By Selwyn Duke
Saying there’s a bright side to amnesty may seem much like talk
of the advantages of malignant cancer. But this won’t be a pie-in-the-sky
article about the “economic benefits” of new workers, expanding the tax base or
the wonders of “diversity.” There is no Ayotte-Rubio flip-flop here; in fact,
for those who don’t know me, I’ve long called for a halt to even legal
immigration. And understanding why is necessary to put amnesty’s “bright side”
in perspective.
By Selwyn Duke
“It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are 20 gods, or no
god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.” This thought,
articulated by Thomas Jefferson 200 years ago, aligns well with
sentiments espoused today. “I don’t care what adults do in their private
lives,” says the libertarian. “But listen, buddy,” adds the
don’t-tread-on-me conservative, “just don’t shove it in my face.” But
does this characteristic attitude of American modernity damn us to spawn
a very un-American posterity? Does a misguided tolerance ensure an
intolerable future?
Continual tolerance of a thing generally
leads to its acceptance. For instance, while we may find ice-age
temperatures unpleasant, a civilization experiencing them long enough
becomes like the Eskimos in the Arctic and accepts its eternal winter as
the new normal. But what of the abnormal? Should it be tolerated?
To
answer this question, we must first address moderns’ flawed conception
of tolerance. G.K. Chesterton once said, “Tolerance is the virtue of the
man without convictions”; it should be added that it is also his vice.
For tolerance is a virtue only when exercised as is necessary, since it
implies a perceived negative. For example, you would have to tolerate an
itchy rash or stubborn cold, but you wouldn’t tolerate a fine car or a
delectable meal — you relish those things. And while we may admire a man
who tolerates suffering with a stiff upper lip, this may turn to
contempt if he invites it upon himself with a tolerance for being a
doormat; it then seems like weakness of character at best, masochism at
worst.
Read the rest here.
By Selwyn Duke
Young, handsome and Hispanic, Marco Rubio was once hailed as
one of the new faces of the Republican Party. But now we learn that he actually
brings two new faces to the GOP.
One that says one thing one moment and another that says a
different thing at a different moment.
After all, while Rubio appeared in this deceptive ad touting
the supposed conservative nature of his amnesty bill, The Examiner tells
us the following:
In a Spanish-language interview
Sunday with the network Univision, Sen. Marco Rubio, the leading Republican on
the Gang of Eight comprehensive immigration reform group, made his strongest
statement yet that legalization of the nation’s estimated 11 million illegal
immigrants must happen before any new border security or internal enforcement
measures are in place, and will in no way be conditional on any security
requirements.
“Let’s be clear,” Rubio said.
“Nobody is talking about preventing the legalization. The legalization is going
to happen. That means the following will happen: First comes the legalization.
Then come the measures to secure the border. And then comes the process of
permanent residence.”
And then comes the death of the nation.
By Selwyn Duke
Comedian Bill Cosby spent years rendering fatherly advice on the hit sitcom The Cosby Show,
but in recent times has received more press for the fatherly advice he
has given off screen. And he’s on the social stage again with a New York Post article
in which he discusses apathy, responsibility, race and religion.
Unfortunately, his pleasingly paternal prescriptions were mixed with
statist paternalism — and naiveté.
Cosby opened his piece with a defense of Little Big Gulp’s (a.k.a. Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s) health puppeteering, writing:
Read the rest here.
By Selwyn Duke
When women start doing what men have traditionally done,
yours is a civilization of the setting sun. This is brought to mind when pondering
a recent Pew Research Center study
showing that women are now the primary or sole breadwinners in 40 percent of
American households. You may have heard the story — it created quite a
stir on Fox News, with Greta Van Susteren and Megyn Kelly (who became quite
hysterical) taking exception to male colleagues' warnings about the
development's sociological implications. But if these two ladies, and the
other critics, had reacted rationally and not emotionally, they would realize
what is obvious:
The rise in female breadwinners is a sign of a civilization
in decline.
By Selwyn Duke
Call it living in Upside-down Land or the realization of the
Bible’s prediction of a time when bad will be called good and good, bad, but
once again innocent schoolchildren have been persecuted for, well, just being
children. This time the offender was Chase Lake Elementary School (CLES) in
Edmonds, WA, where some kids were suspended for using Nerf guns on school
grounds. And it’s an all-too-common story. A child will be punished for drawing
a gun, shaping his fingers as one and saying “bang!” merely
talking about guns or some other innocuous action. And recently there was a
case of a five-year-old boy who brought a cap gun to school to show a friend
and then was interrogated for two hours until he wet his pants. It’s all
very bizarre and very twisted.
In the Edmonds case, the children were told that they could
bring the toys to school, but I’m not interested in individual details but
deeper matters. And make no mistake, something deeper is afoot here.
By Selwyn Duke
There’s an old patriotic joke about how the Soviet media spun a
two-auto race in which an American car bested a Russian one. Went the
reportage: “Russian car finishes second in race.
American car comes in next to last.”
But this joke has nothing on the modern Western media’s practices,
which were on full display in the coverage of a recent Vatican speech on
finances given by Pope Francis to visiting new ambassadors. For
instance, The Telegraph ran the headline,
“Pope Francis urges global leaders to end 'tyranny' of money.” Author
Nick Squires then went on to “explain,” “He [the pope] said free-market
capitalism had created a ‘tyranny’…. [That is,][u]nchecked capitalism
had created ‘a new, invisible, and at times virtual, tyranny’, said the
former Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio.”
The problem?
The pope never used the term “free-market capitalism.”
For that matter, he never mentioned capitalism or the “free market” at all.
Nor did his speech include the phrase the “tyranny of money.”
Read the rest here.
By Selwyn Duke
Often a phenomenon of bad marriages, “selective deafness” is
when one hears only what is convenient. The same failing manifests itself in government
when politicians and judges hear the Constitution talk only when it sings their
tune. Worse still, sometimes these people behave as if the document says things
it doesn’t. This is the equivalent of hearing things.
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