The Objective Standard Blog

The Objective Standard Blog: September 2009

Raymond C. Niles on 'The Big Biz Show' by TOS Admin
John David Lewis on 'The Big Biz Show' by TOS Admin
Rationally Selfish Radio with Dr. Diana Hsieh by Craig Biddle
John David Lewis on Scoreboard by TOS Admin
The Fall Issue of TOS by Craig Biddle
Our Self-Crippled Warby Elan Journo by ARC Media
Four Important Articles for this God-Awful Date by Craig Biddle
Yaron Brook Interviewed by Larry Greenfield by Craig Biddle

Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Raymond C. Niles on 'The Big Biz Show'

Posted by TOS Admin at 7:35 AM

Ray Niles will be on “The Big Biz Show” with Bob “Sully” Sullivan & Russ “T” Nailz, discussing his article “Property Rights and the Crisis of the Electric Grid,” on Wednesday, Sept 30, at 2:40 p.m. Pacific Time. The show can be heard live online from 1 to 3 p.m. Pacific Time at www.businesstalkradio.net (click on “Listen Live”).

Labels: Announcements, Business and Economics, Events, Individual Rights and Law

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

John David Lewis on 'The Big Biz Show'

Posted by TOS Admin at 7:35 PM

John David Lewis will be on “The Big Biz Show” with Bob “Sully” Sullivan & Russ “T” Nailz, on Wednesday, October 7, at 2:40 p.m. Pacific Time. The show can be heard live online from 1 to 3 p.m. Pacific Time at www.businesstalkradio.net (click on “Listen Live”).

Labels: Announcements, Events

Sunday, September 27, 2009

Rationally Selfish Radio with Dr. Diana Hsieh

Posted by Craig Biddle at 1:08 PM

I’d like to recommend a new podcast program called Rationally Selfish Radio, hosted by Dr. Diana Hsieh. Dr. Hsieh posts two podcasts per week, discussing a broad spectrum of topics—from how an introvert can meet people, to the conditions under which a person can morally accept an inheritance, to the essential factors in choosing a career, to the nature and status of cosmological arguments for the existence of God. She has also interviewed me (on the subject of sacrifice vs. liberty) and plans to interview other writers and intellectuals in the future.

In the nine episodes to date, Dr. Hsieh has consistently zeroed in on the principles pertaining to the subjects at hand; she has applied them with precision and with clarifying examples; and she has done so in an entertaining and easy-to-follow manner. (Don’t be thrown by her slow talking in episode #1; she picks it up in subsequent shows.) I highly recommend Rationally Selfish Radio to anyone interested in the application of sound philosophy to good living. Click on, tune in, live well!

Labels: Announcements, Philosophy, Religion

Friday, September 18, 2009

John David Lewis on Scoreboard

Posted by TOS Admin at 4:23 PM

On Thursday, September 24, at 7:00 PM (EST) Dr. Lewis will appear on Scoreboard with David Asman (Fox Business News) to discuss why there is no ‘right’ to health care.

Labels: Announcements, Events, Healthcare

Monday, September 14, 2009

The Fall Issue of TOS

Posted by Craig Biddle at 3:54 PM

The print edition of the Fall issue is at press and will be mailed shortly; the online version will be accessible to subscribers beginning September 20. For promotional purposes, we are making both John David Lewis’s article “Obama’s Atomic Bomb: The Ideological Clarity of the Democratic Agenda” and Paul Hsieh’s article “How the Freedom to Contract Protects Insurability” available on our website early and for free.

The contents of the Fall issue are:

From the Editor

Letters and Replies

ARTICLES
Obama’s Atomic Bomb: The Ideological Clarity of the Democratic Agenda
by John David Lewis

America’s Self-Crippled Foreign Policy: An Interview with Yaron Brook, Elan Journo, and Alex Epstein

An Unwinnable War?
by Elan Journo

The Creed of Sacrifice vs. The Land of Liberty
by Craig Biddle

The Rise of American Big Government: A Brief History of How We Got Here
by Michael Dahlen

How the Freedom to Contract Protects Insurability
by Paul Hsieh

How Morality is Grounded in Reality
by Craig Biddle

BOOKS REVIEWED
Objectively Speaking: Ayn Rand Interviewed edited by Marlene Podritske and Peter Schwartz
Reviewed by Dina Schein Federman

The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life by Alice Schroeder
Reviewed by Daniel Wahl

Fred Astaire by Joseph Epstein
Reviewed by Scott Holleran

The Garden of Invention: Luther Burbank and the Business of Breeding Plants by Jane S. Smith
Reviewed by Daniel Wahl

If you have not yet subscribed to TOS, why not subscribe today? You can do so online or by calling 800-423-6151.

Labels: Announcements, Ayn Rand and Objectivism, Business and Economics, Foreign Policy and War, Healthcare, History, Individual Rights and Law, Philosophy, Religion, Science and Technology

Friday, September 11, 2009

Our Self-Crippled Warby Elan Journo

Posted by ARC Media at 5:12 PM

Watching video of the Twin Towers imploding, we all felt horror and outrage. We expected our government to fight back—to protect us from the enemy that attacked us on 9/11. We knew it must, and could, be done. Fighting all-out after Pearl Harbor, we had defeated the colossal naval and air forces of Japan. But eight years later—twice as long as it took to smash Japanese imperialism—what has Washington’s military response to 9/11 achieved?

The enemy that struck us—properly identified not as “terrorism” but rather the jihadist movement seeking to impose Islamic law worldwide—is not merely undefeated, but resurgent.

Islamist factions in Pakistan fight to conquer that country and seize its nuclear weapons. The movement’s inspiration and standard-bearer, the Islamic Republic of Iran, remains the leading sponsor of terrorism, and may soon acquire its own nuclear weapons.

Then there’s the Afghanistan debacle. Eight years ago, practically everyone agreed we must (and could) eliminate the Taliban and its jihadist allies—a primitively equipped force thousands of times less powerful than Imperial Japan. Now that goal seems unreachable.

Today swaggering holy warriors control large areas of the country. They summarily execute anyone deemed un-Islamic, and operate a shadow government with its own religious law courts and “virtue” enforcers. Last year the CIA warned that virtually every major terrorist threat the agency was aware of threaded back to the tribal areas near the Taliban-infested Afghan-Pakistan border.

Why have we been so unsuccessful?

No, the problem is not a shortage of troops, nor is the remedy another Iraq-like “surge.” That sham, appeasing solution entails not quelling the insurgency, but paying tens of thousands of dollars to insurgents not to fight us, for as long as the money flows. And it means leaving Iraq in the hands of leaders far more committed to jihadists than Hussein. No, the crucial problem is the inverted war policy governing U.S. forces on the battlefield.

Defeating the Islamist threat demanded that we fight to crush the jihadists. Victory demanded we recognize the unwelcome necessity of civilian casualties and place blame for them at the hands of the aggressor (as we were more willing to do in World War II). Victory demanded allowing our unmatched military to do its job--without qualification. Instead, our leaders waged a “compassionate” war.

Before the Afghan war began, Washington defined lengthy “no-strike” lists including cultural sites, electrical plants--a host of legitimate strategic targets ruled untouchable—for fear of affronting or harming civilians. Meanwhile, we sent C-17 cargo planes to drop 500,000-odd Islam-compliant food packets to feed starving Afghans and, inevitably, jihadists.

Many Islamists survived, regrouped and staged a fierce comeback.

The no-strike lists lengthened. So, necessary bombing raids are now often canceled, sacrificing the opportunity to kill Islamist fighters. Jihadists exploit this to their advantage. Lt. Gen. Gary L. North tried to justify the policy to a reporter: “Eventually, we will get to the point where we can achieve—within the constraints of which we operate, which by the way the enemy does not operate under—and we will get them.”

“Eventually”—for another eight years?

In Washington’s “compassionate” war, we give the enemy every advantage--and then compel our soldiers to fight with their hands tied . . . ever tighter.

Naturally, U.S. deaths have soared. More Americans died in the first eight months of this year (182) than in all of last year--the bloodiest year of the war, up till now.

If Afghanistan now seems unwinnable, blame Bush and Obama. Bush crusaded not to destroy the Taliban but to bring Afghans elections and reconstruction. Obama’s “new” tack is to insist we spend billions more on nation-building and bend over backwards to safeguard the local population. Both take for granted the allegedly moral imperative of putting the lives and welfare of Afghans first--ahead of defeating the enemy to protect Americans.

This imperative lies behind Washington’s self-crippled war—a war which could have worked to deter other jihadists and their state-sponsors, but instead encourages them to attempt further attacks.

How many more Americans must die before we challenge this conception of a proper war?

Labels: Foreign Policy and War