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Evaluating Sarah Palin’s speech in Hong Kong

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Sarah Palin giving a speech on economic policy
Sarah Palin giving a speech on economic policy

Story from the Wall Street Journal. (H/T Caffeinated Thoughts, Muddling Towards Maturity)

Let’s take a look at her speech.

Somebody has been reading Thomas Sowell’s book “A Conflict of Visions”, in which he talks about “the constrained vision” and “the unconstrained vision”.

We don’t believe that human nature is perfectible; we’re suspicious of government efforts to fix problems because often what it’s trying to fix is human nature, and that is impossible. It is what it is.

Here’s her defense of the free market.

Lack of government wasn’t the problem. Government policies were the problem. The marketplace didn’t fail. It became exactly as common sense would expect it to. The government ordered the loosening of lending standards. The Federal Reserve kept interest rates low. The government forced lending institutions to give loans to people who, as I say, couldn’t afford them. Speculators spotted new investment vehicles, jumped on board and rating agencies underestimated risks.

The speech also discusses cap-and-trade, free trade, and more.

Critical acclaim

Caffeinated Thoughts did a great job of linking some of the reactions from the left.

The New York Times:

A number of people who heard the speech in a packed hotel ballroom, which was closed to the media, said Mrs. Palin spoke from notes for 90 minutes and that she was articulate, well-prepared and even compelling.

“The speech was wide-ranging, very balanced, and she beat all expectations,” said Doug A. Coulter, head of private equity in the Asia-Pacific region for LGT Capital Partners…

[…]Mr. Goodé, a New Yorker who said he would never vote for Mrs. Palin, said she acquitted herself well.

“They really prepared her well,” he said. “She was articulate and she held her own. I give her credit. They’ve tried to categorize her as not being bright. She’s bright.”

My view? I say that Thomas Sowell prepared her. She probably ordered all his books from Amazon.com. Then she read them all at the kitchen table, with her glasses on and a laptop in front of her for her notes.

I am becoming more and more comfortable with her as a solid advocate for my point of view.

Check out her Facebook page where she’s been writing lately.

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Polemics

Religious pluralism and moral relativism are self-refuting

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Check out this post from Neil Simpson’s blog.

Neil writes:

Self-refuting: [Religious pluralists] claim that other paths to God are valid, but they specifically exclude Christians who think Jesus is the only way.  But if all these paths are valid, why isn’t orthodox Christianity?  And if orthodox Christianity is valid, then these other paths are not.  Also, the definitions of “God” in these religions are mutually exclusive.

Pluralists simply don’t understand or apply the logical law of non-contradiction: You can’t have a personal God (Christianity) and an impersonal God (Islam) at the same time, or be saved by faith in Christ alone (Christianity) and by good deeds (everybody else), die once and face judgment (Christianity and Islam) and be reincarnated (Hinduism), Jesus dies on a cross (Christianity) and Jesus does not die on a cross (Islam), etc.

In the same post, he also explains why religious pluralism actually an arrogant and hypocritical point of view, not a tolerant one!

Now, check out this post from Pugnacious Irishman.

Rich explains how to do defeat moral relativism without even saying a word. You better learn how to do it, because the majority of the people you meet today believe in moral relativism. Rich knows – he’s a school teacher and this is the ethical theory that all the young people subscribe to.

My thoughts

This sort of weak tolerance of all viewpoints and moralities doesn’t cut any ice with open-minded atheists and skeptics. They like to discuss arguments and evidence. The best atheists and agnostics are guided by reason and evidence, so they are not offended by your exclusive views. On the contrary: the fact that you hold to unpopular, divisive views appears to them as courageous and authentic. Remember, Anthony Flew was an atheist once. Sure, most atheists are guided by untested assumptions and selfishness, but some of them can be reasoned with.

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Polemics

MUST-READ: Should women be accountable for their own decisions?

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Laura of Pursuing Holiness writes the most amazing post ever written. (H/T ECM)

Here is her thesis:

We’ve come to this weird place in our history where women become babies instead of have them.  It’s all about choices – but not about consequences.  Rights, but not responsibilities.

You MUST read the whole thing.

She links to a number of articles to make each of her points. And her post is cross-posted at Hot Air, so she is participating in the comments as well.

False accusations

I noticed that Peter Sean Bradley had a related post up earlier this week about false rape accusations.

Excerpt:

A study of rape allegations in Indiana over a nine-year period revealed that over 40% were shown to be false — not merely unproven. According to the author, “These false allegations appear to serve three major functions for the complainants: providing an alibi, seeking revenge, and obtaining sympathy and attention. False rape allegations are not the consequence of a gender-linked aberration, as frequently claimed, but reflect impulsive and desperate efforts to cope with personal and social stress situations.”
(Kanin EJ. Arch Sex Behav. 1994 Feb;23(1):81-92 False rape allegations.)

This is actually done all the time in divorce courts in order to get custody of the children, and the child support payments that go with having custody.

Excerpt:

Yet patently false accusations of both child abuse and domestic violence are rampant in divorce courts, almost always for purposes of breaking up families, securing child custody, and eliminating fathers. “With child abuse and spouse abuse you don’t have to prove anything,” the leader of a legal seminar tells divorcing mothers, according to the Chicago Tribune. “You just have to accuse.”

Among scholars and legal practitioners it is common knowledge that patently trumped-up accusations are routinely used, and virtually never punished, in divorce and custody proceedings. Elaine Epstein, president of the Massachusetts Women’s Bar Association, writes that “allegations of abuse are now used for tactical advantage” in custody cases. The Illinois Bar Journal describes how abuse accusations readily “become part of the gamesmanship of divorce.” The UMKC Law Review reports on a survey of judges and attorneys revealing that disregard for due process and allegations of domestic violence are used as a “litigation strategy.” In the Yale Law Review, Jeannie Suk calls domestic violence accusations a system of “state-imposed de facto divorce” and documents how courts use unsupported accusations to justify evicting Americans from their homes and children.

Also, consider the Teacher’s College professor who committed a hate crime against herself. She may have done this in order to get sympathy from those who were investigating her for plagiarism. Notice in the linked article that when she is accused of plagiarism, she blames the racism and sexism of her accusers! She is the victim, and her accusers are the oppressors.

UPDATE: From commenter James:

A UK newspaper recently presented that a great many women have *never* had sober sex.

Mike Adams recently wrote an article about a professor who has gotten in trouble for presenting peer reviewed papers which were topically relevant to students in class… trouble because they didn’t support the feminist line.

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