Tuesday, July 06, 2010

Are My Opinions Controversial Enough to Make the List?

So, the Transportation Security Administration is instigating a restriction of information available on the internet to individuals who work for the TSA.  Here are the basic criteria to get on the list.

• Chat/Messaging

• Controversial opinion

• Criminal activity

• Extreme violence (including cartoon violence) and gruesome content

• Gaming

The email does not specify how the TSA will determine if a website expresses a “controversial opinion.”

I am guessing, here, but I would bet that any opinion which does not express admiration and praise of the State will be deemed as controversial, because if there is one thing the power brokers of the State do not want is an educated minion.

TSA to Block “Controversial Opinion” on the Web

Posted by John Venlet on 07/06 at 11:58 AM
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Revolution and History

Rand Simberg points to a Walter Russell Mead essay, written while Mead was in London on July 4th, with a post titled Thoughts On The Revolution, without comment, except to say, “Read the whole thing,” after providing an excerpt from Mead’s essay.

Mead’s essay is titled London Fourth, and it is an interesting read, and the essay touches on the subject matter which has occupied a number of my recent posts.

An excerpt from Mead’s essay I found particularly interesting.

In that sense, the forces that drove the American Revolution are still coursing through our politics now.  While a significant number of Americans (usually relatively affluent and well educated) want a transformational government acting in the service of a coherent moral vision, larger numbers of Americans start getting nervous when they see too much movement in that direction.

I hope that larger and larger numbers of Americans begin getting more and more nervous in order to check the do-gooders who believe that morality can be legislated into existence, because it cannot.

Posted by John Venlet on 07/06 at 10:55 AM
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“So Who Owns You?” - An Attitude

How do you answer the question which is the title to this post?  I know how I answer this question.  No one owns me, I own myself.

This question, “So who owns you?,” according to Lee Harris, was the impetous for his most recent book The Next American Civil War: The Populist Revolt against the Liberal Elite, and the question was also the impetous for an article in The American titled The Spirit of Independence: The Social Psychology of Freedom, which is well worth your time to read.

A quote from Harris’ essay in regards to the answering of the question which poses as the title to this post.

In retrospect, their answers were more profound than mine. My answer came from the head; theirs from the heart. Many of those who responded from the heart probably knew very little about the philosophy behind libertarianism. Perhaps some had read John Locke or John Stuart Mill back in college, but most of them might best be considered natural libertarians. They knew they couldn’t stand the idea of someone else owning them, someone else telling them what to do or how to think, of someone else bossing them around. They all felt competent to manage their own lives and deeply resented any attempt by other people, including the government, to manage their lives for them. Rightly or wrongly, natural libertarians are firmly convinced that no one else can know their best interests more than they do. They insist on remaining in charge of their own destinies and bristle whenever other people seem intent on taking charge of their lives. Because natural libertarians respect their own independence, they respect the independence of others. They do not aspire to control other people’s lives, but when other people aspire to control theirs, they will resist tooth and nail. The natural libertarian will behave this way not because of an ideology, but because of his or her distinctive attitude towards life.

What is your attitude toward life?

Arts & Letters Daily.

Posted by John Venlet on 07/06 at 08:19 AM
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