WhatFinger


The difference between enlightened self-interest and nihilistic narcissism is the difference between the conservative and liberal viewpoints

The Left, Right, and Baltimore



Looking back at the past forty years, I now see that things were racing out of control: People had grown lax and indifferent, Forming factions and fighting among themselves.
They forgot about obligations and duty, Ignored notions of loyalty and justice.... Full of self-conceit, they cheated each other, Creating an endless, filthy mess. The world was rife with madness..... Few were aware that the world was star-crossed And dreadfully out of kilter. If you really want to understand this tragedy, look deep Inside..... --Taigu Ryōkan (1758--1831) From "Dewdrops on a Lotus Leaf," translated by John Stevens.

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There are two ways to destroy a city like Baltimore. One is to bomb it as occurs in war. The other is to kill it slowly via policies that destroy or drive out initiative, responsibility and pride. Baltimore, Chicago, Detroit and other formerly great American cities are a microcosm of the second way. They are examples of Liberalism unconstrained. Like a cancer, it works slowly but incessantly until it finally overcomes the organism it pretends to help. Monty Pelerin "Baltimore -- A Hollow City With Hollow People"
The difference between enlightened self-interest and nihilistic narcissism is the difference between the conservative and liberal viewpoints or weltanschauung. Using political jargon you could say that it is the difference between Right and Left. More to the point, the difference between the Right and Left is chiefly one of personal responsibility. The Right believes in self-responsibility, while the Left favors the "blame game" and adopting a victim status. The Left points fingers everywhere but at themselves -- whatever the problem is it is everyone's fault but their own. I bring this up because watching the various pundits on TV discuss the mess in Baltimore makes this dichotomy between the Left and Right all too clear. Are liberals really so clueless as to not know how whiny, irresponsible, and juvenile they sound? I suppose it must be, and most of them actually do not have a clue. Most on the Right would agree with James Quinn's assessment of the Left: Believing liberal welfare policies will fix the problems created by liberal welfare policies is insane. Liberalism is a disease of the brain and has infected a vast swath of America, especially in urban enclaves across the land. [italics added] James Quinn, "Whose Fault is Baltimore?" Making the same mistake over and over again and expecting different results is a common definition of insanity -- and yet that is exactly what I see liberals doing again and again in place after place. It's like watching an especially recalcitrant child playing with a box of matches. You just know that sooner or later bad things are sure to happen, but there seems to be no way to talk them out of their foolish willfulness. Well, if the Right cannot talk the Left out of its destructive foolishness, then what? Armed struggle, street fighting? It may come to that yet, although I continue to pray it does not. In any event, somebody has to act like an adult here, and apparently it has fallen to the Right to pick up those reins, by default if nothing else. And just as a parent attempting to discipline an unruly child can expect resistance and "back-talk," so too the Right can expect similar behavior from liberals when their "matches" are taken away. It goes with the territory. I admire the way Gov. Scott Walker maturely handled the liberal hysterics in his state. He just went ahead and did what was right, regardless of what sort of temper tantrums the Left threw. And that should be a lesson to every conservative IMO. Regardless of the crapola the Left throws at us for taking a righteous position, stand in the light. (And we had better believe that they will throw it. Expect it, and welcome it as a sign of our effectiveness -- consider the source and rise above it). I do not allow other people to push my buttons and pull my strings -- at least not for long. Indulging myself in such negative energies causes me to be less....effective. I quickly drop resentments and anger when I spot them in myself. And that's a good thing, because if I held onto my resentments and anger I would have died of a stroke or a heart attack long ago -- say about one year into Obama's reign. The idiocy, greed, corruption, and other vileness that is all too common in this world would have short-circuited my psyche and caused me to blow a fuse years ago. So although I am well aware of the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune," I do not dwell on them excessively. I try to balance them out by purposefully cultivating an appreciation for the beauty, glory and grace in this world (both visible and invisible). I have not noticed an appreciation for much of anything among the agitprop protestors milling around the crowds in Baltimore and elsewhere. In fact, an "attitude of gratitude" is glaringly absent. What I see in its place is a haughty and churlish sense of "entitlement." The Left had best hope that they can continue to keep urban blacks under their thumb and shackled to the government plantation -- because if the urban blacks ever get wise to how the Left has played them and betrayed them, that'll be all she wrote.

if I hear one more smug, supercilious, race-baiting leftist bigot spout off about slavery I think I'll scream

I'm not holding my breath waiting for urban blacks to get hip however. They have been cleverly indoctrinated with entitlement and victimhood beliefs for far too long. All the Left has to do is keep pointing their fingers away from themselves and toward the Right. Kept in ignorance, propagandized and indoctrinated, all too many urban blacks obediently look in the direction that their overseers tell them to, and dutifully ignore the true source of the corruption, despair, and stagnation that long-term rule by the Left invariably leaves in its wake. They will instead blame their condition on "them" ("them" primarily consisting of white conservatives, although a black conservative will do in a pinch). I do try to stay above the fray as much as I can -- although if I hear one more smug, supercilious, race-baiting leftist bigot spout off about slavery I think I'll scream. No I won't -- I'll take a few deep breaths and focus on something positive and uplifting....for the sake of my enlightened self-interest.


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Jim ONeill -- Bio and Archives

Born June 4, 1951 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Served in the U.S. Navy from 1970-1974 in both UDT-21 (Underwater Demolition Team) and SEAL Team Two.  Worked as a commercial diver in the waters off of Scotland, India, and the United States.  Worked overseas in the Merchant Marines.  While attending the University of South Florida as a journalism student in 1998 was presented with the “Carol Burnett/University of Hawaii AEJMC Research in Journalism Ethics Award,” 1st place undergraduate division.  (The annual contest was set up by Carol Burnett with money she won from successfully suing a national newspaper for libel).  Awarded US Army, US Navy, South African, and Russian jump wings.  Graduate of NOLS (National Outdoor Leadership School, 1970).  Member of Mensa, China Post #1, and lifetime member of the NRA and UDT/SEAL Association.


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