News and Notes: 11-7-05

Had a bit of a hiccough in my normal blogging schedule, so I'm doing my usual Sunday Roundup today. Mainly, I'll focus on followups to my last two posts and a few other interesting items that have caught my eye recently.

But first things first....

Happy Birthday, Mom!

I am happy to say that hurricanes had nothing to do with my interrupted blogging schedule, for a change! The wife and I flew out to Mississippi yesterday to join my brothers in throwing a surprise birthday party for our mother, who has just reached the big [redacted]-O. Since she sometimes stops by here, I had to forgo my normal practice of giving my readers a heads-up before I break my usual posting routine.

The wife and I flew in and had my uncle pick us up. We then had him let us out around the block from her house so we wouldn't all arrive at the same time. By the time Mom saw me, I was sitting in a lawn chair in the back yard with my wife walking over. The look on her face was priceless!

More on Chinese Espionage

Over at Hundreds of Fathoms, Lubber's Line posts a huge roundup on Chinese espionage and general international meddling that will take quite a bit of time just to go through.

According to the FBI and U.S. Immigration, cultural and economic exchange between the United States and China results in about 150,000 Chinese students studying at U.S. Universities and about 700,000 Chinese tourists and business executives visiting the U.S. each year.

Stop by there. He has clearly done an excellent job.

Other Coverage of the European Intifada

At The Stupid Shall Be Punished, Bubblehead recently posted on the rioting in France (and Nebraska football), including a good roundup on submariners and others who commented on the situation.

Andy at the Charlotte Capitalist brings us more info with a post today.

I can't help but note in passing that French obstructionism of American anti-terrorism efforts in the Middle East sure has paid off! Good thing the frogs didn't "enrage" the Islamic world by going to Iraq with us or otherwise giving us a hand....

Great Pictorial

Bothenook worked a pumpkin patch during a recent blogging hiatus and photo-blogged it upon his return. Beautiful shots.

Motorcycles and Activism

Chap and the Gaijin Biker both point out some interesting examples of "motorcycle activism" for lack of a better term.

Over at Chapomatic, some bikers have organized to counterprotest Fred Phelps's group when it makes unwelcome appearances at the funerals of American servicemen. Chap quotes the Ark City Traveler:

There are 15 motorcycle clubs involved, and they plan on going where the protestors go, making sure families are not hurt by them. This usually means surrounding them, providing a human shield, and drowning out the protestors' voices with their motorcycle engines.

"Anytime they go to a soldier's funeral to cause problems, we will be there," Houck said.

Houck said the group gets permission of families and local law enforcement officers before attending.

"We are not here to stop their free speech," Houck said. "We object to them disrupting military funerals and waving vicious signs. We want them to respect soldiers and their families."

Until that happens, the cyclists will also be exercising their freedoms.

Meanwhile, the Gaijin Biker reports that some motorcyclists are defending their freedom to donate organs to the death, so to speak. He quotes a Reason Magazine article:

In the final analysis, not enough people took seat belt laws personally. For the most part, whatever objections they harbored were overcome by force of law and force of habit. By contrast, substantial numbers of motorcyclists have complained loudly, conspicuously, and persistently about helmet laws for more than three decades.

(For the record: I oppose mandatory seat belt and helmet laws, as well as state payment of medical expenses. The sole burden of an individual's foolishness should be borne by that individual.)

I agree with the Gaijin Biker when he says the take-home message of the article is that "Those who value a particular freedom have an obligation to protect it," although I would hasten to add that I found Reason Magazine's analysis of why seat belt laws -- but not motorcycle helmet laws -- so easily made it onto the books in so many states to be shallow.

In the final analysis, not enough people took seat belt laws personally. ... Politicians didn't have to understand their passion to respect it. And therein lies a lesson for the world's busybodies and petty tyrants.

The problem, unsurprisingly missed at Reason, is that people did not take the seat belt laws personally because so many of them do not understand intellectually why the nanny state is dangerous.

If the public appreciated the dangers of having the state make prescriptive law (e.g., the state prescribing objectively bad or arbitrary behavior, the public slowly getting used to the government controlling more and more of their lives, the precedent for the state to use the "public good" as an excuse to do other things like seizing one's home on behalf of a real estate developer, etc., etc.) -- the public would certainly have "taken seat belt laws more personally".

But such an understanding would require one to know (1) what sets off the government as a unique social institution (its monopoly on the retaliatory use of force), (2) why we need government in the first place (to protect individual rights), and (3) what the basis is for individual rights (man's possession of a rational faculty). This information was discounted as irrelevant by the Libertarian Party long ago.

Particular freedoms are parts of a greater whole that is jeopardized every time a do-gooder decides that the state ought to force people to behave in a certain way for any alleged reason.

A Couple of Updates

Don Watkins has announced that the second issue of Axiomatic is now available.

Zach Oakes now has the PSU Objectivist Club up and running, including a nice, new web site.

Blogroll Addition

I have added Four Knots to Nowhere, the blog of fellow Ultraquiet No More contributor MT1(SS), to my blogroll. He beat me to the punch Saturday in breaking the news about the Chinese espionage arrests to our group submarine blog.

-- CAV

Updates

11-8-05: Corrected a typo.