Tag Archives: politics

A European Army

Posted on by
Reply

There’s a nascent move afoot to create a European army to which, presumably, all the member nations of the EU would contribute men, equipment, and money.  German Chancellor Angela Merkel suggested to the European Parliament last Tuesday that such a force

would complement NATO.

I’ll leave aside the question of how the EU’s member nations would pay for such an establishment when they’re having so much trouble finding ways—or reasons—to pay for their commitment (of all of 2% of their respective GDPs) to NATO.

There’s another question that badly wants answers.  While the US—and the free individual nations of Europe and of Asia—have benefitted from the existence of their standing armies, our own Founders had misgivings about such an establishment, to the point that for some years after our own birth, we had neither standing army nor standing navy.  Such a thing was, they feared, the stuff of tyranny.  Even though the formal raison d’etre of a standing army was, and is, outward-looking and for defense of the nation against foreign threat, a standing, professional military facility (they feared) ultimately would become a domestic threat: Government would come to use the thing to suppress and then to oppress the people over whom such a well-equipped Government ruled.

So far, those fears have not been realized in those nations where the people remain free enough to choose at more or less regular intervals the persons they will have as members of their governments.  Such free peoples have checked the power of their governments.

But what of the European Union?  That organization does not have a universally freely elected governing body.  The European Parliament, to be sure, is elected by the citizens of the member nations.  However, that body has no governing authority; it can only make recommendations.  The real power of the EU’s Government is shared among the European Council, which consists of the heads of state of the EU’s member nations; the President of that Council; and the President of the European Commission, whose members are European Council appointees.  That’s a lot of power concentrated away from the will and the choices of the citizens of the member nations.

It’s a power that gets freely and broadly exercised, too, as illustrated by the EU’s Government presuming to reach inside a member nation—Italy—and dictate to that nation what its domestic budget must be.  Were [Italy] to remain intransigent, and were the EU to have its own standing army, what might be an outcome of a future dispute between [Italy] and the EU?

The peoples of Europe, the citizens of the individual member nations, need to think very carefully whether they want to arm so well a system of governance over which they have so little say.

A Bogus Beef

Posted on by
Reply

Recall CNN‘s Jim Acosta striking a White House intern (albeit lightly) and actively preventing her from doing her job.  In consequence of that, the White House suspended Acosta’s accesses to the White House.

Now CNN is suing the White House to get Acosta’s credentials back.  They’re doing it, too, on the risible grounds that the suspension violates Acosta’s 1st and 5th Amendment rights of free speech and due process.

Sure.

Acosta is in no way restricted from speaking his piece or from asking questions, either personally or in his capacity as a member of the press, although for the time being, he can’t ask his questions at White House pressers.  With regard to that last, the freedom of…the press, here personified by CNN, is in no way restricted since the suspension applies to Acosta personally: CNN is free to appoint another of its employees to attend such gatherings and ask such questions as CNN might consider useful.

Furthermore, getting credentials for access to the White House is a privilege, not a right; due process plainly does not apply.  On the other hand, striking White House personnel—or anyone else—however firmly or lightly is neither a right nor a privilege for anyone, much less for members of the press.

In my view, Acosta should not have his suspension lifted until his boss publicly apologizes for Acosta’s misbehavior.

Yapping

Posted on by
Reply

It’s what porch dogs do.  The current noise-making is from Progressive-Democrats objecting to Matthew Whitaker having been appointed Acting Attorney General after Jeff Sessions’ resignation at the request of President Donald Trump.

A number of lawmakers called upon Whitaker to recuse from the Russia probe, citing his criticism of the investigation.

Some years ago, Whitaker expressed some opinions about the investigation of which these Progressive-Democrats disapprove, and so they want him to recuse himself from the Mueller investigation.  Because anyone who, at any time, has said anything of which those folks disapprove is automatically disqualified for any government job.

The yapping has reached the point where the State of Maryland has asked a Federal judge to keep Whitaker from acting in his role on the grounds that he wasn’t legitimately appointed.  Never mind that the

Vacancies Act [formally, the Federal Vacancies Reform Act] allows the president to temporarily fill a position that requires Senate confirmation with any official who’s been in the department for over 90 days.

Specifically, the relevant part of the Act says

The President can select a senior “officer or employee” of the same executive agency who is equivalent to a GS-15 or above on the federal pay scale, if that employee served in that agency for at least 90 days during the year preceding the vacancy.

Whitaker was AG Sessions’ Chief of Staff from October 2017—something more than 90 days.

Whitaker’s assignment is entirely legitimate. As for recusing, those calls, aside from the noise for noise’s sake aspect, is insulting to Whitaker’s integrity, insisting as they do that he’s not capable of exercising his responsibilities, including vis-à-vis the Mueller investigation in an objective, balanced manner.

Whitaker—and Trump—should ignore the yapping and simply proceed as though the street were merely filled with the noise of children playing.  (Not that I would ever mix metaphors.)

A Bit of Perspective

Posted on by
Reply

The 1%-ers, the Evil Rich.  How much does it take, really, to become of member of the world-wide crowd of really rich folks, or how much would have to be given up to leave that group?  Jade Scipioni, of FOXBusiness, offered some information from Credit Suisse Research Institute’s 2018 Global Wealth Report last week.

  • the global top 1% requires a net worth of US$871,320
  • the global top 10% requires a net worth of US$93,170
  • the global top 50% requires a net worth of US$4,210

On the other hand, the Federal Poverty Guideline income for a family of four for the US in 2018 is US$25,100, and the median household income in the US is US$62,175 as of last June (income is just one component of net worth, which also includes the value of possessions).  The median net worth in the US is in the neighborhood of US$84,500 for a middle-aged, 50-ish person.  (An aside: that middle-age for an American compares to a life expectancy—total lifetime—of an Angolan of 52 years, 51 years for a Chadian, 50 years in the Democratic Republic of Congo, 53 years in Mali….)

There does seem to be something to this capitalism business.  A free market is both a first and an absolutely necessary step in seeing to our least.

None of this means we shouldn’t care about our own poor, rich though they are in the world.  They live in our neck of the woods, not the world at large.  The responsibility for seeing to the least among us is ours, first—they are our neighbors—and our government’s only last.  It’s useful to keep in mind, though, that we’re not as bad or as bad off as we’re often made out to be.

The full report can be read here.

A False Dichotomy

Posted on by
Reply

In an address near the Arc de Triomphe in Paris to mark the end of WWI, French President Emmanuel Macron made a pitch for globalism.  In the course of that, Macron let slip his true feelings.

Patriotism is the exact opposite of nationalism. Nationalism is a betrayal of it.  By saying our interests first—who cares about the others—we erase what a nation holds dearest, what gives it life, what makes it great and what is essential: its moral values.

This is a typically false dichotomy offered by a man of the Left. The situation also could be, as a man of the US has said repeatedly, “Our interests first, but not at all alone.”

Moreover, patriotism is the love of nation and the desire to preserve that which unifies the people of a geographic area into a nation—including especially that people’s moral values.  The best way to preserve those values is to protect a nation’s borders, to get immigrants—freely allowed in, so long as their entry is legal—to assimilate, to embrace the values of the nation they’re joining, rather than hold themselves apart.

There’s nothing in there that says “who cares about the others.”  There’s nothing in there that says one nation of patriotic people who believe in their own nation won’t work with or help the peoples of other nations.

Macron knows all this.