"Hu Jintao is Hitler"....anyone?

I had posted this several years ago and found it in my drafts. Apparently it hadn't posted properly. Always fun to see if one's speculations are accurate.

We don't see a lot of mass demonstrations around the world with impassioned freelance protestors carrying signs that say China's appointed president Hu Jintao "is Hitler." We also don't see 'round the clock television news and print media decrying the horrors taking place in the Sudan. True, the violence is enough to get some media coverage -- an establishment media outlet can only unbalence the news so much before they've lost all credibility.

During the last five years, Chinese backed Sudanese tribesmen have been responsible for over 200,000 deaths and displaced over two and a half million people. Surely that's on par with tragedy in Iraq -- and the President of China threw in Tibet as a little extra (that did muster some temporary protest).

So why exactly is Hu Jintao the host of the Summer Olylmpics and Bush is just....well, "Hitler?"

By the way, if you haven't noticed, Iraq is on the verge of becoming everything conservatives had hoped for and leftists had despised; a freely elected peaceful and prosperous nation. I know we're still in the very beginning of such a propect (Obama could be elected and Al Queda could have a new friendly abode for it's international operations), but lets hope the trends continue in Iraq and peace comes to the Sudan...even though Bush "is Hitler" and Hu Jintao isn't.

The BBC (...eye roll)

...so what.

I was watching a brief Niel Cavuto piece on -- the dreaded -- Fox News the other day and his notably casual and likable manner caused me to consider a network I don't watch - the BBC.

**********

I've often contemplated the relevance (or greatness?) of the BBC, Britain's mega-billion dollar media empire. I view it's articles often through links but I never intentionally seek out its brand of journalism. I don't avoid it because it's not a high quality professional news organization (it obviously is) or because I have anything against British accents (except when they're being used by people who aren't British thinking they sound more sophisticated if they talk in the style of the King James Bible).

I avoid the BBC because of how others often show their admiration for it. I avoid it because I deliberately wish to retain my credentials as a "philistine simpleton" with blue-collar roots. Many people I've known reference the BBC the same way they reference the current U.S. president. I sometimes think their motivation has more to do with a need for hero worshiping than any genuine appreciation for quality information. Kind of like a teeny-bopper groupie for the approved rock band of intellectual snobbery.

Today's scathing critique on intellectual snobs will not address issues of the BBC's bias or the fact that it receives tax-funding, valid issues for debate in themselves.

What motivated me to write these comments today was simply -- as noted -- watching Niel Cavuto on "the dreaded" Fox News. I'm not a fan of his or anything but I couldn't help but note that his personable manner was so unlike the aura which surrounds the BBC and those who admire it so. I'm sure there are plenty of likable decent people at the BBC but, having grown tired of the haughty manner of so many professional intellectuals and armchair philosophers (i.e. snobs), it's refreshing to have people (FOX) report and comment on the news of the day in a style that's -- for lack of a better phrase -- friendly and down to earth. I realize that may sound ridiculous when one considers that it's really just basic information one hopes to glean from a network, but...

On more than one occasion I've had to hear the arrogant sneers and condescension from holier than thou progressives as they insult the coverage of important events that non-FOX networks manage to miss. The U.N. Oil for food scandal, Benghazi, the I.R.S. targeting private citizens the President and his party disagree with, etc. etc. Is it really so bad that one major News network looks skeptically on the party in power? I dare suggest that, if not for FOX we'd be ever so much closer to one party rule (of course, the Demo-comms immigration policies will achieve that end).

I doubt that the average country bar patron in middle America watches much of the BBC (okay, they probably never watch it). It's likely as well that the BBC and its staff would not like the average country bar patron in middle America. Wine or beer? K-Mart or Cartier? Nascar or Polo? There is something to be said for a common brand, especially in a time when the ideals of philosopher kings are being rammed down our throats on every front. Simple may not be "better" but it's often more palatable to sound judgement and common sense.

Though attempts are often made to denigrate FOX News as somehow being less than a true outlet of news, one would be shying from objectivity to suggest that Bret Baier, Chris Wallace, Juan Williams, or Harris Faulkner are less than competent and professional journalists. Like other news outlets, Fox has it's pundits and commentators but an inquiry into the quality of FOX's news reporting has nothing to do with Hannity or Bill O'Reilly (admittedly, I cringe with embarrassment when I occasionally hear my viewpoint coming from Hannity's overly strident mouth). Personally, I think Greg Guttfeld runs rings around any mainstream propaganda points that John Stewart can crouch in comedic terms. And, along with the wit, some common sense insight.

I'll continue to read BBC links sent to me from friends or linked to on web sites and I'll continue to acknowledge that it offers a professional format, but I'll also continue to roll my eyes up when someone makes a dramatic proclamation that their media outlet of choice is the heroic bastion of cosmopolitan global professional tight-asses.

It's Selfish to not Obey

The essence of socialist sympathy is that one is selfish and irresponsible if they fail to take responsibility for other people's responsibilities.

Physics, Economics, and Politics

The psychologist Carl Jung often considered basic laws of physics to understand and explain the principles at work in the human psyche. I think this concept can be equally applied to collective constructs like the state and economic systems.

As one extreme example, I'd suggest that North Korea, a totalitarian state with a notable lack of flexibility, spontaneity, or change, exemplifies a concept where a huge amount of "energy" is used to reduce entropy (in an attempt to literally stop it). Energy is used by the North Korean state to primarily direct centripetal forces toward the maintenance of the state and it's rigid economic system. In following this course, the state and its economic vitality are relatively static -- again, only after having expended great amounts of energy in achieving this objective.

As an opposite example, I'd suggest that the United States (up until recently) has utilized relatively little centrally directed energy to the purpose of reducing entropy. Therefore, entropy has occurred at a relatively high rate, resulting in a dynamic release of energy in a very spontaneous way. Individual players applying individual initiative have expressed a general centrifugal force away from the static maintenance of central authority.

So it is that America has always been changing and manifesting incredibly diverse expression that spills energy out symbolically as wealth creation and general creative impulse. The North Korean example (really, any authoritarian institution) uses the energy it has to the end of merely keeping things the same -- attempting to stop any natural impulse toward entropy. The statist ideal must use considerable amounts of the energy available to it to merely hold back the natural tendency toward energy release -- entropy. In so doing, it locks up the potential release of energy that manifests in a dynamic creative economy. The free ideal allows for the natural physical tendency toward entropy and thus does not squander energy or resources to the futile and unproductive goal of merely freezing a status quo. In fact, by allowing the the natural course of events to play out (entropy), vast amounts of energy are released in a sort of spontaneous chain reaction which shows up as incredible diversity and creativity. Of course, the ideal path the United States has been fortunate to have taken is now coming to a close and we can see that, as the state is invested with greater power, enormous resources (energy) are being directed to the mere maintenance of the state and obedience to it. As can be expected in this environment, the attributes of dynamism are slowed and creativity and wealth are stifled.

Statism/socialism is a whining obsessive directing its demand that all things remain static and lifeless. Free society allows for the spontaneous impulse in nature that produces diversity and positive evolution.

Term Limits

The issue of term limits leaves any liberty-loving individual in a bit of a quandary. I used to be one who would say, as a matter of fact, that term limits already exist because the voter can limit a politician's term. Why should their free choice be limited? My view has completely changed as I now see that, if one's ultimate goal is to maximize personal freedom, one must rein in the inevitable results that a permanent political class brings to governing when the voting public permits such a political class to form -- and it usually does.

In a sense, the decisions of the voting population require checks and balances as much as any other branch of government.

Just as we can't allow "Majority rule" to trample on the rights of minorities or individuals, there must be some check on the careless errors that can occur in the election process when whim and the fashions of a time can leave future generations enslaved. We justly wouldn't wish to honor the free choice of putting a Hitler into power. Maintaining a free society requires distrust of anyone consolidating power, even it they've gained such power through the election process.

Declarations of Independence

In expressing one's political alignment it's become common among many to say they are "independent." Of course, generically, it can be stated that one is simply not a follower of a specific political party, but more often than not it is used by many to convey their desire to be seen as "open-minded" (who doesn't want to be that?).

In the end, almost everyone independently arrives at their independent viewpoint, no matter where it is on the spectrum. True, some are more adaptable than others and some more open to accepting that others may differ in their views, but there is nothing wrong with having a general tendency in one's beliefs toward conservatism or liberalism. To state that one is independent is often a mere attempt to pretend that one is somehow outside and above of the argument. Everyone is in "the argument" no matter how objective they wish to see themselves.

I'm struck by how many times a person has noted their credentials as bonafide "independents" and then rambled a cookie-cutter critique of a situation that fit quite neatly into a clear position on the political spectrum.

One can be independent of surrounding pressure groups or collective norms of a time and place, but that in itself doesn't make them any more objective or insightful than anyone else who merely holds a belief on a given circumstance.

If there is any distinction with value to be made between styles of political appraisal, it is that of those who merely hold beliefs, and those who wish to impose them forcefully upon others. At various times throughout history, both Fascists and communists could have stated the "independence" of their position, but that hardly distinguished them as anything beyond garden variety dogmatists...and what's so "independent" about that?

Circular Conflict

Has anyone noticed the irony of Russia's recent threat to...Denmark, of all places.

Basically, if you assist in the use of a missile defense shield...we'll target your ships with...a missile. I totally get why a country would not like to see the other side with a defensive system but it still seems weird that so much angst is reserved over the concept of a country seeking to defend itself and its allies from a nuclear attack.

'Like telling a kid you might hit him with a baseball bat if he or she buys pepper spray.