Category: Comment

As I mentioned last November, Eric Metaxas wrote Letter to the American Church, asking believers to exercise their faith in the ballot box and in action. Metaxas juxtaposes the American church with the German church up to and during the Third Reich. I have a friend who thinks Metaxas is offbase.

Isn’t what Metaxas is saying just hyperbole? If not, then is the call upon the church loud enough?

The debate on what the church should do is a perennial one. We’re called to exercise our faith and we should put our faith into action. What is too far?

Still reading Isaacson’s Elon Musk:

“Wokeness wants to make comedy illegal, which is not cool. Trying to shut down Dave Chappelle, come on, man, that’s crazy. Do we want a humorless society that is simply rife with condemnation and hate and no forgiveness? At its heart wokeness is divisive, exclusionary, and hateful. It gives mean people a shield to be mean and cruel, armed with false virtue.”

I would add that it is stifling; can’t breathe.

Had some time to reflect on Haley’s loss. The party has turned the corner. I hoped that I would not have to support the opposition.

Just reading more of AI in Isaacson’s Elon Musk.
“The danger comes when artificial intelligence is decoupled from human will.”
We have to maintain control of AI. It should remain aligned with human goals. AI bots should be an extension of the will of individuals not systems that could follow their own goals and intentions.
This goes all the way back to the human development of tools. That’s what AI should be. But the question of consciousness has not really been answered.

The decision rule says we do something as long as its added benefit is greater than the added cost. Profit is the reward for innovation, and is intrinsic to freedom.

Our rights to property hinge on three things:

– Private ownership under the right rules. Life, liberty and the acquiring and possessing of property. The king gave property to whom he wished, but the Americans wanted equality of opportunity.
– Market freedom.
– Reliable money. Government is for everyone, thought the Founders, so the purpose of government was to safeguard others’ rights to property.

In the end, the right to acquire is a public good, and bureaucratic rules that are unpublished and complicated stand against freedom.

Markets allow us to operate according to our own plan. The price system–supply and demand–is the creation of a spontaneous order. It creates wealth for consumers and interference in the market brings unintended consequences, such as removing a species from an environment. Naturally, the demand curve works like this: if prices fall, then more people buy, and if prices rise, less people buy.

Self-interest is not the same as selfishness. Self-interest is doing what you are better off doing, and philanthropy functions on it. Mother Theresa felt she was better off doing what she did; she felt better doing it.

Price is what you give up to get something else. Mother Theresa felt the added benefit of working was greater than the cost of working.

Contrary to current thought (from among others, college-age Americans) about capitalism, the spontaneous order of the market fosters philanthropy. The pricing system is based on voluntary exchange and mutual benefit occurs because everyone is better off. This is freedom. Outside interference with the market system will reduce freedom. Most people do not think of how the market involves enormous coordination with no central planner. Cooperation brings efficiency and innovation. Innovation takes X (raw materials) and makes it more than X. Profit is the incentive to innovate and creates things others want.

Consumer demand and the will to serve and please others leads to philanthropy. Acting to one’s own plan actually allows us to bless others from our excess. The market is moral because it is based on merit and it requires you to think of others.

Listening to Michelle makes me aware of what is possible. She is almost as articulate as Barack.

I still hope Trump will be in prison in enough time before the election. Trumpies are only part of the GOP, a part that must die. I think they don’t have enough numbers to reelect, so we need another candidate.

Because of the incredible use of credit today, Americans, many of them young, are in bondage. This is a classic.
SNL: Don’t buy things you can’t afford

Here’s to a new year. This is the year of the election: more lies, scandals, and plain-out criminal behavior. This from both sides.

I will spend my time better, reading and learning all I can. Trying also to be a better human. Being a light.

I can’t wait for November to be over.

A knee-jerk progressive doesn’t need to read Shakespeare or any other white male. They know the answer to any encounter with greatness.

Out in the Kuiper Belt/the immensity, human companionship is still necessary. What are extraterrestrials also without God?

Merry Christmas,
The Needy Human

Trump needs to be prosecuted before the election and/or beaten at the polls. But I don’t like that courts get to decide who is eligible to run.

Should not relish either, really.

And we didn’t know who to blame. Was it the administration, that was quiet when the border came down and when youth were confused? Yet, we see the blame leveled at the right, who are not in power. Deflecting and press conferences. Villainization. Refusal to take responsibility.

-Venting

In the digital age, oil, coal, and natural gas are still used and give us petrochemicals (plastics included) and other fossil-fueled wonder makers:

• Asphalt (roads)
• Toothpaste
• Detergent
• Food containers
• Medicines and vitamins
• Computer screens
• Cellphones
• Keyboards
• Computer mouse
• Mouse pad
• Phone Charger
• Car batteries
• Shirt buttons!
• Paint
• Floorboards
• Window coverings
• Gas for delivering these products to sellers, distributors, and consumers
• Factory machinery
• Wind turbines and solar panels–and, ironically, power backup for those “renewables.”
• AND Food, laundry, heating, driving

In 1950 over 60% of the world’s population was undernourished, but because of insecticides, herbicides, fungicides, and fossil-fueled farm equipment, that number was down to less than 9% in 2019.

But with what global warming we do have, wouldn’t it be easier for the hysterics to advocate using nuclear? You would think so.

Giuliani has come a long way from NYC mayor and 9/11. It’s sad to see him trying to deny his actions. I do think the amount of the damages was ridiculously high; the man will go broke. But the two election workers asked for tens of millions of damages, not $148 million, as the judge ruled.

As I said previously, The Orange One is a crook. I am disgusted by his behavior and lies. On the other hand, the left one, I also hate hysteria and moral totalitarianism.

The case here is clear: crime can outweigh bad policies. I just don’t want either. The left thinks their freedoms are being taken away. I feel the right is having theirs taken by the DoJ’s institutions (FBI, CIA, courts). There is no judicial autonomy right now.

No one likes censors. No one likes crooks.

So I will go back to my post of a few months back: Trump must be prosecuted and, hopefully, declared guilty — before the election — so a real GOP candidate will be chosen.