April 16, 2012

The Democrats' Biggest Lie

There are white lies.  There are ordinary lies.  There are big lies.  And then there are lies that are so huge that it is difficult for a rational person to believe that such a lie has been attempted.  The left's talking points ab...

April 5, 2012

Savage New Territory: Trickle Down Tyranny

In the "Acknowledgments" at the end of his new book Trickle Down Tyranny, Michael Savage states that this book is his "most seminal work."  Since "seminal" means, "strongly influencing later events," Savage is offering a prediction about -- not ...

March 1, 2012

Socialism without Guns

As their economic orgy fades to its inevitable end, the people of Greece find themselves in a country that resembles more of a debtor's prison than a representative democracy. The Greeks have sold their freedom for a mess of pottage. If the United St...

February 21, 2012

Taking Socialism Seriously

In a master/slave world there is no right or wrong.  There are the strong and the weak (the rich and the poor). Socialism sees the world through the prism of master/slave.  From this vantage point "truth" is synonymous with "power."  S...

January 20, 2012

Venture Capitalism not Crony Capitalism

Venture capitalism is, and always has been, the heart of capitalism. There is nothing "new" or modern about it.1 Venture capitalism is one or more private investors financing a risky new venture (thus, the "venture" in venture capitalism) -- or a pri...

January 18, 2012

Newt is right. Obama is the food stamp president.

My home state of Idaho just broke a record. Of her 1.5 million residents, 235,000 are on food stamps. The tab is $30 million a month. That's $360 million a year. This means that every person in Idaho must somehow come up with $240 a year -- just to p...

December 24, 2011

Yes, Virginia, Obama Is Santa Claus

In September of 1897, an eight-year-old girl wrote a letter to the editor of the New York Sun.  The girl wanted to know if there was a Santa Claus.  The letter and the editorial response from Francis Pharcellus Church have become a Christma...

December 8, 2011

The Milgram Economy

In the early 1960s, an infamous series of psychological experiments was conducted at Yale.  The tests are now known as the "Milgram Experiments."  The tests were an attempt to determine if person X, who is in a position with power over and ...

November 27, 2011

Our Accidental Top Dog

A few weeks ago, our Irish Water Spaniel was just another young dog.  Now he is one of the top Irish Water Spaniels (IWS) in the world.  Here's how it happened. The universe of show dogs is huge.  The IWS portion of that universe is ti...

November 3, 2011

A Question for the GOP Presidential Candidates

Here's a question we need answered by the GOP candidates. "What are you going to do about global warming?" I know. I know. It's now "climate change." And, yes, the Climate Research Unit's (CRU) hockey stick graph has been pulled from the IPCC reports...

November 1, 2011

Generation Null

Move over, Generations Y and X -- make room, at least in Zuccotti Park, for Generation Null.  This is the generation whose ignorance passes for knowledge; these are the protesters whose selfishness is thinly disguised as sincerity.  This is...

October 4, 2011

Waiting for a Wise Man

Human beings have an abstruse and potentially dangerous impulse.  We yearn to be led by a wise man.  The human desire for an enlightened ruler -- whether that leader is spiritual and/or secular -- is ancient; it is widely shared; and it is ...

January 24, 2011

Death by Deconstructionism

The talking heads continue to yap about the source of the savagery driving Jared Lee Loughner.  Many on the left have tried, and failed, to pin the blame for the Tucson massacre on the Tea Parties or, just as ridiculous, on Sarah Palin.  Me...

January 7, 2011

Three Gifts from the Tea Parties

America's middle class did the hard work and (finally) flexed its political muscle in last year's elections.  But the grueling truth for the Tea Parties is that the real drudgery lies ahead.The Tea Parties have given America three precious gifts...

December 21, 2010

Obama's Problem as 'The Smartest Person in the Room'

Since Obama first stepped on the national stage, pundits have fallen all over each other in a race to declare that Obama is special type of genius.  Tom Shales of the WaPo recently called Obama "the smartest kid in the class."  Bi...

December 16, 2010

Middle-Class Hypocrites

The most dangerous of hypocrites come from the middle class.  These are the middle-class "intellectuals" who openly despise other members of the bourgeoisie.  They are ubiquitous in academia, the arts, and in much of the mainstrea...

December 2, 2010

The Bourgeoisie, Egalitarianism, and the Death of Culture

Three crucial points underlie our crisis of culture in the Western world:1) There is no culture, at least as we know it in the West, without the bourgeoisie.2) The notion of egalitarianism, which in the last few hundred years has come to dominate our...

October 14, 2010

Three Things Government Cannot Do

"Government" is an abstract and amorphous word. It means nothing until it is put into some frame of reference (state government, municipal government, central government, etc.). The addition of these adjectives merely narrows the sphere of ...

October 12, 2010

It's Okay on Nickelodeon for Girls to Beat Up Boys

My almost seven-year-old granddaughter spent the weekend at our home. I had the grandfatherly privilege of watching what, when I was a kid, were the Saturday morning cartoons with her. I had not seen a weekend kids' cartoon for years. I relented -- J...

September 26, 2010

The Quietus of Reason

We live in a linguistic Wonderland. Most of us are aware that words have meanings. Too many of us have lost track of the fact that if we don't use words properly, or (as in a famous Monty Python skit) at least get "them in the right order,"...

September 13, 2010

Economic Lunacy

I know logical lunacy when I see it. I may not be an economist, but as one trained in logic as a philosopher, I have been horrified by the recent economic policies of both Presidents G.W. Bush and B.H. Obama. Let's start with Bush and the first TARP ...

September 7, 2010

Realism and Revival?

America's cultural crisis has both material and spiritual causes. Glenn Beck's Restoring Honor rally in our capital city was an attempt to address both the material and spiritual issues on what is essentially a political level. Can spiritual problems...

August 26, 2010

We've Made a Deal: America Picks Door Number 2

In the next few years, one of two doors will open in America. Door Number 1: Progressive thought will be proven correct. America's economy will bounce back, and we will become a semi-socialist, politically correct paradise -- much like the European U...

August 12, 2010

Manufacturing Liberals

Liberals are not insane, as many conservatives believe. Most liberals (I am not speaking here of the political or intellectual class) are ordinary human beings pursuing everyday human lives -- just like the rest of us. Here is a brief summary of why ...

August 1, 2010

Conservatism's Double Dilemmas

"Dilemma" is a technical term -- easily misunderstood and often misused. The English word "dilemma" comes from the ancient Greek δί-λημμα. "Di" means "twice" or "double,"...

June 20, 2010

Happy Father's Day! (For now): A Cautionary Tale

Just before noon, a week ago Friday, my father had a heart attack. My mom tried to call the local Veteran's Administration clinic to get him treated. My dad is a vet who proudly served in the Marine Corps. As luck (and the federal bureaucracy) would ...

June 15, 2010

Some Advice for the Tea Party: Take Your Time and Learn from Your Mistakes

The results of the primary elections (from the perspective of the Tea Party folks) have been mixed. While there have been a few upsets of incumbents, the good old boys and the GOP establishment's anointed have been doing fairly well[i].That is to be ...

April 6, 2010

The Perfect Constitutional Storm

Much has been made of several states suing the federal government over the passage of ObamaCare. The argument is, essentially, that the new law violates the 10th Amendment and infringes on the "commerce clause" of the Constitution. In this ...

April 1, 2010

The Abolition of the Family

America is headed down an extremely dangerous path to a potential catastrophe that is rarely discussed. It is the eradication of the family. Abolition of the family! ... The bourgeois family will disappear, in the course [of history] as its supplemen...

March 14, 2010

Logical Positivism and the IPCC: 'The Best-Laid Schemes...'

There has never been a scientific scam in the history of mankind as big as the science swindle of "climate change." Nothing comes close. Modern scientific hustles like mesmerism, phrenology, eugenics, the Piltdown man, and even Lysenkoism, ...

March 4, 2010

The Pathetic God of Environmentalism

Writing, or trying to write, about God is usually a bad idea. Either there is a God or there is not. If there is no God, then there is nothing to write about. (Sorry, atheists -- but if you are right and God does not exist, then why bother spending s...

February 11, 2010

The Rise and Fall of Frank Church: A Lesson for Conservatives

[Editor's note: hear Larrey Anderson interviewed about this article here.]Idaho's Democrat Senator Frank Church[i] was one of my heroes when I was in high school. Church wrote a letter of recommendation for me to Harvard and offered to nominate me to...

February 7, 2010

Populist Constitutionalism and the Tea Party

The Tea Party is a unique populist movement and moment in American history. There is no charismatic leader of the party. The Tea Party has more grassroots movers, shakers, and members than any other populist movement ever seen in our country. So what...

January 14, 2010

Some Advice for the Republican National Committee

As a retired state senator, I have been in and out of politics most of my adult life. As a result, I have come to know, and have remained acquainted with, some fairly prominent members of the GOP and, in particular, the RNC. Because I have seen the i...

December 14, 2009

We Are in Big Trouble

Our country is in big trouble...huge trouble. It is time for Americans to take a hard look at our values, our conception of justice, and our standards for truth. This piece is intended as a first step in that direction.1) ValuesThe story of Tiger Woo...

December 9, 2009

Revenge of the Computer Nerds

It is fascinating to watch the mainstream media in America duck (and/or make excuses for) the greatest scam in modern history: the "science" behind man-made global warming. Even more entertaining, and far more enlightening, is to follow the...

November 29, 2009

The Feminine Mistake

The philosophical basis of Hegelian/Marxist philosophy is not only antithetical to the family, but irreconcilable with the rights of women everywhere. The philosophy is at its core misogynist. Hitching the feminist wagon to Marxism was and is the fem...

November 25, 2009

A Progressive Constitution

I don't begrudge the progressive left its political power. They won. They are far from ashamed to say it, and I am not afraid to admit it. What I do mind is the left's obvious neglect and disregard for the Constitution as it is written.If the left is...

November 16, 2009

The Principle of the Excluded Moderate

One of the three basic rules of Aristotelian logic is called the "principle of the excluded middle." In, Latin the rule is called "tertium non datur," which roughly translates into English as "no third option"[i]. This l...

November 8, 2009

Constitutional Chess

Since the passage of the "Judiciary Reorganization Bill of 1937" (and the attempted "packing" of the Supreme Court by FDR), the rules of interpreting the Constitution have been rigged to support a progressive ideology. The Constit...

November 2, 2009

No Health Care in the Constitution

Nancy Pelosi was recently asked by a reporter, ""Madam Speaker, where specifically does the Constitution grant Congress the authority to enact an individual health insurance mandate?"She replied, "Are you serious? Are you serious?...

October 18, 2009

What is Equality?

President Obama recently spoke to the Human Rights Campaign about "equality."  Here is how he began his speech:Thank you so much, all of you. It is a privilege to be here tonight to open for Lady GaGa. I've made it.  (Laughter.) I...

September 3, 2009

The Science of Global Warming: Saving the World or Hunting for Ghosts?

If we wanted to know how to cure a sick cow we could ask the scientist known as a veterinarian. The veterinarian has studied the biology, physiology, anatomy, etc., of animals and could probably help us with our sick cow. Veterinarians know about cow...

August 28, 2009

Probability and Global Warming

Imagine we have gone to a movie made by a former politician (who is not a scientist). In the movie we are informed (1) the earth is warming exponentially. (2) Human beings have been and will continue to cause this warming because we release a natural...

August 18, 2009

Wanted: American Intellectuals Thinkers

Helen [Mom]: "Everyone's special, Dash." Dash [Son]: [muttering] "Which is another way of saying no one is." - from the Pixar movie, The IncrediblesOne of the tragedies, and paradoxes, of our post modernist age is the dominan...

July 25, 2009

My Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Moment

If it can happen to Professor Gates and to me ... it might happen to anyone. I am talking, of course, about being handcuffed by the police in Cambridge, Mass.Most Americans have heard Professor Gates' story. Here is mine:It was a bitter cold winter n...

June 24, 2009

After Global Warming

Science and ideology don't mix. They never have and they never will. The house of cards that is the science behind "climate change" is collapsing at exactly the same time it is being imposed by the Obama administration and Congress as an id...

June 10, 2009

Dear Senator Cornyn

Dear Senator Cornyn:I received your urgent letter today from the National Republican Senatorial Committee.  You said that you needed to hear from "our Party's most trusted supporters, like you, as these important debates get underway in Was...

May 17, 2009

The Attitude of Ideology

Why is it that so many people believe that the world works the way that they want it to work, rather than the way it actually works? The philosopher Robert Nozick taught me the answer to this question. He also taught me that leftists are not the only...

May 10, 2009

Reflections on Conservatism and Christianity

A servant is not greater than his lord. If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. (John 15:20)Are social conservatives hurting or helping the cause of conservatism? The answer to this question has not yet been decided. Christian conservati...

April 21, 2009

From Tea Parties to Political Parties

So nearly half a million Americans finally "took to the streets." Moms pushed baby carriages. Men and women skipped a day of work (some of their kids skipped school). Some entrepreneurs closed down their businesses. Almost half a million Am...

April 17, 2009

Saving the Republic

"What can we do to win back our country?" Conservatives are asking themselves that question -- with increasing urgency -- every day.  They are desperately groping for a way to stop the twin avalanches of deficit spending and socialist ...

March 31, 2009

Immune from Race-baiting?

A funny thing happened to me a few weeks ago. I discovered that I seem to have at least a limited degree of immunity from the routine charges of racism regularly aimed at conservatives.  It was readers who informed me of this miraculous healing....

March 21, 2009

Intellectuals and Philosophy vs. Conservatives and Tradition

Tired of being called a “traditionalist?” Maybe you shouldn’t be. Traditionalists may know more about truth than we have been led to believe.Intellectuals, philosophers, and ersatz “progressives” have been hanging the al...

March 14, 2009

The Myth of Relativism and the Cult of Tolerance

Introduction It has been twenty years since the late Allan Bloom shook the intellectual elite in this country with the opening line of The Closing of the American Mind:  “There is one thing a professor can be absolutely certain of: al...

February 28, 2009

Conservatism Speaks at CPAC

Mike Church asked me to prepare a talk for his national radio program.  He asked me to give the speech that I would have given had I been invited to speak at CPAC on the state of conservatism in America today. My initial reaction was: Who cares ...

February 27, 2009

Conservatism Speaks at CPAC

Something beautiful, sad, unexpected, and miraculous happened yesterday at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). Conservatism appeared at the meeting and spoke for nearly ten minutes.Dressed in a brilliant white gown, Conservatism blin...

February 23, 2009

Racism, Eric Holder, my Son and Me

Enough is enough. I have had thirty plus years of enough. I have had enough of being called a "racist." I will not sit here and be called a racist and a coward by a self-serving, race-baiting politician like Eric Holder.  You wanna tal...

February 3, 2009

Congress: The New Power Class

There is no native criminal class except Congress.  - Mark TwainTraditionally Americans have loved to hate their Congress. But in the last several years our country has changed. Most clear thinking Americans no longer hate our Congress -- w...

January 28, 2009

Why Bipartisanship is Unethical

Depending on the circumstances, "bipartisanship" is almost always a sign of either (A) political weakness or (B) moral turpitude. In either case, bipartisanship is almost never ethical.[i] In this article I will demonstrate why.To make this...

January 21, 2009

Conservatism's Dilemma: To be or not to be in the GOP

The GOP heavily (almost exclusively) relies on conservatives for grassroots campaign workers and financial support. But the Republican Party has a long history of exploiting conservatives' efforts and misusing conservatives' financial contributions. ...

January 17, 2009

Lessons from Boru: How to Fetch, Live, and Love

Béar Croi Boru. That's his official AKC name. It's Gaelic. It means "Boru with the heart of a bear." It fits him perfectly.Boru is the oldest of our three Irish Water Spaniels. My father-in-law bought him, thirteen years ago, as a gi...

December 29, 2008

Where should Conservatives Draw the Line?

As January 20th approaches so too does the possibility of the biggest federal power grab in the history of the United States. The number of proposals for more federal intervention to "solve" America's problems is staggering. In this article...

December 28, 2008

George W. 'Deer in Headlights' Bush

I admire President Bush. I think he is a good man and I have said so before. But as Bush leaves office he is looking more and more like a deer in headlights.Plato makes it clear in the Statesman that there is no instruction manual for the great polit...

December 24, 2008

The Greatest Book Ever Written

As we ponder, each in our own way, this most special of holidays, I have a suggestion: read (or reread) the greatest book ever written -- the Gospel of John.Christianity has given the world many things. Its detractors say Christianity has provided th...

December 19, 2008

Climate Crisis = Logic Crisis

Al Gore is right! Sort of. The current debate over climate change is over. At least, it is over in terms of a logical and unbiased inquiry. The debate over "climate change" is no longer a matter of science. In the past forty years, the prop...

December 14, 2008

Worshipping the Weather

Everyone is religious. People will have their religion. The particular religion does not, necessarily, have to include worship of a god -- but it must include a dogma and rituals.For many on the left, environmentalism has become a religion, no real s...

December 7, 2008

Al Gore and the Bard

I was rereading Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice a couple of nights ago and I ran upon a phrase that reminded me of Al Gore:You may as well go stand upon the beachAnd bid the main flood bate his usual height....The Merchant of Venice (Act IV, Sce...

December 1, 2008

W Too Nice to be President?

Conservatism needs a fresh start. It is losing arguments ... and it is losing elections. One person, more than any other (even more than John McCain), has caused this: President George W.  Bush.Conservatives have not been winning arguments -- or...

November 28, 2008

Stop and Think

Really. Stop and think. What does your government actually do for you? This article is a series of quick thought experiments to help answer that question. First thought: Where are you physically situated? Unless someone has printed off this article a...

November 27, 2008

Thankful for Family

There is much more going on the traditional nuclear monogamist heterosexual family than meets the eye. The family is the "laboratory" that creates self-aware and decent human beings.Professor Ed Kaitz in his seminal piece on American Thinke...

November 15, 2008

Waltzing on the Titanic

America's young people helped elect Barack Obama. Way to go kids! This article is for you. Let's take a look at your future.We won't need a time machine. We will just need to visit Europe and talk to the youth of France, Italy, and Greece. Don't worr...

November 4, 2008

If Obama Wins ... or if McCain Wins

"Gird up your loins, son." That's what my dad used to tell me when I was facing a tough test as a kid. Well, "gird up your loins" conservatives. No matter what happens in today's election America is gonna need us.One of two things...

October 26, 2008

The Dangerous Reasoning of the Connecticut Supreme Court

The Supreme Court of Connecticut recently embraced legal reasoning that opens a Pandora's Box. The Court recently handed down the latest in a series of bizarre rulings from state courts on "gay marriage." Using the court's logic any and all...

October 6, 2008

A Long Term Strategy for a Free Market Bailout

We have been told that we must do something to save our credit markets -- and we must do it now. We have also been told that the only viable solution is the recently passed bailout bill financed by the taxpayer and piloted by the Treasury Department....

August 28, 2008

The broken dream of police brutality in Denver

Jimmy Breslin wrote a guest editorial for the Denver Post a couple of days ago entitled "No Need for Cops to Repeat History."But it isn't the police who have been trying to repeat history here in Denver -- it is the radical left. The Denver...

August 7, 2008

Obama's Abstract Patriotism

When Barack Obama gave a speech on patriotism, he equated patriotism with the abstract concepts of "sacrifice" and "service to a larger cause." Senator Obama does not understand what patriotism is -- or how it works.A couple ...

August 3, 2008

Why the Left is Unpatriotic and Why the Right Should Say So

Most conservative political commentators tiptoe around the unpatriotic positions maintained by many liberals in America. We hear prominent conservatives say things like this, "I am not challenging Mr. Liberal's patriotism. I am challenging his p...

June 29, 2008

Justice Anthony Kennedy and Our Schizophrenic Supreme Court

Conservatives were, rightly, thrilled by the recent Supreme Court decision that affirmed our constitutional right to keep and bear arms. Not so fast. Of the four important decisions the court has rendered in this term, three of them have gone the wro...

June 22, 2008

The Second Amendment: Much Ado about Firearms

The Second Amendment is not that hard to understand -- not if the person reading it has a lick of sense. I'll prove it.What does this sentence (let's call it S1) mean?My over-exuberant neighbors having a wild party next door, my wife called the cops....

June 1, 2008

Who Separates Church from State?

The phrase "wall of separation between church and state" has become a lightning rod for heated debate. This phrase is from Thomas Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptists in Connecticut and is understood by some to reflect the reasoning b...

May 24, 2008

Liberals and control

Strongly held beliefs are more dangerous foes of truth than lies.  - Friedrich NietzscheWith the coming nomination, and the possible election, of Barack Obama, history is repeating itself. A venerable liberal yearning finds human expression anew...

May 19, 2008

Your Energy Future Under the Democrats

The "energy plan" announced by the Democrats offers one thing: a significant slowdown of our economy for at least twenty years. Those who run both legislative branches of the congress, and the energy plans of both of their leading candidate...

April 26, 2008

Accepting the Premises

Have you seen it?  Newt Gingrich and Nancy Pelosi on TV to demand federal sponsorship of new forms of "clean" energy to combat what Gingrich calls, during the ad, "climate change." Notice, when you view the ad that Newt does ...

April 19, 2008

Privacy and Property Rights

Whereas, whenever kings, instead of protecting the lives and property of their subjects, as is their bounden duty, do endeavor to perpetrate the destruction of either, they thereby cease to be kings, become tyrants, and dissolve all ties of allegianc...

April 2, 2008

The Left Trades Places

One sign that the left is losing (and subconsciously knows it) is the prominence of conspiracy thinking in its fantasies.When I was in the ninth grade I decided to run for student body president of my junior high school, and became suddenly and ...