I’m still sitting here shocked. And by now, few things can shock me.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/letter_from_america/1178345.stm

http://www.pennsylvaniafiduciarylitigation.com/2008/07/articles/business-succession/shirtsleeves-to-shirtsleeves-in-three-generations/

You can’t win against death. But you can win against other mortals. There are plenty of enemies to kill and achieve victory over, but death is not one of em. But it doesn’t matter, we are not here to fight death, Gods, or any other supernatural and omnipotent beings like entropy.

We can adequately fight our mortal foes just fine. Even if you are legally “unarmed”. And by legally, I mean not in actuality.

Victory, to be victory, must be both transparent and transient. It does not last, but that’s the point of life, that it does not last. Thus that is the goal, to create life, knowing it does not last. To create the United States, knowing that it is not for forever. We are not here for forever, we are here for the people that lives right now, for the ones that can live right now, and for those that will be alive in the future.

The Left wants to be Gods, they wish to be immortal. They want perpetual wealth, perpetual power, and perpetual control over the fate of humanity until the end of the universe. That is not exactly humble.

I do not take that view. Certainly I share the Left’s view of humanity and its foibles, particularly concerning war, poverty, and etc. But I’m a true believer, not a dupe, cannon fodder, or tool of the Left’s political class. I pursue the means that will necessarily achieve my goals. My goals, not their goals. And in so doing, I believe that you can keep free will just as it is. All you have to do to get people to make better choices is to change the consequences of those choices. You don’t have to make the choices for them. You just have to make one choice very very painful, the choice you don’t want them to take. Make evil work for good. Make greed work for America. Whatever works, use it if it will help. Discard the useless. Adapt the useful to your own cause. Cement the Sunnis and any other potential allies. If they are willing to work, give them loyalty tests. If they betray us, give them a noose or bullet free of charge.

Thus Tookie justifiably gets killed for a variety of reasons. 1. Where there is life, there is hope. Where there isn’t life, there is no hope of repeat offenses or more victim bodies.

2. Death is the ultimate way of saying “don’t do this”. It is instinctual, it is genetic, it is primordial and cultural and educational and intellectual all rolled into one. Death is the forever equalizer and we all know it. Nothing, not propaganda, not America, not the Thug in Chief Obama, can reverse it. God can, but then again, that’s God.

3. It is also a way of saying, we are free. We are free to make decisions that we are confident in, even when the consequences are permanent death and irrevocable execution of selected individuals. We will take such moral consequences on ourselves, we will not back out, we will not quibble and say “what if he is innocent, then it would be better to have stripped 25 years of his life rather than all of his life”. Yeah right, a failure in duty to sentence the guilty and release the innocent. It cannot be lessened because of “mitigating circumstances”. Anyone that seeks to do so is a moral coward that believes hacking off a man’s arm is better than hacking off his leg. Only a matter of degree, people. Like nuking one city rather than two. It’s a matter of degree, not a matter of kind.

“Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations”.

It has to be American in source – no other nation offers that possibility – but I don’t know where it originated.

“The sins of the father shall be visited upon the son even to the seventh generation” may also apply. I once thought that was a curse, but have come to realize that it’s just a statement of fact.

We create our futures in our children.

So…

“It isn’t whether you win or lose…it’s how you play the game” ? Both small scale, and large scale?

Should I have?

Those particular novels are an interesting life lesson, I would say. Like the Deathstalker novels I recommended to Laer P of Cheatseekingmissiles, it concerns with the good guys fighting an insurgency against the ruling elites, the ones with de facto military supremacy and occupation of all areas of national and public power and influence.

It’s a very inspirational story which I believe would benefit many here in these dark times.

To win the election, you’re asking people to choose the hard way. I don’t think it’s going to happen – not unless they lose everything first. They’re going to have to go cold turkey first. We’re going to have to prepare to start over. My question is…assuming we are given the opportunity to start over…are there any changes we can make that would prevent us (the “us” of the future) from falling into the same error? or is it just a moral reality that we cannot achieve real heights without free will, but the free will must always offer the risk of failure?

In one respect, you are describing the human condition. We will fail and succeed, generation after generation, and this cycle doesn’t appear to be breakable. Not unless we transcend ourselves, of course, utilizing either technology or something else entirely different.

However, even when we know perfection does not exist, even when we know the sin of Utopia, there is still value in striving for excellence. Even if in the end we will all be defeated. Esprit de corps. And free will? That is the question, is it now.

As I recommended the Honor Harrington series (and Off Armageddon Reef) to Mike D, which has ended up with him taking some unexpected vacations from this blog , so do I too recommend the Mistborn trilogy.

These are inspiration stories. Fictionalized yes, but the trials are no less demanding and the sacrifices no less real. Every legend, after all, was based upon some kind of truth, a human truth if not an actual historical event.

The problem is that you are unlikely to convince the majority of voters to choose that which they perceive is against their best interest. They see the “bennies” promised by the left as theirs. First they lust after the bennies promised, then when they receive any portion of those bennies, they perceive them as their rightful property. They then want _all_ the bennies, or they want the ones they have forever. The Republicans offer them the right of making their own choices – and the price is “the bennies”. They’re not buying. They’re not about to buy.

I can remember in the days of the cold war, we cheered any tale of the escape of anyone from behind the Iron Curtain. I remember later hearing that some who made the escape later when back…living in a capitalist society was “too hard”. I thought that was astonishing – even unbelievable – but now I see a society that is becoming the same…unable to live without the state to care for them.

The grand experiment may be over – not because the concept failed but because it’s “too hard” for a whole bunch of people. It’s a lot easier to be a domesticated farm animal – even if you’re destined for slaughter – than to be a wild animal not knowing where the next meal is coming from, and always on the lookout for the predators. It does entirely depend on the moral fiber of the people, and since the goal for the last 70 years or so has been to destroy the basic moral fiber of this nation, we may not have enough left to appeal to. The only way to win the battle in the long run is to develop the Judeo Christian ethic once again in our children. Even if you win an election – any election – you cannot rebuild without rebuilding the underlying ethic of the population. The ethic that got us where we were before we began the last road was the Judeo Christian ethic. It is what made us unique, and having been pulled off that path by the temptations of the flesh, we have lost our way and are easy prey for the spoilers.

To win the election, you’re asking people to choose the hard way. I don’t think it’s going to happen – not unless they lose everything first. They’re going to have to go cold turkey first. We’re going to have to prepare to start over. My question is…assuming we are given the opportunity to start over…are there any changes we can make that would prevent us (the “us” of the future) from falling into the same error? or is it just a moral reality that we cannot achieve real heights without free will, but the free will must always offer the risk of failure?