As I write this it is just beginning to be the 4th of July in the United States now, though its been 4th July for some time here in New Zealand. The 4th of July is, of course, Independence Day. Typically in New Zealand, those members of the secular blogosphere, who consider themselves to be [...]
Entries Tagged as 'International Politics'
September 11
September 11th, 2009 15 Comments
Today I reflect, as do many, where I was and what I was doing when I first heard about the attacks on the World Trade Tower. Like my parents generation’s remembrance of where they were and what they were doing when Kennedy was assassinated and their parents remembrance of the news of V-Day this was [...]
Senator Jim Demint on the Proposed Hate Crimes Amendment
July 18th, 2009 16 Comments
Wintery Knight has posted the video below from a debate of Senator Jim Demint speaking on the proposed hate crimes amendment currently before the US Senate. I do not agree with all of the Senator’s arguments; the Senator seems to oppose the idea that some crimes or assaults are worse than others; however, having distinctions [...]
Tags: Hate Crimes
Bush’s Legacy
January 16th, 2009 42 Comments
I am always slightly disturbed when I encounter Bush-haters amongst my friends. Disturbed not because it surprises me that Bush-hater exist but because my friends are otherwise smart, informed, thinking people who have a healthy degree of scepticism towards the left-wing, anti-conservative values of the media and hollywood; I just don’t get how they can [...]
Tags: George Bush · Iraq · US Politics · War Ethics
More on Iraq and the Just War Theory
October 11th, 2007 11 Comments
A little while ago I posted up some thoughts I had about the war in Iraq. These thoughts did not come in a vacuum. At the time of the invasion I read several books on the morality of war. At the time of compiling this article had just read James Turner Johnson’s works on the [...]
Tags: George Bush · Iraq · Saddam Hussein · US Politics · War Ethics
Dixie Chicks, Free Speech and the Flat Earth Society
February 13th, 2007 No Comments
One irritating feature of the contemporary media is the credence they give to the views of celebrities. There is often a kind of unwritten assumption that because a person is a good actor or singer, his or her views on politics, morality and ethics somehow carry more weight.Case in point is the enthusiastic reporting of [...]
Tags: Bad Reasoning · Dixie Chicks · Freedom of Speech · George Bush · Historical Ignorance · Iraq
Internationalism is Dead: Boneparte’s Descendants
March 24th, 2011 13 Comments
OK, so we thought that you would want to hear it here first. Internationalism–the idea that nation states are subject to a higher “sovereignty”– is dead. The corpse is rotting. The Libyan “adventure”, called for by the UN, is growing madder than a March Hare. All the problems and faults of internationalism are now clearly [...]
Tags: International Politics · Internationalism · Libya · Muammar Gaddafi · Napoleon Boneparte · United Nations