA. Unless the answer is “Yes” -- if the answer is “no” or “maybe”, or if the DHS doesn’t answer at all -- the airline wouldn’t be allowed to give you a boarding pass, or let you or your luggage on the plane.

This is the third identification-related “rulemaking” in the last month and a half in which the DHS has proposed to restrict the right to travel.

[During the public comment period on the proposed regulations the most interesting are those submitted by] the USA Department of Defense, which wants not merely military flights but also all flights operated by military contractors exempted from the DHS permission ("clearance") system. The Pentagon also says the programming the DHS wants completed within six months will take the military at least one to two full years.

As usual, our rulers will exempt themselves from this regulatory orwellian nightmare.
h/t: John Ray

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

Alive and Well in 2006

While the image to the right is readily recognizable,
that on the left is a bit more esoteric. Few these days have viewed the logo of the Sturmabteilung or SA who were the thugs that regularly disrupted gatherings and speeches in opposition to the National Socialist (NSDAP) party whose logo is represented on the right. Their tactics are today used for the most part by leftists who wish to silence opposition to the collectivist agenda in Europe and the U.S. The following is a typical example:

There was a university, some speakers and an audience. The speakers had been invited to the university in the name of intellectual debate and free expression. Some of the audience, however, would have none of it. Intolerant of the views being aired, they shouted-down the speakers and repeatedly called one of the black representatives “nigger.” Then, in a final fit of hatred and rage, in quintessential Brownshirt style, they stormed the stage violently, squelching voices that would have contributed to a fruitful exchange of ideas.

But what was the university? And, more to the point, who were the speakers and the audience? Were the guests communists or advocates for illegal immigration and the audience right-wing ideologues? No, not at all.

This fascistic display occurred at vaunted Columbia University, ostensibly a bastion of free expression. The speakers were with the Minuteman Project, the organization of citizen border sentinels. And the mob posing as an audience comprised those who despise such individuals: leftists. Leftists who did the Brownshirts proud. [...]

"Liberals" [yes those are sneer quotes] are afforded the right to speak mostly unfettered by disruptive voices, while conservatives are subjected to as much abuse as today’s Brownshirts can get away with dishing out.

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ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

Meanwhile, in the Fwench Republic™

This boob is fond of lecturing us barbaric Americans on the finer points of "human rights" while Le Nouvel Observateur reports the following (excuse the cleaned up computer translation):

Two young people had to appear in [court] on Monday, October 9th in Mulhouse [in the province of Alsace, France for "contempt of court" having written: " [Put] Chirac in the zoo, free [the] animals ".
Loïc, [a part time worker] in the entertainment[?] industry, and Christelle, [a] student, had wr[itten] slogans on banners [o]n a nearby street [in the] (square) where Jacques Chirac came to [cut the ribbon at a new] streetcar [service in] the Alsatian town. The president of the Republic is indeed the first magistrate of France.
Their banners were also hostile to the [labor] Contract [ ] disputed by [muslim youth protesters] in France. [Advised] by a passer-by, seven agents in [plain clothes] arrested them[ ]. The banners, [including] those concerning Jacques Chirac, [did not have permission to be] (displayed).

[The two face ] one year of prison and 15.000 euro of fine

The[ir] lawyer intends to plead [before] the court dealing with criminal matters the defence of fundamental liberties, (his) [clients are] being [prosecuted] for the exercise of "free" speech] against the president [due to anti-CPE [political hysteria].

If [there is a] conviction, their lawyer says smiling that he could "ask for a presidential pardon".

"French law defines the President as head judge of the country™ (banana republic?) or something, thereby neatly rendering all mockery of the President and his office the same thing as contempt of the highest court in the land. Not a bad racket." Expect the progressives™ to implement such a practice when they come to power here.
hat tip: No Pasaran

At least 1000 Words

This picture, although photoshopped to include the mushroom cloud in the background is worth a thousand words. It records the toast closing the deal between the Clinton Administration and the Nork dictator Kimmie in 1994. As you may recall, the deal included construction of two nuclear processing plants in North Korea and other goodies paid for by U.S. taxpayers in exchange for Kimmie's "agreement" to "end" North Korea's atomic weapons program. Today we note Senator Clinton and other dhimmocrat politicians displaying the chutzpah of blaming the Nork's progress in atomic weaponry on Bush

"The Supreme Leader was a sweet little man who could be trusted to abide by a non-proliferation pact when Bill Clinton was president, but it only took six years for Bush to drive him completely nuts. It wasn't just the "Axis of Evil" remark, either. When the Shrub blew the lid off North Korea's secret nuclear weapons program, he forced the proud nation to brazenly continue what it had been doing discreetly under Bill Clinton for years. Our only hope is that a Democrat will be in the White House in two years, so that Kim Jong-Il will once again be a misunderstood yet reasonable man ready to sit down at the bargaining table with his American friends.

I don't expect Bush to thank Bill Clinton for Winning the Peace in North Korea. But Clinton should at least get the credit he deserves for insuring that no Americans will ever have to die on North Korean soil, but rather in the comfort of their own homes as long as they live within the blast radius."

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

Al Gore, Call Your Office!

Temperature Record of the Week
The temperature Record of the Week is from Columbia, MS. During the period of most significant greenhouse gas buildup over the past century, i.e., 1930 and onward, Columbia's mean annual temperature has cooled by 1.12 degrees Fahrenheit. Not much global warming here!

"In May, U.S. government and private forecasters warned of another dire Atlantic hurricane season. Coming on the heels of hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the forecasts kept oil prices near a record for months. They scared away some insurance investors in a year the companies may end up turning in higher profits. And hedge funds like Amaranth Advisors LLC gambled big that natural gas prices would climb -- and lost. No hurricanes have struck the U.S. coast so far this year, deflating natural gas prices... The bungled forecasts shed light on what happens when energy traders, investors and, in some cases, the news media, rely too heavily on an inexact science" -- Bloomberg news service (with thanks to Benny Peiser at CCNet).

More Kyoto "Bovine Scatology"

Surprise surprise! But we knew from the getgo that Kyoto was just a smokescreen to attack free enterprise.

With roughly 8-10% annual GDP growth in both countries, China [and India who are exempted] will soon be emitting more greenhouse gases than America, and the growth in emissions from these two countries will dwarf any reductions in emissions in the developed world, even if all of them met the Kyoto standards.

And the dirty secret is out on this one too: almost none of the signatories to Kyoto will come anywhere close to meeting their targets of a reduction from 1990 emission levels. As a means of reducing global greenhouse gas emissions , Kyoto has so far been a failure.

Some of the signatory nations bound by Kyoto have had a much faster percentage increase in greenhouse gas emissions since the treaty was signed than the United States, which did not agree to be bound by Kyoto protocols. Since Gore cannot accuse these nations which to date have earned a failing grade of being led by George Bush, or the victim of an oil company disinformation campaign, it might suggest that the reductions in emissions he seeks, are not as easy to achieve as he maintains, and that Kyoto is not the vehicle to achieve them.
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Cost of "Free" Speech: $300.00 per Hr.

Did you think that free speech was protected by the 1st and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution? Think again. It would appear that those amendments have gone the way of the 2nd and 10th.

George F. Will in Newsweek
A few people opposed to a ballot initiative that would annex their neighborhood to Parker, Colo., talked to neighbors and purchased lawn signs expressing opposition. So a proponent of annexation got them served with a complaint charging violations of Colorado's campaign-finance law. It demands that when two or more people collaborate to spend more than $200 to influence a ballot initiative, they must disclose the names, addresses and employers of anyone contributing money, open a separate bank account and file regular reports with the government. Then came a subpoena demanding information about any communications that opponents of the initiative had with neighbors concerning the initiative, and the names and addresses of any persons to whom they gave lawn signs. They hired a lawyer. That has become a cost of political speech.

Before any of you consider putting up yard signs in this political season you had better investigate the cost per hour of trial lawyers these days. What next; bumper stickers?

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ

Discrimination and Government Power

In many communities around the nation these days debate rages over the prohibition of so called "big box" merchandisers such as WalMart, Costco, Home Depot and Lowes. One of the main arguments put forward by those who oppose such enterprises centers around the competitive advantage they enjoy over smaller "mom and pop" businesses which the opponents prefer. As the prices in any large scale business tend to be lower than in smaller ones the opponents point to "unfair" competition. There are, however other factors to consider in the competition equation such as service, convenience and time, which customers invariably consider. Customers, if given the opportunity, may be willing to pay extra for such conveniences as avoiding checkout queues and obtaining personal assistance. Conversely, others may opt for the inconveniences in order to retain more of their hard earned cash to spend on other products. Dr. Walter Williams calls this the cost of preference indulgence. Leonidas will tend to oppose those who would use government power at any level to suppress or eliminate freedom of choice.

In the U.S., the Davis-Bacon Act of 1931 (still on the books), a super minimum wage law, was enacted to protect unionized white construction workers from competition with black workers. The support ran along the lines of Alabama Rep. Clayton Allgood's testimony: "That contractor has cheap colored labor that he transports, and he puts them in cabins, and it is labor of that sort that is in competition with white labor throughout the country." (Congressional Record, 1931, page 6513).

What minimum wage laws do is lower the cost of, and hence subsidize, racial preference indulgence. After all, if an employer must pay the same wage no matter whom he hires, the cost of discriminating in favor of the people he prefers is cheaper. This is a general principle. If filet mignon sold for $9 a pound and chuck steak $4, the cost of discriminating in favor of filet mignon is $5 a pound, the price difference. But if a law mandating a minimum price for chuck steak were on the books, say, $7 a pound, it would lower the cost of discrimination against chuck steak.

Minimum or maximum prices are one of the most effective ways to encourage people to indulge their preferences, be they racial or any other preference. In general, any kind of economic regulation that restricts peaceable, voluntary exchange has the capacity to lower the costs of preference indulgence. Decent people should be against such regulations.
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Meanwhile, should automobiles have been prohibited in order to protect buggy-whip makers' jobs?

hat tip/ Dick MacDonald

Riding the Tiger

In 1939, the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact cleared the way for Hitler to start World War II. The Pact caught the world by surprise, because it was an alliance between two bitter enemies, National Socialist Germany and Communist Russia. From a historical perspective this is not so surprising as both National Socialism and Communism are collectivist philosophies as John Ray often points out. The present tacit alliance between the left and the Muslim jihadists William S. Lind calls the "Marx-Mohammed Pact:"

Fjordman:
"What made possible the recent bombings in London (July 2005), and [Madrid] and the many more that almost assuredly will follow in Europe and the United States, is the Marx-Mohammed Pact. Once again, two sworn enemies, Marxism - - specifically, the cultural Marxism commonly known as Political Correctness - - and Islam, have made a Devil's bargain whereby each assists the other against a common enemy, the remnants of the Christian West." "London and Madrid were only a foretaste of what those policies will bring to Europe and America. If we dare rip down the camouflage nets cultural Marxism has erected to blind us we see Europe has two real choices: an infinity of Londons/Madrids or a second expulsion of the Moors."

Of course, the same collaboration happened in Iran, where popular "reformers" such as Ali Shariati in the years before the 1979 revolution infused Islam with aspects of Western thought and made the Marxists believe that they could coexist with Islam. So they cooperated in overthrowing the Shah - and then all the godless Socialists were the first ones to hang from lamp posts around the country when Khomeini and his Islamic cronies seized power. The secular Leftists in Europe know fully well that they do not agree with religious Muslims on [most] issues, but they believe they are the senior partners in the alliance and that they can "ride the tiger." That may be true now, but for how long will the situation remain like that?

As the commenter Kactuz points out: "...On the surface you have what should be two mortal enemies - the left and Islam - yet we are seeing a convergence of these two based upon their shared hate of Western Culture: liberty, individualism, democracy and capitalism. The dirty little secret is that Islam despises the left also, but this will not keep radical Muslims from using them to advance their agenda [this is what is known in the Koran as Al-Taqiyah]. The left will never know what hit them until they are on their knees and some jihadist is standing over them with a sword.

It will probably worsen before the will to survive manifests itself in western culture.

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ