Vox Popoli

From the Washington Times: Gunmen waved their weapons in Fallujah’s streets and outside car windows yesterday, cheering what they called a victory as U.S. forces pulled back. However, the Marines insisted they weren’t going far and that a new Iraqi force taking the front line will root out die-hard insurgents. The new Fallujah Protection Army, put together by Iraqi generals from Saddam Hussein’s ousted regime, likely will include former army soldiers who fought American forces over the past month, Marine Lt. Gen. James Conway said…. Scores of Iraqis gathered in the streets, some flashing “V” for victory signs and raising the Iraqi flag. Motorists shouted, “Islam, it’s your day,” and “We redeem Islam with our blood.”

Tell me again that we can’t pull out because it would send a bad message… that message has already been sent and received. A complete pull-out would at least demonstrate that we have an understanding of what we can do – remove unsavory regimes – and what we can’t. Since any regime wants nothing more than to stay in power, we’ve already demonstrated the only thing that really matters. Unfortunately, this notion of nation-building and trying to impose democracy without conceding power to the religious extremists has already obscured that object lesson. Whatever happened to Hussein anyhow? Next thing you know, they’ll be putting him back in charge.

Czech President Vaclav Klaus greeted his country’s entry to the European Union on Saturday by warning Czechs that they risked losing sovereignty and being disillusioned in their union with western Europe. “I want to welcome both those who look forward to EU entry and those who have serious qualms. And I want to warn that they could be disillusioned,” he said in comments broadcast shortly after midnight on the private television network Nova from a fabled mountain in the center of the country. Earlier, Klaus had in Prague reiterated his view that his country would lose much of its decision-making powers to the EU. “Many of the decisions will be made in Brussels and our voice in the decision-making process will only be part of that. That will confine our sovereignty and anyone who thinks about it will see that,” he told journalists.

The European Union will be a human tragedy. I guarantee it. How long it will take, I don’t know, but the foolish people who elected to give up their sovereignty will be no more pleased to live under the rule of the Fourth Reich than they were under its predecessor. It will take a little longer for them to realize it, that’s all. If Hitler had been more clever, he would have used financial grants in the place of panzers and won a more lasting victory.

I wonder how long it will be before the grants stop and the iron hand inside the velvet glove begins to show itself. The Euro is forever, as Romano Prodi once said. I wonder, too, which state will be the first to attempt, unsuccessfully, to leave.

The reaction of various female columnists and bloggers to the latest reality show, The Swan, is really funny. First, the notion that women are significantly affected by media images is a complete load of nonsense. They may be emotionally affected – as in jealous – but this pernicious media bombardment still hasn’t prevented them from getting fatter than ever before in all of human history. Terms like “morally offensive” and “harmful” are thrown around with abandon, demonstrating that there is no televised sin, be it murder, blasphemy or adultery, so grave as a woman making her sisters look bad by comparison. There’s a reason, after all, why little butterballs get off on telling each other that they are really looking too skinny.

Sure, surgery can be dangerous, as is being overweight. But it seems that many women would prefer to get up in arms about a television show helping women look the way they want than the fact that the percentage of obese women aged 20-34 has increased from 18.5 to 25.8 percent in the last six years. And 63.6 percent of the 35-44 crowd is overweight. And yet, we only hear warnings of that devil D-cup.

Another complaint is that men don’t value women for their careers, education and intellect. Well, tough. Who are you to tell us what we should value? Unless I’m planning to sponge off a woman and let her pay the bills, why would I care what she does for a living? I spoke with a 30-something architect who has had trouble finding dates, and she was horrified when I told her that perhaps 5 percent of the men out there would consider her education and employment to be a significant relationship asset. She’s a smart girl, but had never stopped to think about what men actually like in a woman for ten seconds.

Seriously, look at the facts. Men like pretty girls. Men like women who smile, not lecture. There has never, in the entire history of magazine publishing, been a men’s magazine dedicated to women’s resumes and test scores. Think maybe there’s a reason for that? Because we don’t care! Intelligence isn’t a negative – Space Bunny could argue rings around half the people who email me – but it’s generally not an attribute any man would place in his top five. What attributes are most important? It varies of course, but this list is probably fairly common:

1. Pretty face

2. Nice body

3. Pleasant demeanor

4. Sexual compatibility

5. Sense of proportion

6. Sense of humor

7. Intelligence

Notice that there’s nothing about money, careers or any of that sort of thing on the list. Religious guys will probably have religious compatibility somewhere in the top three, but almost never at #1. Sure, there’s the occasional John Kerry who rates financial assets above all, but that doesn’t hasn’t entered into most men’s thinking since the days of Middlemarch. Men, feel free to correct me if I’m wrong, but be honest about your priorities. Save the PC sensitive New Age male stuff for the office.

Macedonian police gunned down seven innocent immigrants, then claimed they were terrorists, in a killing staged to impress the United States, authorities said Friday. Speaking after a two-year investigation, a police spokeswoman, Mirjana Konteska told reporters that six people, including three former police commanders, two special police officers and a businessman, have been charged by police with murder…. Konteska said the killings were an attempt to “present themselves as participants in the war against terrorism and demonstrate Macedonia’s commitment to the war on terror.”

Since breaking away from Yugoslavia in 1991, Macedonia has been eager to win U.S. political and economic support in its search for acceptance into the Western camp of nations. It took Washington’s side against traditional U.S. allies in supporting the ousting of Saddam Hussein and now has troops with the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq.

Blame Derbyshire. Reading the poem in light of yesterday’s conversation just caused the title to leap out at me. With deepest apologies to Mr. Yeats:

I WILL arise and go now, and go to Innesmouth

And a small altar build there, of clay and fishbones made;

Nine dread nights will I have there, enshrouded in darkling myth,

And live alone in the lurking shade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes creeping slow,

Swelling in the veils of the black tide I hear the chittering;

There midnight’s all a glimmer, and dawn an eerie glow,

And evening full as the deep ones sing.

I will arise and go now, for always night is day

I hear the Shoggoth calling with vile sounds by the shore

While I stand by the mirror, my face a pallid gray,

I hear it in my cold heart’s core.

Joan Veon writes on WND: At the Millennium Summit in 2000, the United Nations presented the world’s 189 kings, princes, prime ministers and presidents a list of global needs. They include by 2015: reducing poverty and hunger by 50 percent, ensuring that children everywhere are able to complete a full course of primary schooling, reducing by 66 percent child mortality, halting and reversing HIV-AIDS, malaria and other major diseases and improving the lives of 100 million slum dwellers … among others. Notice this is not a country-by-country goal – which would reflect the idea of national sovereignty – but reflects a world united and governed through a universal political body called the United Nations. These goals have also been adopted by all of the extended U.N. family: the International Monetary Fund-World Bank, the World Health Organization, UNESCO, etc., as well as the Group of Eight heads of state. Many leading multinational and transnational corporations have also adopted these goals.

Interesting goals for what people dismiss as a debating society. I have said this many times: the United Nations is the most dangerous threat that mankind has ever known. Once it has tax revenues and a military, it will be a matter of seconds until the Maos, Lenins and Saloth Sars begin competing to seize the reins of power. The most ruthless of them will win. Contemplate, if you will, just what that sort of social engineering psychopath is likely to do with that sort of power and global reach.

A full course of primary schooling. Somehow, I suspect homeschooling won’t be smiled upon.

VDH writes:We are presently engaged in a world war for our civilization and its vision of a just and humane society. Our values will either endure this present struggle and indeed be invigorated by the ordeal, or like once great civilizations of the past we will stumble in the face of barbarism and lose all that we hold dear…. Americans believe that freedom and consensual government — far from being the exclusive domain of the West — are ideals central to the human condition and the shared aspirations of all born into this world.

This is some pretty serious hyperbole. There is a world war being waged against us, but losing to the global jihad will take decades, if not a century or more. In the meantime – and partially under the aegis of the war on method – we are losing what little we have not already lost of our civilization’s vision of a just and human society. The twin devils of bureaucratic centralization and cultural secularization have destroyed most of what made the West Western; if the global jihad ultimately triumphs it will be the equivalent of Alaric’s Vandals sacking a long-tottering Rome.

The jihad does offer an opportunity to throw off feckless secularism, but the response of the nation’s leadership has made it clear that a restoration of freedom is not in the cards. Quite the opposite would seem to be the case. Our corruption is systemic.

I just wanted to say “thanks!” to all of you who made donations to Spirit of America this week. We raised $50,000 from the blogosphere! You people ROCK!!!!

Holy cow! That’s impressive. Reflecting back on last week’s column, I wonder how much of the $1.5 million raised came from individuals in the ABCNNBCBS community? Blackfive also has this reminder that there are no atheists in foxholes.

Fred Reed writes: The Bell Curve, an excellent book more maligned than read, pointed out a trend seldom noticed. The authors called it “cognitive stratification,” not a phrase Byron would have chosen but serviceable enough. It means the concentration of the intelligent. In 1850 people of high intelligence were dispersed through the population. If the child of a cowboy had an IQ of 160, he would probably remain in the geographical region with cowboys. He might be more successful than most, and might choose as friends the quicker wits thereabouts. Yet he would be part of the community…. In 1850 there were few jobs requiring the very bright. Today they abound. Universities began to scour the country for the highly intelligent. These, once found, met each other at elite universities or, later, in the places where the bright concentrated to work: Laboratories, software houses, hospitals, magazine journalism, and occasionally law firms. They married each other. Their children tended to be bright. The result has been that the bright tend to live, play, work, and sleep almost entirely with each other.

It is true that the bright and educated are almost shockingly insulated. I once had an argument with a woman who insisted that everyone went to college – she defied me to name one person in our social circle who hadn’t. I couldn’t do that, so I was forced to make do with demonstrating that around 50 percent of the populace goes to college at all, and a significant percentage of those who do never graduate. My father used to get on my case for being contemptuous of other people’s intelligence, but he finally stopped when I illustrated how many of my problems in the corporate world stemmed directly from overestimating others. Contempt may not be nice, but it is nevertheless wise to temper your expectations of the capabilities of others on whom you are relying.

The most significant thing in this regard has little to do with intelligence. Possibly the great lie of the last 250 years is that man is rational. Our market theories depend on it, often our business activities postulate it, and it simply isn’t true. Man is inherently irrational, and this is supported day in and day out by watching the actions and decisions of those around you. Much of the time, intelligence simply helps one do a more convicing job of rationalizing one’s stupid decision to follow one’s desires.

From the Mises Institute: The revolutionary government first decided to cure the evils generated by inflation with more inflation. Instead of destroying assignats received for the national properties, they reissued them in the form of smaller notes. In June 1791, they issued another 600 million assignats (the previous promise not to issue more was conveniently and predictably forgotten), and in December an additional 300 million. By the end of the year, its market value had fallen to 66 percent of its face value. In 1792, they issued 600 million more. In April of the same year, they confiscated the estates of the émigrés (those who fled France to avoid being arrested or murdered) and added them to the national properties.

Then came 1793 Year One; the year of la Terreur. Having tried inflation and legal coercion, they would try terrorizing the population into accepting the plunging assignat at par, and producing and selling at a patriotic loss. In March, the National Convention created the Orwellian-named Committee of Public Safety (another unfortunate American precedent), which was a kind of committee of terror, dedicated to expropriating and murdering those deemed to be “traitors” to France or enemies of la Revolution. In May, they passed le Maximum, imposing price ceilings on grain. It worsened the grain shortage. In June, they passed the Forced Loan, a progressive income tax, whose progressivity was progressively lowered to reach more and more citizens. They also passed increasingly draconian and deadly laws designed to force people to accept the assignats at par and forbidding them from exchanging them for anything less than their face value. In July, the Convention repudiated the first issue of interest-bearing assignats. In August, trading (i.e. buying or selling) specie [gold] was prohibited. In September, the Convention passed the General Maximum, extending price ceilings to all foodstuffs, as well as firewood, coal, and other essentials. In that month, despite the deadly coercion, the assignat fell to 30 percent against gold. During 1793, the Convention issued 1,200 million assignats; in 1794, 3,000 million. Next came the deluge. In 1795, 33,000 million were printed, and in October, when a new government the Directory assumed power, the assignats’ purchasing power had fallen to almost nothing. On the black market, 600 francs of assignats traded for one gold franc.

The Directory was done with the assignat, but it was not done with inflation. In February 1796, it issued a new paper currency, the mandat, and made it exchangeable for assignats at the rate of 30 to 1. By August, after 2,500 million had been issued, the mandat had fallen to three percent of its face value. In 1796, the Directory had had enough, finally, and it withdrew the legal tender character of both the assignat and the mandat. Thereupon, their remaining meager exchangeable value disappeared altogether.

Interesting how modern it all sounds, doesn’t it. Fiat money and socialism have gone hand-in-hand longer than socialism has been a recognizable philosophy. Not that one can blame socialism for inflation, as it’s been around since the first king decided to spend a few extra denari by issuing adulterated coins. If Prechter is not correct, and we are NOT heading for a deflationary Great Depression, we may be unfortunate enough to see what happens if the Fed tries to inflate us out from underneath the mountain of debt hanging overhead. At least our monetary masters have been more circumspect. It’s taken us 70 years for our dollar to lose 95 percent of its value; the French Directory managed to completely destroy the assignat in five.