Limbaugh has made a lot of (legitimate) hay out of the rather tame verbal beating one Robert Broadus of Clinton, Maryland, gave to Senator Ben Cardin on the subject of healthcare.



It is interesting to note, that in responding to Broadus, Cardin can only accuse him -- before the fact -- of being part of the cause of the healthcare problem. If you don't have healthcare insurance then, res ipsa loquitur, someone other than yourself is going to pay for you. Cardin has no way of knowing what Broadus is going to do if the circumstances he hypothesized come to fruition. For all Cardin really knows, Broadus is going to make a payment schedule with the hospital whose emergency services he employs. (That's what I have done, so it is a possibility.) But no, let's accuse Broadus of a crime. You don't have healthcare insurance so, obviously, you're going to fail to pay your hospital bill when the time comes.

And, with that simple move, we demonstrate just how reasonable that IRS fine really is. You deserve to be fined, because to be without healthcare is to be in default, even before there is a bill to pay, thus putting that burden on others. You miserable rat.

Always with these people, disagreeing with them means you're guilty of moral turpitude, or even a crime.

Ah, but that's The Prevention State for you: punishing you with fines and imprisonment before you actually cause any harm. That's why The Prevention State is justly characterized as a servile state.

P.S.

Don't be fooled by the technical difficulties in the video: Robert Broadus is not a black man. Well, not a real one, anyway.

I know it's been going around a while, but it is funny. And I'm still just goofing off.




As a bonus, here's an announcement from His Beatitude's teleprompter:

Got this via email:

Dear Diary

Just moved to Texas ! Now this is a state that knows how to live!!

Beautiful sunny days and warm balmy evenings. What a place! It is beautiful. I've finally found my home. I love it here.

June 14th:
Really heating up. Got to 100 today. Not a problem. Live in an air-conditioned home and drive an air-conditioned car. What a pleasure to see the sun everyday like this. I'm turning into a sun worshipper.

June 30th:
Had the backyard landscaped with western plants today. Lots of cactus and rocks. What a breeze to maintain. No more mowing the lawn for me. Another scorcher today, but I love it here.

July 10th:
The temperature hasn't been below 100 all week. How do people get used to this kind of heat? At least, it's kind of windy though. But getting used to the heat is taking longer than I expected.

July 15th:
Fell asleep by the community pool. (Got 3rd degree burns over 60% of my body). Missed 3 days of work. What a dumb thing to do. I learned my lesson though. Got to respect the ol' sun in a climate like this.

July 20th:
I missed Lomita (my cat) sneaking into the car when I left this morning. By the time I got to the hot car at noon, Lomita had died and swollen up to the size of a shopping bag, then popped like a water balloon. The car now smells like Kibbles and Shits. I learned my lesson though. No more pets in this heat. Good ol' Mr. Sun strikes again.

July 25th:
The wind sucks. It feels like a giant freaking blow dryer!! And it's hot as hell. The home air-conditioner is on the fritz and the AC repairman charged $200 just to drive by and tell me he needed to order parts.

July 30th:
Been sleeping outside on the patio for 3 nights now, $225,000 house and I can't even go inside. Lomita is the lucky one. Why did I ever come here?

Aug. 4th:
It's 115 degrees. Finally got the air-conditioner fixed today. It cost $500 and gets the temperature down to 85. I hate this stupid state.

Aug. 8th:
If another wise ass cracks, 'Hot enough for you today?' I'm going to strangle him. Damn heat. By the time I get to work, the radiator is boiling over, my clothes are soaking wet, and I smell like baked cat!!

Aug. 9th:
Tried to run some errands after work. Wore shorts, and when I sat on the seats in the car, I thought my ass was on fire. My skin melted to the seat. I lost 2 layers of flesh and all the hair on the back of my legs and ass. Now my car smells like burnt hair, fried ass, and baked cat.


Aug 10th:
The weather report might as well be a damn recording. Hot and sunny. Hot and sunny. Hot and sunny. It's been too hot to do Shit for 2 damn months and the weatherman says it might really warm up next week.

Doesn't it ever rain in this damn state? Water rationing will be next, so my $1700 worth of cactus will just dry up and blow over. Even the cactus can't live in this damn heat.

Aug. 14th:
Welcome to HELL! Temperature got to 115 today. Cactus are dead. Forgot to crack the window and blew the damn windshield out of the car. The installer came to fix it and guess what he asked me???

"Hot enough for you today?"

My sister had to spend $1,500 to bail me out of jail. Freaking Texas.

What kind of a sick demented idiot would want to live here??

Will write later to let you know how the trial goes.

I don't know what all the whining's about. When I was growing up we didn't have an air conditioner.

I'm homesick again.

(Razing the Servile State III)

The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, until Shiloh comes, and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples. ~ Genesis 49.10

In my previous posting on this subject, in which I sought to explain how a Christian's resistance to the state could be consistent with Romans 13, I made much of the notion of the consent of the governed. In other words, in contrast with the Roman Empire, in which not every subject of Rome's rule was a citizen, the Christian in the United Servile States of America has rights. In resisting the state, on the basis of the consent of the governed, the Christian acts in no way differently than Paul did when he objected to being whipped because as a citizen of Rome he had rights, one of which was the right not to be whipped or in any way punished without benefit of trial (see Acts 22.22-29). At the very end of that same posting I said I disagree with Christian Reconstructionist/Dominion theology. More specifically, what I said, in full context, was:

While I affirm the right of rebellion under Anglo-Saxon law tradition, as well as another tradition going back to Juan de Mariana, of regicide, I think we (i.e., Christians) should prefer another route. Bearing in mind, as I said above, that while Paul enjoined obedience to usurpatious, Roman governing authorities, he proclaimed a message which undermined the very state those authorities served. The best approach, it seems to me, is to agitate -- not call, not request, not even beg -- for surrender of illegitimately exercised powers.

Others, of course, would assert another approach. Christians, they would argue, should seek to hold public office, and hold those offices as ministers of God, as Paul calls governing authorities. In those offices, then, they should devolve these illegitimately exercised powers back to the states where they belong. Chief among these are, I think, Christian Reconstructionists or Dominionists, with whom I disagree.

For my purposes here, the Theonomist position will be described as follows. Simply put, despite the claims of dispensationalists and others, God's law has not been set aside; with the exception of the ceremonial laws, it still applies today. It must, because the Law is not arbitrary; it is a reflection of God's own character and cannot any more be set aside than God can deny Himself. Not only that, since the law was the standard applied by the Old Testament prophets against the nations, that law applies to believer and non-believer alike. God does not have one standard for believers and another for non-believers. Neither a Christian nor a non-Christian nation is ethically free to institute whatsoever laws may please it. Finally, despite popular understanding, theonomists do not propose to impose a theocratic dictatorship. Rather they intend changing the political order not by means of revolution (unlike some people we know), but by dependence upon regeneration, education and legal reform. (In my estimation, one of the best explanations of the position is Greg Bahnsen's "The Theonomic Reformed View", in Greg L. Bahnsen, et al, Five Views on Law and Gospel, Zondervan, 1996.)

I describe myself as a qualified theonomist. I agree with everything I just wrote as a description of the theonomic view that the law still applies today. But I take note of the fact that while the prophets do appraise the nations in terms of God's law, the nation of Israel (i.e., believers) are never tasked with applying that law against the nations themselves. Even if change should come by the above-mentioned means, there will still be those who dissent. The system theonomists propose, even if acceptable to a majority, must involve a certain amount of aggression against the property rights of the dissenters, specifically the right of self-ownership. The consent of the governed might be construed as the consent of self-owners to have their self-ownership aggressed against. (Technically, of course, if they consent, then there is no aggression involved. But let's not be technical just yet.) If, on the other hand, one does not consent to government, then government aggresses against self-ownership.

Self-ownership strikes the ear as a secular humanistic conception, and we (especially if we are Reformed) might therefore be inclined to dismiss it. But to my mind self-ownership (albeit a libertarian conception) is at the very least consistent with the fact that humans are responsible to God for their actions. In other words, humans must own their actions. If my actions are mine then so is the self which performs the actions. The non-believer is responsible for -- owns -- his unbelief and all the actions he performs in his unbelief. He owns the ends he selects as well as the means he selects for attaining those ends. Theonomists propose commanding the unbeliever to employ his property in a certain way, even, I'll grant, the right way. They propose aggressing against our neighbors' self-ownership, and this, despite theonomists, as a general rule, being very much free market oriented.

What theonomists, then, have in mind is a notion similar to what both the left and the right have of consent of the governed, which is really, the consent of the majority of the governed. This puts the minority in the position of having their self-ownership aggressed against, which, to them, amounts to government without the consent of the governed. And their property rights in themselves would be aggressed against under a right-leaning theonomic regime no more or less than their other property rights would be, or are, under a left-leaning anthroponomic regime. Why should anyone trade a left-leaning aggressor for a right-leaning aggressor? The only difference is the nature of the property rights being aggressed against. And that is why I believe it can truly be said that the difference between right wing theocrats like Theonomists and left wing theocrats (like those people at Theocracy Watch) is the nature of the regime to be imposed, as Mises explained:

In our time the most powerful theocratic parties are opposed to Christianity and to all other religions which evolved from Jewish monotheism. What characterizes them as theocratic is their craving to organize the earthly affairs of mankind according to the contents of a complex of ideas whose validity cannot be demonstrated by reasoning. They pretend that their leaders are blessed by a knowledge inaccessible to the rest of mankind and contrary to the ideas maintained by those to whom the charisma is denied. The charismatic leaders have been entrusted by a mystical higher power with the office of managing the affairs of erring mankind. They alone are enlightened; all other people are either blind and deaf or malefactors. ~ Ludwig von Mises, Human Action (4th Ed.), p. 156.

Anti-theonomist statists of non-theistic stripe will object to being described as theocrats on the grounds that they don't have a god. But their position is preposterous. It amounts to affirming that we should approve their dictatorship on the ridiculous grounds that their opponents' system posits, as given by a god, a complex of ideas whose validity cannot be demonstrated by reasoning while theirs posits, as given by some other source, a complex of ideas whose validity cannot be demonstrated by reasoning. Big deal. The choice they offer is still between two dictatorships. And to both of them, I say, "No me jodan."

So, in brief, in critiquing the dogmas of the servile state, I include a theonomist state because I don't think it can properly honor the concept of the consent of the governed, a concept which I think is consistent with the notion that, since God holds people responsible for (makes them own) their actions, people have to an extent some ownership of themselves. To govern a man without his consent, even for a theonomist, is to aggress against his property rights in himself. I object to the present non-theonomic, servile state without, at the same time, preferring a theonomic one. And that simply had to be explained because those who love our servile state will have it that all who oppose it (that is, the right wing) wish to impose upon us a theocracy. Thus do they hope to frighten us into their ever loving, protecting fold.

Part IV

This ain’t John McCain’s logrolling senatorial club any more. This is a deadly serious attempt to realize the vision of the 1960s and to fundamentally transform the United [Servile] States of America. This is the fusion of Communist dogma, high ideals, gangster tactics, and a stunning amount of self-loathing. For the first time in history, the patrician class is deliberately selling its own country down the river just to prove a point: that, yes, we can! This country stinks and we won’t be happy until we’ve forced you to admit it. ~ David Kahane

During the campaign season, I was continually mystified by how ignorant McCain was about what precisely was going on. Given virtually any opportunity to hit back -- HARD!!! -- he refused, especially during the debates (see some of my reactions here, here and here). I don't know how many times McCain reassured us of his ability to reach across the aisle and blah, blah, blah. But it wasn't too long before I realized what was wrong with McCain: He was thinking in terms of politics, which is about governing a society, rather than revolution, which is about transforming it. There is a difference: In governing, that which is governed is left substantially unchanged by the act of governing; but in transforming, the whole idea is to alter society. Obama, no one seemed to notice (despite what he said, repeatedly), was not campaigning to govern; he was campaigning to transform, by which I mean not fix, repair, or correct, but rather, alter or even abolish. Destroy.

In governing, it makes total sense to reach across aisles, make friends, roast marshmallows and sing camp-fire songs and, when seeking office, to boast of one's abilities to do so as an important qualification. But one cannot resist revolution (i.e., transformation) in that way. It may be distasteful to say so, especially if one's hope is to govern, but the fact is transformation, and resistance to it, must be played by different rules than apply in politics. McCain either never figured that out, or he wanted transformation as well, but only to a lesser extent, or more slowly. McCain should have been resisting a revolutionary, but he never realized it. How else to explain his saying, “My friends, you have nothing to fear from an Obama presidency.” Pardon me while I spew chunks. He would have been right, if Obama's presidency were going to be about governing. But why should McCain have thought so? Because he never understood what was going on. Through inattention he never understood his opponent's motives, or his goals. He really thought the campaign was about politics, how to govern. When one wants to govern (and is campaigning for office against one who wants to revolutionize) the campaign, though it preserve the outward appearance of government office-seeking, is really combat.

One cannot have failed to notice that the left have never cared to govern what they find. They seek to transform, and then only, to govern -- forever -- what remains after they have transformed -- altered or abolished. This, explains David Kahane, is why the left have never recognized a duty to -- how to put this -- play fair. There is no fair in a revolution. There is win or lose. Playing fair is how the other side loses. Thus saith the fourth rule for radicals: "Make the enemy live up to their own book of rules." We should stop living up to the rule book:

If [we] had any sense, [we] would start using [their] tactics against [them]. After all, [we] have a few lawyers on [our] side. Sue [them]. File frivolous ethics complaints against all [their] elected officials until, like Sarah [Palin], they go broke from defending themselves. (David Paterson would be a good place to start.) Challenge the constitutionality of BO²’s legion of fill-in-the-blank czars — none of whom have to be confirmed, or even pass a security check. (Come to think of it, neither did Barry.) Let slip [our] own journalistic dogs of war, assuming [we] have any, to find Barry’s birth certificate, his college transcripts, whether he applied to Occidental as a foreign student, and on which passport he traveled in 1981 to Pakistan with his friend Wahid Hamid, for starters.

[...]

What [we]...need...is a Rules for Radical Conservatives to explain what [we’re] up against and teach [us] how to compete before it’s too late.

Some people probably still think Republicans/Conservatives should be above all that type of activity, should play fair. Of course we should live up to our own book of rules, otherwise we become the enemy. But such rubbish overlooks what the "rule book" is for. If the rule book outlines how the game of campaigning for office is played and your opponent really isn't campaigning for office, but rather engaging in revolution (no matter how civil the appearance), then the game for which the rule book exists is no longer being played. The game has been changed from hide-and-seek to seek-and-destroy. You can keep playing hide-and-seek if you like, but your opponent is still going to be playing seek-and-destroy. Your chances, I think, are not so good, unless your opponent never finds you. Good luck with that.

Look at it this way, if you step into the boxing ring expecting a boxing match and your opponent discards his gloves and pulls a knife, or even a gun, you need a different rule book. If you insist on boxing, you're a dumb ass who deserves exactly what's about to happen to you, if only because you won't mount the appropriate type of defense. Moreover, you shouldn't even be playing defense in that situation anyway, moron.

Yes, people should play fair -- if we were still talking politics, if we were talking simply of governance. But we are not; that ship sailed long ago.