Alarming News: I like Morgan Freeberg. A lot.
American Digest: And I like this from "The Blog That Nobody Reads", because it is -- mostly -- about me. What can I say? I'm on an ego trip today. It won't last.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: We were following a trackback and thinking "hmmm... this is a bloody excellent post!", and then we realized that it was just part III of, well, three...Damn. I wish I'd written those.
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler: ...I just remembered that I found a new blog a short while ago, House of Eratosthenes, that I really like. I like his common sense approach and his curiosity when it comes to why people believe what they believe rather than just what they believe.
Brutally Honest: Morgan Freeberg is brilliant.
Dr. Melissa Clouthier: Morgan Freeberg at House of Eratosthenes (pftthats a mouthful) honors big boned women in skimpy clothing. The picture there is priceless--keep scrolling down.
Exile in Portales: Via Gerard: Morgan Freeberg, a guy with a lot to say. And he speaks The Truth...and it's fascinating stuff. Worth a read, or three. Or six.
Just Muttering: Two nice pieces at House of Eratosthenes, one about a perhaps unintended effect of the Enron mess, and one on the Gore-y environ-movie.
Mein Blogovault: Make "the Blog that No One Reads" one of your daily reads.
The Virginian: I know this post will offend some people, but the author makes some good points.
Poetic Justice: Cletus! Ah gots a laiv one fer yew...
…in order to give rich people tax cuts.
Thanks to Newsbusters.
This kind of thing interests me because it cuts right to the heart of what is “right wing” and what is “left wing.” Supposedly, the terms came into use during & right before the French Revolution; you were right-wing if you were a royalist and backing Louis XVI, and you were a lefty if you backed Napoleon.
Today, it seems to me both sides are for some kind of freedom, at least if you believe in a literal way the words used by each side to describe itself…”right wing” is defense of our economic freedom, “left wing” is defense of some other kind of freedom. Someone, somewhere, must be lying since if it were that simple, an amalgamation of some kind would be inevitable wouldn’t it? We’d try to find some way to enjoy all kinds of freedoms. That’s not happening — nobody seems to be breaking a sweat trying to make it happen — so one side, or the other, must be not quite so chummy with the concept of freedom as they’re presenting themselves.
And then it occurs to me: What policy advanced by the left — anywhere! — is there to make some product or service easier to acquire in a free market? Or merely to preserve the status quo, for that matter…I can’t think of a single one, across all these issues. If there can be organized labor, they want it. If there can be a minimum wage, they want it raised. If there can be some bit of onerous regulation, they want that, and you’d better believe if there can be a tax they want that too.
It seems the only way they ever want it easier for anybody to be able to get hold of something they need, is if there’s a plan for that thing to be given away for “free,” compliments of the taxpayer. Oh, sorry…the “rich people.” Right.
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The Right wants freedom to. The Left wants freedom from.
So you want to start a business? We want you to be free to, says the Right, with minimal interference from the government. The Left, on the other hand, wants you to be free from:
— risk
— adverse market conditions
— acts of God
— changes in the status quo
— foreign competition (provided you employ their union buddies)
— domestic competition (ditto)
etc. etc. etc.
Of course, they also want you to be free from the conditions that might cause one to want to start one’s own business in the first place — to wit: drive, ambition, a sense of self-reliance, etc. — but that’s another tale for another time.
- Severian | 05/23/2011 @ 09:34The Right wants freedom to. The Left wants freedom from.
I understand what you’re saying, Sev. I remember, however, Rush once put it exactly the other way around back when he had his TV show, I think- the Right wants freedom “from,” the Left wants “freedom to.” Bear with me…
He was saying that the Left wants freedom to, meaning it wants permission from the government to do all the things it wants to do. The Right, meanwhile, wants freedom from: government interference. The Right, according to him, was of the belief that the government had little business interfering in many of the areas it does, to start with. He was referring to inalienable (God-given) rights which gov’t has (somehow) put itself in the position of arbitrating. The split between Right and Left had to do with different understandings of where rights come from in the first place: one side says they come from God, the other, a political grant from government.
I think we’re pretty much on the same page, though.
- cylarz | 05/23/2011 @ 13:20By sheer coincidence, there is a vigorous inspection of this going on at NewsRealBlog.
- mkfreeberg | 05/23/2011 @ 14:20