Political philosophy

[Spock]

ibid.

[GreyMouser]

Originally Posted by Nurvingiel

But no one cares that a foreign government installs our Head of State, even nominally!?

What if George W. Bush appointed our Head of State? People would foam at the mouth! I don't see why no one bats an eye that a different government appoints the Governor General.

Just a check on the Constitutional situation- I hasten to add that I find the whole thing ridiculous, and we should set up a republic-

but... No foreign government installs our Head of State; Canada has been proudly independent since...1982.

HM QEII is our Head of State as Queen of Canada; I understand she has some similar responsibilities to a group of small islands scattered in the North Sea.

According to the Westminster Statute of 1931 all Commonwealth nations, including Britain, have similar standing vis a vis the Crown- IOTW her standing as Queen of the UK is legally exactly the same as her status as Queen of Barbados.

The British Government has no more connection to the Canadian government than does the government of Japan

[GreyMouser]

I want to disagree with the definition of 'democracy' and 'republic' here.

A republic is any nation which rules "in the name of the people"; whether the actual ruling is by an oligarchy (the Republic of Venice) a democracy (US, France) a military dictatorship (pick any one, they're depressingly frequent) a one-party state (Fascist or Communist), even some theocracies- the Islamic Republic of Iran is (officially) guided by the Ayatollah, but derives its power from the people.

Basically, any country which is not a monarchy or true theocracy (like old Tibet or the Vatican City)

A democracy is a country governed by the people's will expressed in free elections -People's Democracies don't count, nor do 2000 year old definitions

Whether it's direct or representative doesn't matter. Thus, Canada is a democracy but not a republic; Pakistan is a republic but not a democracy.

[Count Comfect]

And I'll disagree right back .

A republic is a form of government in which the people's will is mediated through representatives* - as in the Senate of the Roman Republic.

A democracy is a form of government in which all the citizens of the state vote on every issue that comes to their attention - as in the democracy of ancient Athens.

These can also be called "representative" and "direct" democracy, respectively, but I find that conflating the two under the single word "democracy" eliminates an important distinction. I liked that my debate team in high school was democratic - and I like that my Model Congress in college is republican.

I don't find it to be a particularly useful use of the word "republic" to apply it to somewhere like North Korea, at least from a political-philosophical view.

*elected or unelected, although the tribunes & consuls of Rome introduce an interesting elective element into an otherwise unelected body.

[BeardofPants]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy

[Spock]

"I pledge allegiance to the flag and to the republic for which it stands"

[Gwaimir Windgem]

GM, I agree with the Count on this one. Defining a republic as any government which in some way supposedly rules 'in the name of the people' is not very helpful. Where the authority to rule comes from is an entirely different (though of course related) question than what method of rule is the best.

[inked]

Teaser:

"The modern liberal state has its own dogmas, sacrileges, holy things, taboos, which it guards as jealously and enforces almost as rigidly as the Taliban used to guard and enforce its version of Islam.

Exaggeration? You decide. In the year 1300, in what we call the Dark Ages, a pig was tried for blasphemy in France. In the year 2000, two hundred years into the Age of Enlightenment, on the eve of the 21st century, in the United States, when a six-year-old boy kissed a six-year-old girl, the authorities charged him with sexual harassment."

read the whole thing: http://www.israpundit.com/2006/?p=1108

[Gwaimir Windgem]

Or more importantly:

Contrary to how most Western political leaders, academics, or editorialists use the word, “democracy” doesn’t mean peace, freedom, equality, prosperity, secularism, security, or justice. The D-word simply means a method of governmental succession.

Damn straight.

[Count Comfect]

Ah, inked, but we mock and pity the school district that charged the boy with sexual harassment. Those who tried the pig went unmocked until our times. I'd say we still have a long way to go before "liberalism" is a theocracy.

EDIT: And of course, Gwaimir is right on the "more importantly."

[inked]

Ah, but liberalism is a theology and a religion. It is a Godless theology and religion with naught but humanity as the apex of existence by which to judge.
Self-judgment being notoriously lax, it is not surprising that whatever current fad is operative becomes the norm. Now, as to the older definition of a liberal as one who was generous, free with person and pelf, and educated to community awareness and advancement, I have not one complaint. But to today's highjacked version, who seeks the implementation of a rigid anthropocentirc view as defined by the current fad, to the enforcement of that in contradistinction to tolerance, and who affirms legally and philosophically the pig declaration in ANIMAL FARM that "some animals are more equal than others" I have no sympathy whatsoever.

Currently it would seem that the arch "liberals" in the ACLU are bent on limiting their own members freedom of criticism of the organization, thus elevating some pigs even higher status than other pigs. That feeding frenzy should be quite enjoyable to observe, as long as one isn't within spattering range. But see the ACLU thread for that. It is merely the point of currently understood "liberalism" to redefine all in their own image and to accuse others of the sin of intolerance when any protests.

Current "liberalism" loves to speak of the intolerance of the proletariat when the proles vote the laws into place and they don't suit the "liberals," doesn't it. Check any headline. It's only when the proles comply with the liberals "values" as they happen to be expressed today that the "libs" offer reassuring pats on the heads to the "good" little boys and girls who have the "wisdom" to see things the "right" way. Any dissent is intolerance and bigotry and phobia and hatred.

Any "liberal" can accuse America of becoming a theocracy on the whim of a moment and be lauded for "truth-telling" by scores of lap-dogs to the acclamation of the mainstream media. But any attempt by any religious organization to refuse the force-fed secularism acceptable to "liberals" is a phobic campaign against human rights. You see how it works.

O great and powerful, Man, no Woman, no Human,
Thou rulest in might and splendor!
Who can forget the glories of Lenin, Stalin, Mao, and Che?
We aspire to achieve all that they failed at in their day!
No wrongs allowed - only the right!
Established by the old-new use of might!
As to our motive who could gain-say?
Tomorrow's not likely to be like today
No truth's objective, consistent, or
Grand as the most-est powerful, Who-Man.

[Count Comfect]

Inked - liberalism is NOT a religion. It is a worldview, but it neither posits the existence nor the non-existence of a diety; rather, it is a way of looking at the world in an attempt to find somewhere that people of differing religions (or, yes, no religion) can all come together, without the inherent disagreements that come with bringing religion into the fray. It says that we must judge things based on our reason, because that is something, we trust, that all people have. It says that we must not discriminate, because we cannot come together if some of us are pushed away by hatred and bigotry. No person is "more equal" than any other - but we must realize that this in itself implies that there can be no right to discriminate, because to assume this right implies that the discriminator IS "more equal" than the discriminatee.

Religious organizations are, or should be, free to exercise their religious views, except where those views come into conflict with others' rights. As an example, if Massachusetts enshrines a right to homosexual equality, the Catholic Charities cannot violate that right based on their own religious feeling.

As for what you call "force-fed 'secularism,'" or the case of the ACLU wishing to squelch its own internal dissent, please do the justice of not judging all groups by the worst within them.

[inked]

Like so?

http://www.aim.org/media_monitor/4610_0_2_0_C/

While the U.S. fights Muslim terrorists in Afghanistan and Iraq, the U.S. and the United Nations are helping allies of Muslim terrorists come to power in Kosovo, a province of Serbia. This is a foreign policy disaster in the making that you should hope and pray gets some immediate attention from the media. To illustrate the dimensions of the problem, Father Keith Roderick of Christian Solidarity International has testified that Albanian Muslims in Kosovo have been systematically destroying Christian churches and other sites in Kosovo and the Serbian Christian population in the province is being "squeezed down to oblivion." The evidence is on display in a new DVD, "Days Made Of Fear," directed, produced and distributed by Ninoslav Randjelovic.

At the same time, Father Roderick also says that hundreds of new Mosques have been built in Kosovo over the last several years, financed mostly by Gulf Arab money.

The excellent DVD consists of 8 different films, but the most explosive is "Notes About the Rock," on the destroyed and vandalized churches and monasteries in Kosovo. Many of the scenes captured on film are considered the only video documentation on this subject available.

There is no question about the reason for the destruction. The churches were targeted by the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), also known by the acronym UCK. These initials are visible on the ruins, like a calling card. They openly advertise their anti-Christian Jihad, but our media pay no attention.

Writing for the Byzantine Cultural Project and reviewing the DVD, Theodoros Georgiou Karakostas comments, "The footage of ravaged and destroyed Serbian Churches and Monasteries is appalling. The DVD is a shocking affirmation that the American television Networks such as CNN, FOX, ABC, CBS, NBC, and the others are all lined up with the foreign policy establishment and are active practitioners of official censorship. I cannot recall seeing any of the horrifying footage on this DVD on American television."

He adds, "The same U.S. media which continues to attack the Bush administration for lying about the Iraq war, continues to give Bill Clinton, Madeleine Albright, Richard Holbrooke, Wesley Clark, and Samuel Berger a pass for their destructive war on Yugoslavia. We should remember also that at the last Democratic National Convention in Boston two years ago, one of the top KLA men was an honored guest of John Kerry.

"The same U.S. media which was appalled by the Taliban's destruction of the 2,000-year-old Buddhist statues has nothing to say about the remarkable Serbian Orthodox churches and monasteries which have stood since the period preceding the Ottoman conquests, and which are being systematically destroyed."

Why are the media ignoring what is happening in Kosovo?

One reason, as explained in the book, Media Cleansing: Dirty Reporting, is that the media reported the war wrong and now refuse to report who has really been victimized by it. Another factor is that the much-vilified neoconservatives got Kosovo wrong, too. As I noted in a Media Monitor, "In 1999 the neocons supported the NATO war on Yugoslavia launched by President Clinton. That benefited a Muslim terrorist group, the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), with links to Osama bin Laden." The neocons thought they were supporting a tougher and a new NATO.

To compound this tragedy, the Bush Administration has continued the misguided Clinton policy on Kosovo.

Let's remember that Clinton ordered U.S. military intervention in the Balkans against the Christian Serbs on the grounds that "ethnic cleansing" and even "genocide" were being waged against Serbia's neighbors. Most of that was hokum. Serbia, a U.S. ally in World War II, was being ruled by the communist Slobodan Milosevic, who was desperate to hold on to power in the former Yugoslavia, which included Serbia. While Milosevic was a problem, the Clinton "solution" made the problem worse. Clinton gave the green light to military aggression against the Serbs and even ordered the CIA to provide support to the Kosovo Liberation Army, which was allied with Osama bin Laden and radical Islamists. The U.S. bombed Serbia and forced Milosevic, who was later turned over to a U.N. court, to capitulate. Milosevic recently died in a U.N. prison.

Kosovo, like the American southwest, has been deluged by outsiders, who now want political power. In Kosovo they are Albanian Muslims, many of them illegal aliens from neighboring Albania. They want, with U.S. and U.N. support, to turn Kosovo into an independent Muslim state. The Bush Administration should stop-not accelerate-this madness.

If the Albanian Muslims succeed in taking over a province of Serbia, with U.S. and U.N. support, and establishing their own independent and sovereign state, then why should Mexicans balk at taking over the U.S. southwest? They must figure, with good reason, that the U.N. can be counted on to help them.

The cover-up of the persecution of Christians in Kosovo is another scandal for the media. It shows that when they agree with the Bush foreign policy, which in this case involves the establishment of a Muslim state in Europe and is a continuation of the Clinton foreign policy, they will utter NOT one word of criticism.

Cliff Kincaid is the Editor of the AIM Report and can be reached at cliff.kincaid@aim.org
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Oh, and you haven't read Ann Coulters' GODLESS yet, have you? Well, neither have I. Mine's on the way from B&N, though, and I look forward to it.

[Gwaimir Windgem]

Originally Posted by Count Comfect

Religious organizations are, or should be, free to exercise their religious views, except where those views come into conflict with others' rights. As an example, if Massachusetts enshrines a right to homosexual equality, the Catholic Charities cannot violate that right based on their own religious feeling.

Do you consider marriage a right?

If so, should then the State force clergy to officiate at same-sex marriages even if it goes contrary to their religion?

I gather from this that you think that religious organizations should be forced to help same-sex couples adopt, even if it goes contrary to their religion. Do you also hold that it is right to force Catholic organizations to provide contraceptives, including abortifacients, to their employees?

[Count Comfect]

Originally Posted by Gwaimir Windgem

Do you consider marriage a right?

If so, should then the State force clergy to officiate at same-sex marriages even if it goes contrary to their religion?

I gather from this that you think that religious organizations should be forced to help same-sex couples adopt, even if it goes contrary to their religion. Do you also hold that it is right to force Catholic organizations to provide contraceptives, including abortifacients, to their employees?

1) Yes.

2) Not in their capacity as religious officials - marriage is a civil ceremony - but in their capacity as officers of the state, yes.

3) I don't think any company is required to provide contraceptives OR abortifacients to its employees - but if there was a law requiring such action, yes, they should. I think that a religious organization should not be allowed to ignore state laws because of its status.

[Gwaimir Windgem]

There was a case in Californlia where Catholic Charities was told that they were required to provide contraceptives to their employees; I believe in included abortifacients, but I am uncertain as to that. But even if not, let us say it does, hypothetically speaking.

All right. Catholicism teaches that contraception is wrong. Catholic Charities espouses such belief. Therefore, they believe that it is wrong to contracept. Providing contraception for their employees under "health benefits" would then, it seems, be leading their employees into sin, which is itself sinful. So, one should compromise one's conscience if the State tells them to, is that correct? If one believes that their actions are not only seriously endangering the immortal souls of others, but are endangering their own immortal souls, yet the state mandates such action, they should give no consideration to eternity, but should obey the temporal (and thus ephemeral) authority, is that correct? I say, if the Pope himself tells you to do something which goes against your conscience, don't do so. Your conscience is something you should never violate, and it's definitely something no external authority should command you to violate. That is absolutely a perversion of both morality and liberty. I mean, if you aren't free to keep from doing that which you consider to be wrong, there is no freedom at all. Of course, if the state tells you not to do something you believe to be morally neutral, I say you should obey the law. But conscience trumps any civil law.

Also, if (I'm not saying this is the case, but if) this includes abortifacients, keep in mind that Catholicism considers such to be murder, pure and simple; and not only murder, but murder of a person who is completely innocent and has never done any wrong, thus compounding the fact. So, for a Catholic to agree that they should provide abortifacients if their conscience tells them not to, but the State tells them to, they would have to consider it true that if the State tells you to kill an innocent person, you should do so. Which in fact seems to "I was just following orders" is sufficient justification for war criminals involved in the Holocaust, which I believe is not the case at all.

This whole view seems to be viewing the human person as ordered towards subservience to the State, rather than the State towards allowing the

It seems that you consider religion to be essentially subservient to and an arm of the State; is that correct?

[Count Comfect]

But see, if someone is employed by the Catholic Church and truly believes the Church's teachings, they will not use or desire those contraceptives and abortifacients, and there will be no sin. But if the person wishes to use those contraceptives or abortifacients, the Church has no more right than any other employer to prevent them from doing so. The issue is not one of the Church being subservient to the State, but the Church NOT being superior to the individual's choice, as protected by the State.

[Gwaimir Windgem]

You seem to have ignored much of my post. In the first place, just because someone believes something is wrong does not mean they won't do it. But from the Catholic point of view, there are a number of ways one can be culpable for a sin. One of them is by facilitating it, so that providing contraception would make one culpable for a sin, and so that it would be contrary to the Catholic conscience to do so, so that once again, we have come to the point where the question is "If the State tells you to do something contrary to conscience, what should you do?".

It's not a matter of preventing them from doing so, it's a matter of dispensing free contraceptives to them. They are quite able to go elsewhere to get them. It's not like they have some albino monk stalking all of them to make sure they don't buy a condom, it's simply a matter of forcing a Catholic organization or person to do things which are contrary to the Catholic religion. I would here point out that this is contrary to the freedom of the Catholic. Or are things only a matter of freedom if they are contrary to, rather than consistent with, traditional morality? Perhaps a better formulation would be this: "It seems that one should be free to do things which they do not consider to be wrong, but they should not be free to do things which they do consider to be wrong."

But what you are saying boils down to "the State trumps religion and conscience". Religion, being an organization, would therefore it seems be considered subservient to the state, since as you said no matter.

Also, you have completely ignored my point about murder. The simple fact is that, to the Catholic mind, abortion, including abortifacients, is murder. Thus, if a Catholic provides an abortifacient to someone, to their mind, they are accessories to murder, pure and simple, so that, as regards the Catholic conscience, they are no different from a scientist mixing up gases for the Nazis.

[Count Comfect]

I have "ignored," as you put it only in the sense that I disagree that that has any bearing. No INDIVIDUAL is being required to do anything against their faith. The Church as an organization must follow certain rules if it wishes to employ people, one of which is to provide contraceptives and abortifacients to its employees.

Look, I see the problem you're posing. And no, it is not that freedom only applies when contrary to traditional morality - it is just that the only time we get disagreeements is when freedom seems to come into conflict with traditional morality. Both would say I can eat spinach (assuming I'm not missing some religion in which that's not OK), but because they agree we don't get into the argument.

But I don't see how you can have a right not to allow someone else their rights.

[Gwaimir Windgem]

In the first place, we aren't talking about the Church, we are talking about Catholic Charities. The Pope is not the head of Catholic Charities, it is not a branch of the Church. It is a group which chooses to identify itself as Catholic, and is connected with certain dioceses, but it is not the same as the Church.

Whether it's an organization or not, there must be some individual who authorizes or provides the contraceptives or abortifacients. It's not as if some faceless corporation will do so, but Joe or Sally who works for them will have to. But I'm trying not to limit the discussion to one of Catholic Charities, but to make it a more universal one of the relation.


No one is talking about denying someone their rights. They are perfectly free to go to Planned Parenthood or something and buy their stuff.

But still, it seems that my second formulation applies, i.e. "You have the freedom to do what you think is not wrong, but I do not have the freedom to not do what I think is wrong."