Another quick roundup of Texas’ economic strength, and California’s blue state decline:
Texas vs. California: January 22, 2013
January 22nd, 2013Do Liberals Believe in Any Limiting Power on Government Action?
January 18th, 2013Here’s a great description of natural rights from Judge Andrew P. Napolitano:
As we have been created in the image and likeness of God the Father, we are perfectly free just as He is. Thus, the natural law teaches that our freedoms are pre-political and come from our humanity and not from the government, and as our humanity is ultimately divine in origin, the government, even by majority vote, cannot morally take natural rights away from us. A natural right is an area of individual human behavior — like thought, speech, worship, travel, self-defense, privacy, ownership and use of property, consensual personal intimacy — immune from government interference and for the exercise of which we don’t need the government’s permission.
Read the whole thing, the main thrust of which is the role of the Second Amendment and the natural right of self-defense.
However, with so many of the Democratic Party’s urban elites embracing atheism, is it is even possible for them to comprehend, much less agree with, a natural rights framework for limiting the power of government? Why should humans have any rights at all if they are, in Charles Murray describing the viewpoint of European elites, “a collection of chemicals that activate and, after a period of time, deactivate”? (And if you haven’t read Murray’s entire piece before, I urge you to do so.)
There was a time when a good many patriotic liberal atheists believed in the Constitution as a sort of civil religion, even if they tended to ignore or downplay sections (such as the Second and Tenth Amendments) they weren’t wild about. But now a prominent liberal professor of constitutional law has just come out and said we should get rid of the Constitution because it doesn’t let liberals spend as much as they want, which is rather like a librarian endorsing burning books because they get dusty.
So too, many liberals wanted to believe in a framework very similar to natural rights in order to ensure their children lived in a strong, free and fair America. But, as Murray points out, our elite are increasingly childless, because children are a hassle. So why should liberals worry if they’re bankrupting their children and grandchildren when they have none?
Do modern American liberals believe in anything but their own smug sense of moral superiority? Or their own will to power? They seem distinctly uninterested in “a nation of the people, by the people, and for the people,” unless the people in question are their kind of people. Many see themselves as “citizens of the world,” with more in common with Eurocratic elites than with the working class lumpenproletariat shopping at Walmart. They seem uninterested in the baleful effects of welfare policy and unlimited illegal immigration on the poor as long as such policies continue to swell a permanent underclass of Democratic-voting dependents.
Conservatives believe that America is a nation of free citizens first, not a political entity embodied in an all-powerful federal government. By contrast, liberals did not seem to have any limiting power to their conception of the size and power of the federal government (at least beyond sex). Is there any limiting factor they are willing to accept as a bedrock principle rather than a temporary expedient?
A Dollop of Gun News
January 16th, 2013Lots of news in the world of guns and the Second Amendment today, so here’s a quick lunchtime roundup:
gun laws that in no way would have prevented the crimes they were passed in reaction to. (Hat tip: Say Uncle.)
Travis County Gun Show Ban Shot Down, Stuffed, and Mounted on the Wall
January 15th, 2013Today law-abiding gun owners declared total victory over the gun-grabbing plans of the Travis County Commissioner’s Court:
Travis County Commissioners unanimously voted Tuesday to reverse course on a proposal that would have banned gun shows from county facilities.
Commissioners also agreed to honor an existing contract for nine more gun shows at the Exposition Center.
“I take very seriously the idea of abiding by the law. State law prevents this court from doing much of anything on this issue,” Commissioner Sarah Eckhardt said.
I think it’s great that Travis County Commissioners are actually concerned about obeying the law. Maybe the could spread that attitude to certain other officeholders.
Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott and the NRA-ILA a large share of credit for derailing this very bad idea, as do Dwight and all the other gun owners who stood up and made their voices heard,
Hopefully the gun-grabbers on the Austin City Council will take the hint.
Murderer in a Coma. I Know It’s Serious.
January 15th, 2013Hey, remember Convicted murderer, Democratic fundraiser, and accused heroin dealer Amado Pardo?
He’s been released to hospice care, According to his attorney, he’s “not been mentally responsive since December. ” Hmmmm. Maybe. I’m remembering all those sick gangsters suddenly coming down with an amazing array of ailments in Casino.
Also: “On Thursday, Pardo’s wife Amanda Pardo pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute a controlled substance. She has not yet been sentenced.
Interestingly, a “Tish Pardo” commented on the previous post:
Have you ever heard the saying “don’t judge a person unless you’ve walked a mile in their shoes”? You are very quick to judge Mayo apparently you have all of the “facts”. Yes he’s a convicted murderer, do you know the circumstances? Do you care to hear them? He may not have made the best choices, but he was a good man. He did his time for the murder convictions, you know what the problem is with society? They don’t let people change their lives for the better. If you’ve been convicted of a crime you might as well be a leper. Mayo employed people no one else would, he expected them to work to earn their pay, he helped people. Im not saying he’s a saint, but he used his abilities to help others and give back to the community. A convicted felon turned pillar of the community and here you are degrading him and his accomplishments because of his past.Well, his future is on the rocks because of what people think they know, law enforcement has the word of one man/woman and a lot of circumstantial evidence. But go ahead
It’s a very special type of pleading indeed that includes the phrase “Yes, he’s a convicted murderer.” Perhaps Ms. Pardo could comment below on how Amado Pardo is innocent of the heroin distribution charges, despite his wife having plead guilty to the same crime…
Brief Impressions of the Texas Public Policy Foundation’s 2013 Policy Orientation
January 14th, 2013I enjoyed attending what little I could of the Texas Public Policy Foundation 2013 policy orientation held January 9-11. Here are a few quick and largely random impressions:
Because I just started a new day job, I wasn’t able to attend until Thursday evening, which meant I got to enjoy Austin’s lovely rush-hour traffic on Mopac and only got to hear about half of Ted Cruz’s pre-recorded message. (Cruz was originally scheduled to appear with Sen. John Cornyn, but had to fly off to Afghanistan and Israel on a Senate Foreign Relations trip. Cruz also appeared at lunch that day, a session I was unable to attend.) Then it was time for Texas’ senior U.S. Senator, John Cornyn, to be interviewed.
He defended the Fiscal Cliff deal as necessary to avoid a huge tax increase. He talked about the Senate’s inability to pass a budget. “Shame doesn’t work on Harry Reid.”
On foreign and defense policy, he noted (correctly) that keeping the American people safe is the number one responsibility of government. Cornyn says he’s opposing the nomination of Chuck Hagel and dinged Obama over Benghazi. “If the President and his Administration had been honest about Benghazi, they’re wouldn’t have been a scandal.” (Paraphrased.)
Cornyn also displayed a certain tone-deafness in regard to his audience. When asked to mention possible 2016 GOP Presidential candidates, the first name Cornyn mentioned was NJ Governor Chris Christie, which drew audible groans and hisses from the audience, for good reason.
After the Cornyn speech there was a blogger met-and-great at Rivals Steakhouse. I met a bevy of state Reps whose names quickly blurred together, as well as Ashley Sewell, AKA @TXTrendyChick, who I had already been following on Twitter, and a bunch of other bloggers. Most interesting bit of off-the-record gossip: Confirmation of my Rick Perry hopped-up on goofballs theory. “When I saw him running around Iowa in flats I knew he was in a lot of pain. The man practically sleeps in boots.”
On Friday, I took a long lunch to attend the Newt Gingrich luncheon and signing. I sat one seat down from the indefatigable Holly Hansen (who has her own, far more extensive coverage), and @TXTrendyChick promptly plopped down between us. Obviously our table was the place to be.
I get to hang out with all the cool chicks!
Lt. Governor David Dewhurst was Gingrich’s warm-up speaker. Dewhurst has improved somewhat since his losing Senate race against Ted Cruz last year, but he’s still not a natural speaker. He tries to cram too many policy points into a speech, and isn’t skilled enough to distinguish between major and minor points. When it comes to conservative policy, he seems to know the words, but doesn’t hear the music.
Dewhurst’s four points as to why Texas is doing better than any other state (1. We keep our spending low, 2. Keep our taxes low, 3. A light regulatory hand, and 4. Keep state government out of the way) were all very solid. He also promised additional budget cutting; let’s hope he follows through.
Most interesting parts of Dewhurst’s speech: A clumsily-phrased plea for welfare reform (“I’m not going to pay people to sit on the couch and do drugs,” a proclamation that will no doubt disappoint many members of Occupy Wall Street), and a proposal to arm teachers in the classroom.
Gingrich came on stage to a standing ovation. He said it was unfair for other states to compete with Texas, since we weren’t raising taxes and spending like California. (This is what people call “sarcasm.”)
This was definitely Gingrich 2.0 (or maybe 8.6), an idea-a-minute futurist (I’d like to see him and Bruce Sterling bounce off each other for a couple of hours someday). He was saying things about America 2.0, ubiquitous diagnostic cell phones as a health care initiative, having the programmers behind World of Warcraft come up with ways to teach our kids, and puters mkn kdz wrt btr (I iz skptical). It was even more scatter-shot than Dewhurst, but seemed a lot more organic. And he had one truly fascinating factoid: Students taking Stanford’s online classes did better on tests than the ones taking classes in person.
Gingrich seems genuinely optimistic about America’s future, which is a nice contrast with many of us after the 2012 election.
After the speech I managed to get him to sign two books for me, To Renew America, and Jim Wright’s Reflections of a Public Man, which he was quite amused by.
A few more luminaries:
A very dapper Chuck DeVore. He wasn’t born in Texas, but he got here as quickly as he could.
Apologies to anyone I didn’t mention, didn’t run into, or didn’t get a picture of (some just didn’t come out well). It was a busy two days!
And congratulations to TPPF honcho David Guenthner and his many minions, for all the hard work in carrying this off:
In addition to the copy of Texas Got it Right handed out to everyone, David thrust a copy of DeVore’s The Texas Model: Prosperity in the Lone Star State into my hands. Hopefully I’ll have a chance to say more about both in the not-so-distant future.
The Elephant Joins the Party
January 10th, 2013Dwight and I were out front on opposing the Travis County/Austin gun show ban, but now the 800 pound gorilla has climbed on the bandwagon, with the NRA-ILA sending out a notice to members to oppose the gun show ban. I think they may have a wee bit more reach than we do…
Keep Those Cards and Letters Coming
January 9th, 2013Dwight has now put up even more extensive contact information for Austin City Council and Travis County bigwigs, complete with linkable, clickable goodness, providing a more efficient way to express your displeasure over the proposed gun show ban.
Also, here’s Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson debating a gun grabber on the subject:
And here’s a KXAN piece on the issue, including the Abbott news I put up yesterday. Notice how the writer ends with “Both Biscoe and Eckhardt are Democrats. Abbott is a Republican.” Funny that no news outlet felt the need to mention the political affiliation of these seeking gun control (including Ed Scruggs, the Travis County resident initially reported as seeking such a ban, who also happens to be the founder of Circle C Democrats) until a Republican got involved in opposing them.