Guest Column - The Meaning of the Right to Vote - October 25, 2004

Guest Column - The Meaning of the Right to Vote - October 25, 2004Contrary to popular rhetoric, America was founded, not as a "democracy," but as a constitutional republic--a political structure under which the government is bound by a written constitution to the task of protecting individual rights. "Democracy" does not mean a system that holds public elections for government officials; it means a system in which a majority vote rules everything and everyone, and in which the individual thus has no rights. In a democracy, observed James Madison in The Federalist Papers, "there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party or an obnoxious individual. Hence it is that such democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention [and] have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property."

The right to vote derives from the recognition of man as an autonomous, rational being, who is responsible for his own life and who should therefore freely choose the people he authorizes to represent him in the government of his country. That autonomy is contradicted if a majority of voters is allowed to do whatever it wishes to the individual citizen. The right to vote is not a sanction for a gang to deprive other individuals of their freedom. Rather, because a free society requires a certain type of government, it is a means of installing the officials who will safeguard the individual rights of each citizen.

What makes America unique is not that it has elections--even dictatorships hold elections--but that its elections take place in a country limited by the absolute principle of individual freedom. From our Declaration of Independence, which upholds the "unalienable rights" of every individual, among which are "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," to our Constitution, whose Bill of Rights protects freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and the freedom of private property, respect for individual liberty is the essence of America--and the root of her greatness."

North Carolina EastEnders Fan Club

There are about six EastEnders fan clubs in the entire U.S. of A. and three of them are in North Carolina!!! And you thought I was weird.

North Carolina EastEnders Fan Club
Western North Carolina EastEnders Fan Club
Charlotte North Carolina EastEnders Fan Club

I've attended meetings of the NC EE club and the WNC EE Club. The next meeting is of the Charlotte EE club,on November 13. I might be there, unless you're a stalker.

Usually lying low, show-biz conservatives more visible than ever

I didn't know there were any, until this election. One of them has even made a pro-Bush commercial!

Bush Admits to hiding Bad News

(2004-10-26) -- President George Bush today admitted that his Democrat rival is correct in saying that Mr. Bush is "hiding bad news" until after the polls close next Tuesday.

"My opponent speaks the truth when he says that some Americans are going to get some bad news--maybe even before the sun comes up on November 3," said Mr. Bush, "It will involve defeat and the realization that huge sums of money have been wasted on an unwinnable battle against a determined and entrenched foe."

Although President Bush promised to deliver the news personally in a televised address, he said that Mr. Kerry will likely be the first to inform the American people.

"Of course, bad news is all a matter of perspective," Mr. Bush said. "One man looks at the glass and says it's half empty, another man sees the same glass and says, 'Come on, Dick, let's get back to work'."

by Scott Ott

The Curt Jester: MS Forger

The Curt Jester: MS Forger New product from Micro$oft, called MS Forger, for when you are writing stories for CBS.

"I, Robot" in a nutshell.

This guy Maddox writes a vulgar, "outspoken" blog. He says "This page is about me and why everything I like is great. If you disagree with anything you find on this page, you are wrong." That about sums it up. Do not go there, because it contains really bad language. I mean really bad. And offensive pictures. But he writes some astute social commentary from what looks to me like a Libertarian POV, and he's funny. This post about the movie I, Robot is a relatively milder example of his style.

Reason magazine -- November 2001, Free Radical: Christopher Hitchens interviewed by Rhys Southan

Reason magazine -- November 2001, Free Radical: Christopher Hitchens interviewed by Rhys Southan

...there is no such thing as a radical left anymore. Ça n’existe pas. The world of Gloria Steinem and Jesse Jackson, let’s say, has all been, though it doesn’t realize it, hopelessly compromised by selling out to Clintonism. It became, under no pressure at all, and with no excuse, and in no danger, a voluntary apologist for abuse of power.

It couldn’t wait to sell out. It didn’t even read the small print or ask how much or act as if it were forced under pressure to do so. I don’t think they’ve realized how that’s changed everything for them. They’re not a left. They’re just another self-interested faction with an attitude toward government and a hope that it can get some of its people in there. That makes it the same as everyone else -- only slightly more hypocritical and slightly more self-righteous.

ScrappleFace: Court Upholds Teaching Bible as Fiction in Schools

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals this week upheld a lower court's ban on a weekly Bible class which has been taught in public schools for the past 51 years in Rhea County, TN, because the morality lessons treated the Bible as "religious truth."

However, the court ruled that public schools may "teach moral lessons from the Bible as fiction."

According to the ruling, "As long as the students understand that the Bible is not true, then its moral lessons--honesty, integrity, etc.--are constitutional." Read more

Culture War

We know we're in a culture war, between "family values" and "moral decadence", or between Christians and secular/pagan culture. I'm beginning to wonder if that's the war we're supposed to be in. Aren't we in a spiritual battle over men's souls? Is this battle waged in the culture, really? Or is it waged in the church?

The modern church is so intimidated by worldly rejection, that we have to apologize for being Christians, instead of engaging in apologetics.