They pretend to stand for diversity and what they call marginalized groups, but in fact they stand for no more than what you see in front of you: force. If you do not do as they say, the gangs will destroy you. Gangs at Reed demonstrated they can get their way, and destroy the college, the college’s president, and the college’s ideals in the process.
If prisoners actually do have valuable information, a skilled interrogator can obtain it without harsh techniques. Skilled interrogators do not exact revenge. They do not even need to make threats.
If government tortures and threatens people, how can they tell me what not to do? If the state requires me to report you for neglect, if you do not act the way I want you to act, why should I not incorporate coercion and threats in my business model? We observe extortion, intimidation, and manipulation everywhere. Why should I not participate if I can likewise gain an advantage?
Police unions that protect reckless members, who exploit their positions of authority to commit crimes, cannot honestly think that policy protects their membership as a whole. Police officers that value integrity of their profession must move to replace union and department leaders who betray and dishonor every one of them.
The crew of the space shuttle Challenger honored us by the manner in which they lived their lives. We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and “slipped the surly bonds of earth” to “touch the face of God.”
Consider notes on three policy areas we have had on our minds recently: gun control, health care, and international trade.
“Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves.”
Wartime dishonesty and deception, however, carry potential for harm beyond any other kind of lie a political leader might tell. Fifteen years after President Bush led the United States to smash Saddam Hussein and his state, we ought to remember where he brought us.
If we crave security and freedom – security of living with people we trust, and freedom to live without interference from others – why do we not gravitate toward institutions that embody live and let live principles?
Professor MacLean teaches at Duke University. She joined Duke’s faculty in 2010, and is the William H. Chafe Professor of History and Public Policy there. I wonder if she regards herself as an empathetic person. I wonder if the people at Duke, who offered her an endowed chair when they lured her away from Northwestern, go home and ask what they could have been thinking.
Even if you do not own a gun, or do not want to acquire one, applaud Cody Wilson’s resolve and vision. He needs backing from every one of us. He understands what freedom requires. When we back Defense Distributed and its aims, we protect our own liberty, as the Second Amendment intends.
Nothing lasts to infinity. Every building has to come down sometime. It’s economical to plan for end-of-life when you build it, especially when you’re dealing with a reinforced steel frame.
