10-9-10 Hodgepodge
Saturday, October 09, 2010
Tracinski's Crack-Up
As someone who once actively promoted the work of Robert Tracinski, I feel obligated to urge anyone who has read his take on the Peikoff-McCaskey dispute to work towards a more complete perspective. Perusing the post and discussion on that matter at New Clarion, particularly the remarks by Dismuke and North Bridge, would be a good place to start.
Weekend Reading
"Thus Rand not only establishes how to champion limited government without appealing to religion — she also shows why we must." -- Amit Ghate in "Values and the Defense of Freedom" at PajamasMedia
"Western civilization did not originate slavery, racism, warfare, or disease--but with America as its exemplar, that civilization created the antidotes. " -- Thomas Bowden in "Let's Take Back Columbus Day" at FoxNews
"Can it be that antitrust prosecution of Apple would serve no purpose other than punishing the company for its success? The evidence points in that direction." -- Thomas Bowden in "Apple Now Targeted for Success" at Investors.com
"By intervening in markets, bureaucrats succeed only in manufacturing the panic and unnecessary volatility they had hoped to prevent." -- John Hoenig in "How to Ruin the Stock Market" at SmartMoney
"Obama was correct when he said we are a nation of citizens bound by a set of values. But as to what those values are, he hasn't a clue. Sadly, many Americans don't, either." -- Charlotte Cushman in "Is America a Christian Nation?" at The American Thinker
Procrastination Article
Over at Lifehacker is what looks to be an excellent article on procrastination. It may sound like I'm joking or procrastinating or both, but I probably won't get around to it myself until tomorrow...
From The Vault
Today last year, I posted some gorgeous photos of Boston.
Houston Metro Unveils Rickshaw Lines
Heh!
-- CAV
14 comments:
Hi Gus, thanks for the link. Dismuke has since put in another great comment building on one of mine.
Sure thing. The points raised in the discussion your post touched off have pretty well eviscerated Tracinski's position. Dismuke's managerial insight particularly helped me understand what it was about his piece that rubbed me so far the wrong way.
the comments on ghate's article are quite revealing. Man is not perfect able. Reason is rationalization etc... Man is fallen yada yada yada
you know I think I see your point about not being like the environmentalists and just focus more on promoting our ideas. BTW I think I came up with a good catch phrase: Harness the Environment.
"Harness the environment."
Not bad.
I am thankful for your approach of leaving us to draw our own conclusions from this ARI fracas. I sympathized with Tracinski, if only because I completely agree with him about the uselessness of the "DIM hypothesis", and I have been befuddled by Peikoff's exhortation to vote for Clinton (because Clinton would ostensibly have brought us to the brink of leftist destruction, causing an inevitable capitalist backlash), and then to vote democrat in 2006. I think Peikoff has gone too far in trying to differentiate himself from Rand, by blowing the religious aspect of conservatism out of all context to turn it into impending theocracy.
But there you go. Herd of cats and whatnot.
Mark,
Your first and last sentences confuse me and I disagree with practically everything in between. In particular, if all you see behind Leonard Peikoff's election recommendations was some kind of shallow attempt to differentiate himself from Ayn Rand, then you completely missed his point. On top of that, the sarcastic tone of your comments on Peikoff is completely inexcusable.
Do not mistake my recommendation of getting a more complete context regarding what Tracinski says (or about the Peikoff-McCaskey dispute) for some kind of sanction to start bashing Leonard Peikoff.
Gus
Gus,
I'm not sure what's confusing. I was glad you left me free to draw an entirely different conclusion than your own and I certainly wasn't imagining I had your sanction. I found that many of Tracinski's points echoed my own thoughts about Peikoff. Call it Peikoff bashing if you will - I call it disagreement.
It's not only his election recommendations, but the things he says and reiterates time and again that make me believe he has adopted an overblown "christian theocracy" strawman. And he himself will tell you that Rand did not see it that way.
Mark,
"I was glad you left me free to draw an entirely different conclusion than your own..."
This is what is confusing me: In what sense could I possibly NOT leave someone free to disagree with me? I don't think, at least in the ARI dispute, there is enough evidence for anyone to conclude much of anything, morally, about the participants.
But what if I did? And what if I thought it so blatantly clear that there was no room for honest error? Would my saying as much cause you to feel less free to make up your own mind?
Gus
I noticed that the EPA uses the slogan "Design for the Environment". Notice that it subdues production to nature
What a Sunsteinian way to propagandize!
actually you can easily turn that out around: Design the Environment. I wonder how that compares to Mo's Harness the environment
Nice. You could even just cross out the "for".
Gus,
Well, none of us are perfect. And, as an admirer of your blog who trusts your judgement, I might have been predisposed to simply skim the article, had you fully elucidated your own judgement that Tracinski has "cracked up". Instead, intrigued, I read the whole thing.
Mark
Mark,
Okay. I think I see what you were driving at.
While I appreciate such confidence, let me be the first to say that you should hold anything I say up to scrutiny, particularly on such difficult matters as judgement of other people.
This is for both of our sakes: If I'm wrong about something, it will make me less likely to lead you down the primrose path. And if I'm wrong, I would hope to have some help in gathering the information I need to correct myself.
I do think you see this, but it's a point worth making explicit for the sake of anyone who happens by.
Gus
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