We hold these truths to be self evident - The Rule of Law in Progress or Regress pt-4

"We hold these truths to be self evident..."
As with the question of 'Who will watch the watchers', one of the driving quests of Western Civilization has been how to have a government of laws and not of men, when it is men who must write the laws? We touched upon a couple of the fundamental maxims of Western Law in the preceding post, and one in particular, which puts us on the right path for that - so long as we follow it. They do so by bringing the concept of external limitations to the law, through reasons that are accessible and comprehensible to all men who have a respectful consideration for reality and to the reality of human nature, yet at the same time are not written by men. The maxim I'm referring to is "No one should be a judge in his own cause" - a truth of human nature which takes only imagining whether a bully should be asked to judge whether he was justified in punching your child, to be grasped - the obviousness of which an English jurist, in a case from the year 1620, noted:

case of Day v. Savadge,5 2, where Chief Justice Hobart declared that

"even an Act of Parliament, made against natural equity, as to make a man Judge in his own case, is void in it self;"

IOW, there are principles and concepts available to us from outside of the Law, which are eminently suitable for applying reasonable limits upon all of the laws that men may desire to write for the 'benefit' of other men. And should those in power ignore those limits and write their hearts desire into law in spite of them, and even succeed in having their entire society voting upon and passing them, even with all of that, such laws will in truth be no law at all, they are empty of substance, they are void.

It is open to any man who dares to look at the emperors nakedness with his own two eyes and honest mind, will readily see that that emperor is wearing no clothes at all, that his so-called laws are nothing of the sort, merely the Rule of Law's Doppelganger, the Rule of Rules, made by those seeking to rule over others, and which should be struck down at the very first opportunity to do so.

In other, other words, the Laws of men, are not exempt from complying with the laws of logic, or of math... or as Jefferson put it '...the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God...', and while such a thought might very well cause the modern Pro-Regressive leftist's head to explode, it was once a common understanding, an understanding that our nation (upon which every comfort and technological delight you possess resulted from) was founded through, and is an understanding that successfully kept the Doppelganger at bay for well over a century.

You can even see an example of this, much to my surprise, in the movie "Lincoln". There's a fine scene (though not without some tarnish, which we'll look at in a moment) where President Lincoln explains to a couple of aids, what he means by Principle, and he quickly demonstrates the great steps that are readily able to be taken by all honest men through their observations of nature, which, for those willing to see them, will lead a man from the geometric principles of Euclid, to Self Evident truths for all men:

“Abraham Lincoln: You're an engineer. You must know Euclid's axioms and common notions. I never had much of schooling but I read Euclid in an old book I borrowed. Little ever found in its way in here, but once learnt it stayed learnt.

Euclid's first common notion is this: Things which are equal to the same things are equal to each other. That's a rule of mathematical reasoning and its true because it works - has done and always will do. In his book Euclid says this is self evident. You see there it is even in that 2000 year old book of mechanical law it is the self evident truth that things which are equal to the same things are equal to each other."

The looming shadows
But even here, we have the modernist skew creeping in, and much as I enjoyed this scene when I first watched it, something about it dragged at my attention. The wording used seemed less like that of Lincoln, than of the modern screenwriter; philosophically it doesn't belong to the Realist school that Lincoln would have been familiar with. Few in Lincoln's day would say that something is true simply because it works, that is a far more modern notion, the darkly pragmatic approach which was still being formulated at that time, and I doubt it would have sat well with him. To be sure, we do confirm that things are true through verifying them, but philosophically, epistemologically, it is only because the reality IS true, that we are able to verify it - verification, logically, has to come after the thing being verified (that is Self-Evident, is it not?) - our experimentation , like the anthropologist's broom, only brushes the dirt from the bones - it doesn't create the skeleton, it only serves as a means to our discovering it. The self evident fact is that it works because it's True, and because it's true, we are able to observe and verify it.

While Hollywood added their spin to the scene, they didn't spin the substance of it from nothing, and minus the pragmatism, that was just the sort of comment that Lincoln often used to make a larger point. In fact, if you do some googling on Lincoln's speech in the movie

Who Benefits from transforming Rules into Laws - The Rule of Law in Progress or Regress pt-3

Is having laws to rule by the same thing as having the Rule of Law?
So a couple key points noted in the preceding post, was that judging the laws by their outward appearances alone led to confusing the Rule of Law, with its Doppelganger, the Rule of Rules, as well as the importance of having laws that are universal in nature, laws that apply to all, rather than to only a favored, or frowned upon, few. That lack of universality, the adding of exceptions and loopholes to the laws, is partly what Ben Franklin had in mind when he declared himself to be a "mortal enemy to arbitrary government and unlimited power". Arbitrary, here, means:

"adjective - based on random choice or personal whim, rather than any reason or system."

When government acts arbitrarily, it takes on the assumption of power unrestrained by proper limits, which is the raw status of savagery at the societal baseline, where a ruler (one man or many) exerts power over others by their word alone, and may change form one moment to the next with the desires of that ruler. The chief distinction between whether that power flows directly from the mouth of a single leader, or through a process of extended discussion through councils and representatives to be written down for public display, is the placement of some deliberation and delay upon their execution, but neither puts real limitations upon the scope and reach of that power. Finding what can properly supply those limits, has been the holy grail of Western government since the establishment of the first democracy in Athens.

What can properly limit the powers over those who are living under them?

Other laws?

There are many who do believe that it is enough to have one law that limits the extent of another. Proponents of this, which include most of the law school faculty of the last one hundred plus years, might say (and many do),

"Having an interconnected set of agreed upon laws, publicly available, 'transparent', and written down is sufficient to qualify as Law, eliminates the 'arbitrary' and establishes a Rule of Law."

I disagree.

And so did those revolutionaries who, unimpressed with the fancy red coats and gold braid which that primitive ideal had been dressed up in by the British crown, banished it from our shores, in order to establish a revitalized body of laws in their place on these shores.

But was that all they did? Were the 13 new state's laws, and the later Federal Constitution, limited by nothing more than their own laws? Before asking what those limits might be and where they might come from, lets look a bit closer at what is, or isn't accomplished, when a law is agreed to and written down - and does that act alone make it proper 'Law'?

What is it that writing a law down accomplishes, does it somehow add depth and respectability to them? Certainly not in the act of

Why a Govt of Laws, and not of men? - The Rule of Law in Progress or Regress pt-2

So we left off in the previous post with pointing out that two very different creatures, the Rule of Law, and its Doppelganger, the Rule of Rules, are being mistaken for, and appealed to as being, one and the same thing. Because most people do not distinguish between the two, the resulting confusion spills out well beyond the courtroom and into our daily lives - evidenced by the Mizzou journalism student asserting his rights as protected by the 1st Amendment, and his fellow journalism students and professors asserting their right to 'bring muscle' to silence and banish him - and all will seek to justify their positions through the 'Rule of Law!'.

We're in this situation, because too many of us look no further than surface appearances to support their own passionately held and self justifying beliefs, and if you go no deeper than appearances, then the two do seem to be nearly indistinguishable - both are written in law books, both may be presided over by judges, both embody what people feel to be right, and both will result in a response of force should you violate them - but the fact is that they are in truth as different as night is from day, and our mistaking them for each other is serving as the means for dividing We The People into We The Peoples.

So... how do you distinguish between the Rule of Law and its Doppelganger, the Rule of Rules? If opposing points are given as answers to the same question, then maybe the problem lies less in the answers being given, than with the questions being asked? What is it that even prompts the question which the 'Rule of Law!' is so often given as the answer to? And is it in fact the answer? What's the point of having a Rule of Law? And having chosen to seek such a thing, is 'a nation of laws' a sufficient answer to the question of "What type of nation are we?".

Is the sort of answer that students are typically expected to give in our classrooms - ticking off multiple choice questions, or completing a fill in the blank answer - are they enough to stir an interest in getting beneath the deadly shallows of appearances?

It requires a bit more than that, doesn't it?

Put it this way: We have people offering opposing answers to define the same term, because we accept appearances as being sufficient, and the more shallow the appearances are that we are willing to settle for - multiple choice, fill in the blank - the less likely it is that people will look past the surface, and the more likely it is that the answer we will wind up with will be the Doppelganger, instead of the reality we were seeking.

Our answers are much less of a problem than the questions that we customarily do, and do not, ask of ourselves. Maybe a better approach would be, before asking why the Rule of Law is desirable, we first noodle a bit on why Laws are thought to be desirable at all.

If your answers aren't the answer, ask different questions
It was John Adams who famously stated that we were a ' government of laws, and not of men' - do you accept that as a 'fill in the blank' answer and move on with no further thought, or have you, or do you want to, ask 'Why?' What was the point of that statement? How are the two different? What does it mean to understand that they ARE and SHOULD BE different? The answers are tied up with what we've been looking

Don't stand with victims - Wage pitiless war against their murderers

 To those who've suggested that I change my profile picture to display the colors of France's flag, while I understand the sentiment, I must respectfully refuse, and for the same reasons that I refused, after the last terrorist attack in Paris, to 'Stand with Charlie!', or to 'Stand with Garland' after the attempted terrorist attack in Garland, TX. What I said in my post then, applies just as much today:

"...We do not need to stand with Charlie, or even with Pamella for that matter, instead we need to stand up for, and defend against any such attack, upon anybody, because all of the numerous particulars point to a vital principle which every aspect of Western Civilization depends upon being vigorously defended, and that is far more important than the particular wrongs that have been done in Garland TX, Paris, FR, or any where else in the world. What we should clearly see, now, especially after these latest events, is that it needs to be made very clear, that standing 'with' Charlie, is something that should not be done, instead we must all stand united against those who would silence any amongst us, and especially against those who would excuse their doing it!

Standing with those who were killed, rather than against those who killed them, is less than worthless, it is counter-productive. If you understand that a wrong was committed which must be addressed, and if you understand the nature of what that wrong was, then the civilized response, and the responsibility of a civil society, is first and foremost to eliminate the ability of the perpetrators to commit such barbaric acts towards your people, it means to take the words never again to heart.

The notion that there could be some reasonable 'cause' for the attacks, which the victims should have expected, is, technically speaking: Bullshit...."

At the Battle of Tours near Poitiers, France,Frankish leader 
Charles Martel, a Christian,defeats a large army of Spanish Moors, 
halting the Muslim advance into Western Europe.

And you better believe that the Salon scum are already blaming the victims for the latest attack in Paris, and blaming the West in general. The only sentiment I'll stand with is - and I'm absolutely amazed at my saying this - what the President of France said:

"We are going to lead a war which will be pitiless,"

That I can get behind, I think even Charles Martel would approve, but, if it's all the same to you, I'll do it while standing with our own flag of the Red, White and Blue.

The Lawful scares of October... and beyond - The Rule of Law in Progress or Regress

The Lawful scares of October... and beyond....

“It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters.” - Edmund Burke

From our vantage point here in mid November, I've got to ask, is the last night of the month really the scariest, spookiest part of October? I don't think so. Halloween's Trick or Treating is ghoulish fun for children but it's typically done and gone by midnight, or at least by the end of the next day (your mileage may vary as per the neighbor's decorations). What else is there, you ask? I realize that this might sound silly, at first, but stick around and you just might be surprised into realizing that while children get their gleeful scares from Halloween, the adults, those who are awake, are in for much spookier fare than they are, beginning at the other end of the month, when on the first Monday in October, the Supreme Court comes back into session. The frights raised up on this day are more tangible and linger on well after that day, last on through the month, and they will haunt those who're paying attention throughout most of the coming year as well.

And of course it's not as if these lawful scares are confined to the SCOTUS alone, no, no, no... that's just the glowing head of the horsemen, frightful spin-offs abound from the Federal courts and agencies, and on down to the State and local levels in often unexpected ways, our educational system for instance - all in the name of the 'Rule of Law' they're sprung on us without benefit of candy, delightful spooks or jack-o-lanterns - Tricks a plenty, but very few Treats.

Boo!

What, not scared yet? Ok, sure, you might scoff, lawful SCOTUS stories are a very different sort of thing than children's ghost stories, and no one after all is ever going to go curl up in the gloom telling SCOTUS stories on All Hallows Eve... but... if they tried to... they just might be surprised at how easily it could be done; and we wouldn't have to dress up the language either, no need for:

"In the land of D.C. where the congress lies, Nine judges robed in black sit upon the highest court - One court to find them, One court to rule them all and in the darkness bind them, in the land of D.C., where the congress lies..."

, nah, that's not necessary, not when there are better, more realistic ways to build suspense and fear - through real fears of:

"...will the lawful ones permit this...? Will they outlaw that...? Will we still be allowed to do...?'

No need for Edgar Allan Poe, Stephen King or R.L. Stine, the NEWS alone will make you want to turn the lights on while listening to its spine tingling tales of those who oppose the Rule of Law, and of those who defend it, and how, like changelings, they are oftentimes one and the same people.

Bwa-Ha-HaHAHAAA!

No? Still not feeling it yet, ok...I get it, but...there's a more significant problem with the thought of turning SCOTUS stories into ghost stories, in that with children, if the story gets too scary, they can turn on the lights. But for the adults... turning on the lights isn't so easy or even all that pleasant to do, after all, while a gloomy SCOTUS story is scary, it isn't make believe.

Turning the lights back on will not only not make the scary things go away, it's likely to bring you face to face with a dilemma that has been standing before you all along, unseen or ignored: the twisted twin images of the body of the Rule of Law, and its Doppelganger, the Rule of Rules. Both possess the same appearances, both are written in law books, both are presided over by judges, both will result in a response of govt force should you violate them, but they are as different as night and day - and which one is actually which? Can you tell? Which one's the body of the good Law and which that of the ghoul of the West whose tale we'd sought to escape from?

I wonder how many would resist the urge as the lights come on, to turn them back off again?

You might wonder if I'm being too dramatic. If so, I wonder if you've been paying close enough attention to the reality around you. For instance, if you were to ask your fellow Americans to help you tell which one is which on any number of recent news stories

For Veterans Day - The Harder Right (revisited)

[For Veterans Day this year, I'm going with a re-post from four years ago, which isn't - for me or others - the typical Veterans Day post, but for me it really goes to the heart of the occasion. This post came back into mind a couple days ago when a 'Memories' app popped up some pictures from the 2011 Veterans Day parade in St. Louis that I took part in with Chris & Dana Loesch, "Patch" Po/ed Patriot and our kids [Patch just confirmed my sketchy pictureless memory, Stacy Washington was with us too). The memories were a nice tug - I mostly only see Patch online now, and the Loesch's have since moved to Dallas (catch "Dana" on the BlazeTV), but more than the sentimental value, was the point of this post, well illustrated in the movie clip, of the importance of choosing the Harder Right - not only in the sense of putting your life on the line for it, but the importance of choosing the harder right to a life worth living, and that is what I associate most with our Veterans.

Our Veterans volunteer their lives onto the line, and in pledging their lives to support and defend our Constitution, they serve to secure to us the ability to live a life worth living, should we also take the harder right, and choose to.

To our Veterans - Thank You.

And now, back to 2011:]


For Veterans Day, a clip that doesn't at first appear to have anything to do with Veterans or Veterans Day. It's the climactic scene of a movie that's really grown on me over the years, The Emperor's Club. In this, the point of not only an Education, but of a life well lived - or squandered - is conveyed in just a few moments.

The now aging Mr. Hundert, a Classics Professor, is found in the restroom after a debate competition, by his former student, Sedgewick Bell, who is now grown and launching a campaign for the Senate. Bell was a student he'd tried far more than he should have to help, and Hundert has realized that Sedgewick has yet again cheated in the "Mr. Julius Caesar" debate, which Mr. Hundert was moderating.

He lets his former student know that he knows he tried to cheat, again...

Mr. Hundert:"I'm a teacher Sedgwick, and I failed you. But I'll give you one last lecture, if I may. All of us, at some point, are forced to look at ourselves in the mirror, and see who we really are, and when that day comes for Sedgewick, you'll be confronted with a life lived without virtue, without principle - for that I pity you. End of lesson."

Sedgewick Bell:"What can I say Mr. Hundert? Who gives a shit. Honestly, who out there gives a shit about your principles and your virtues. I mean, look at you, what do you have to show for yourself? I live in the real world, where people do what they need to do to get what they want, and if that means lying, and cheating... then so be it.
So I am going to go out there, and I am going to win that election Mr. Hundert, and you will see me EVERYwhere! And I'll worry about my 'contribution' later.
(Sound of a toilet flushing, stall opens, Sedgewick's little boy comes out, stares at his dad in disgust)
Sedgewick Bell:"Robert? Robert...."
(Robert turns and leaves)
Sedgewick stares after him, stares down, glances at Mr. Hundert, and leaves.

What Mr. Hundert has, he has without need of power, position or wealth... what Cedric threw away, he can't replace through any amount of power, position or wealth.

The best things in life are free... but you've got to earn them, and sometimes fight for them; and some worthy few even choose to risk their lives for your chance to enjoy them.

Thank you to all those who chose the harder right, and especially the Veterans who agreed to risk their lives for it, if need be.

UPDATE - Pictures from the St. Louis Veterans Day Parade
Special thanks to Dana Loesh for inviting us to march with her crew in the parade, my daughter & I were honored to show our support.

Dana Loesh (in a strep throat burqa), Me, Patch Adams and Chris Loesch , ready to roll	... coming around the corner... (pic swiped from Patch Adams)
Parading past Soldiers Memorial	The best message of all!

Patch posted a video that should be an alarming shame in contrasts to all. For those who did turn out for the parade yesterday, thank you, your quality isn't questioned, but for the quantities of others who couldn't be bothered, shame on you.

Ferguson goes to college: What did you expect? A rant

So, the University of Missouri 'Mizzou's President, and its Chancellor have resigned due to the demands of the outraged. What do you want me to say? What more needs to be said than what #BlackLivesMatter says? What is happening in Mizzou, is nothing less than the spirit of the Ferguson riots going to college and applying the same persuasion of force ('cause... why would you go to college to learn to form a persuasive argument, instead of using force?) towards deciding further social and political issues by demands issued with still more threats of force.

What did you expect? 

Were you, like Gov. Jay Nixon, surprised that pulling back the police resulted in the town of Ferguson being burned down? If so, then what can I possibly say to you today, that will make any more sense than what you were unable to make sense of, back then? The only thing I can think of to say, is:

What did you expect? 

And of course it's not just Mizzou,  but all around the nation - in Yale a sociology professor is surrounding by truly hysterical students because of his 'failure' to speak out against Halloween costumes! While I'm sure it couldn't have happened to a nicer guy... what did you expect?

At Mizzou we've got students making a public, PUBLIC mind you, protest, who are freaking out over being photographed during their public protest, and a assistant professor of mass media - of mass media- calling for students to 'bring more muscle' to prevent their protest from being captured in the media - and another faculty member actually shoving a photographer! 

What did you expect?!

We've even got Conservatives saying excusing their behavior, with comments such as this one:

"On one hand, we as conservatives rail on about how the media is unfair and biased, but when the black students at Mizzou didn't want the "biased" media at the celebration of their victory all of a sudden we have sympathy for the media? Seriously?"

You'll never guess what college he went to.

What did you expect?

Some folks are all atwitter now because it seems that Leftist leaders no longer care about freedom of speech. Are you serious? The pro-regressive leftist never cared about 'Free Speech'. Actual concern for freedom of speech would require an acknowledgment and understanding and concern for Individual Rights as derived from the realities of human nature, laws designed to uphold them and all that entails. No pro-regressive leftist has ever, or will ever, acknowledge (except in the most vacuous bromides), understand, endorse or defend any of that. They never cared for freedom of speech, what they cared about was having an up-armored verbal sniper position from which to attack their opponents (those who acknowledged, understood and showed concern for Individual Rights) in the schools, media and govt administrations. Having now gotten significant numbers of 'Boots on the ground' in all of those institutions, they now, logically, want to ensure that those safe positions are not used against them, and there should be absolutely zero surprise that they'll viciously shoot down any who attempt to stand up, occupy or in any manner, turn those snipers nest (as they view them) against their own positions. 

What did you expect?

And large numbers of those same 'Conservatives', having only a passing interest or sympathy with principles in general (mostly consisting of little more than reciting the taglines of traditionalist's marketing materials) will inadvertently lend their assistance to them, even chuckling over the professors or media who are experiencing difficulties at the hands of their monstrous creations. Why? Because most of them swallowed some form of that same Mizzou mindlessness, through the K-12 schools, topped off with 4-6 years of daily drilling in those same college classrooms, and testing throughout on those same anti-conceptual, anti-principled, highly pragmatic, teachings.

What did you expect?

You're not saying anything. Tell you what, I'll tell you what to expect: When a person has positions he has simply accepted without thought, without reasoning, without knowing how or whether or not their ideas are rooted in reality (without which no real reasoning can take place), without ever even having attempted to connect their ideas to reality, students, who are taught, not to ask what is True, but instead to ask 'What's the right answer?', then have no means available for defending those positions they've accepted as 'the right answer', other than by making further assertions, evasions, expressions of outrage and ultimately the threat of violence or actual violence itself.  

What did you expect? What possible alternative could you expect them to have?

When a person does not understand how their ideas were developed or how those ideas and positions relate to what is real and true, then those positions they are given to choose (Hah!) from, will be evaluated not on the basis of their truth, but upon the feelings they evoke in them, and those will be highly influenced by what is popular with those they identify with - fellows, celebrities, 'leaders' - and once those positions are accepted by them, they will doggedly cling to those positions, without reasons (and certainly without considering opposing reasons),  without understanding and without anything resembling a reasonable attitude.

What did you expect?

Having been drilled for 12 - 18 years in accepting answers rather than learning to reason their way to them, they cannot help but exhibit their professors ideal of a Stimulus/Response creature, and having sunk to that level, then anything smacking of the higher human conceptions of Reason, Truth, Reality, are transformed into Trigger words... 'Free Speech' for instance... well and good for approved positions, but opposing ideas are strictly verboten.

What did you expect?

One last question, especially for you 'education reformers' out there who've never questioned the form of education that those who've created this horror have 'educated' us all with, once upon a time there did actually did used to be an alternative form of education (the last gasps of which can be seen here), one that was developed across two thousand years of intellectual effort, trial and error... and if you want to know why you've never heard of it, or if you have heard of it, why you've likely only heard it, 'Scholasticism', as being derided and discredited (ever asked what discredited it? Beyond the slanderous 'how many angels can fit upon a pin' insult/attack made up by those who sought to overthrow it, I mean?), you only need to understand that it was a form of learning (which our Founder's era was taught through, BTW) based upon requiring students to ask and answer questions about what they were being taught, requiring them to explain and understand and be able to defend, from the highest to the lowest, all of their knowledge. Calmly and reasonably.

Having discarded that, what did you expect would follow?

You only need to look to Mizzou for an answer, as that is the very, very, logical result of Ferguson. 

To start with.