Letting Geert Wilders Speak, Part I

The Supine and the Shills

Well, Geert Wilders, the Netherlands MP, has been refused entry to Britain, by order of the Home Secretary. This was a masterful move of significant propaganda value--for Wilders. Naturally, it was not something he engineered, but he was clever enough to exploit it to his own (and his cause's) advantage. He tagged Gordon Brown as "the biggest coward in Europe."

According to the Daily Telegraph he was deported upon arrival at Heathrow because his presence in Britain would "threaten community security and therefore public security." Wow. What on earth is "community security"? The Home Secretary, who signed the deportation order, means of course that there would be some people in the country who would not like what Wilders would have said.

What is does show is that the right of free speech is now virtually defunct--if you happen to have views that are different from the "in favour" group. Today, the group that has the "king's ear" is Islam. So, since the British Home Secretary has muzzled Wilders in that country, we thought it appropriate to give him a platform at Contra Celsum so people can make up their own minds.

Several months ago, a reader of Contra Celsum sent us the text of a speech Wilders delivered at the Four Seasons, New York, introducing an Alliance of Patriots and announcing the Facing Jihad Conference in Jerusalem. The speech was sponsored by the Hudson Institute on September 25, 2008.

Dear friends,

Thank you very much for inviting me. Great to be at the Four Seasons. I come from a country that has one season only: a rainy season that starts January 1st and ends December 31st. When we have three sunny days in a row, the government declares a national emergency. So Four Seasons, that's new to me.

It's great to be in New York. When I see the skyscrapers and office buildings, I think of what Ayn Rand said: "The sky over New York and the will of man made visible." Of course. Without the Dutch you would have been nowhere, still figuring out how to buy this island from the Indians. But we are glad we did it for you. And, frankly, you did a far better job than we possibly could have done.

I come to America with a mission. All is not well in the old world. There is a tremendous danger looming, and it is very difficult to be optimistic. We might be in the final stages of the Islamization of Europe. This not only is a clear and present danger to the future of Europe itself, it is a threat to America and the sheer survival of the West. The danger I see looming is the scenario of America as the last man standing. The United States as the last bastion of Western civilization, facing an Islamic Europe. In a generation or two, the US will ask itself: who lost Europe? Patriots from around Europe risk their lives every day to prevent precisely this scenario form becoming a reality.

My short lecture consists of 4 parts. First I will describe the situation on the ground in Europe. Then, I will say a few things about Islam. Thirdly, if you are still here, I will talk a little bit about the movie you just saw. To close I will tell you about a meeting in Jerusalem.

The Europe you know is changing. You have probably seen the landmarks. The Eiffel Tower and Trafalgar Square and Rome's ancient buildings and maybe the canals of Amsterdam. They are still there. And they still look very much the same as they did a hundred years ago.

But in all of these cities, sometimes a few blocks away from your tourist destination, there is another world, a world very few visitors see - and one that does not appear in your tourist guidebook. It is the world of the parallel society created by Muslim mass-migration. All throughout Europe a new reality is rising: entire Muslim neighbourhoods where very few indigenous people reside or are even seen. And if they are, they might regret it. This goes for the police as well. It's the world of head scarves, where women walk around in figureless tents, with baby strollers and a group of children. Their husbands, or slaveholders if you prefer, walk three steps ahead. With mosques on many street corner. The shops have signs you and I cannot read. You will be hard-pressed to find any economic activity. These are Muslim ghettos controlled by religious fanatics. These are Muslim neighbourhoods, and they are mushrooming in every city across Europe. These are the building-blocks for territorial control of increasingly larger portions of Europe, street by street, neighbourhood by neighbourhood, city by city.

There are now thousands of mosques throughout Europe. With larger congregations than there are in churches. And in every European city there are plans to build super-mosques that will dwarf every church in the region. Clearly, the signal is: we rule. Many European cities are already one-quarter Muslim: just take Amsterdam, Marseille and Malmo in Sweden. In many cities the majority of the under-18 population is Muslim. Paris is now surrounded by a ring of Muslim neighbourhoods. Mohammed is the most popular name among boys in many cities.

In some elementary schools in Amsterdam the farm can no longer be mentioned, because that would also mean mentioning the pig, and that would be an insult to Muslims. Many state schools in Belgium and Denmark only serve halal food to all pupils. In once-tolerant Amsterdam gays are beaten up almost exclusively by Muslims. Non-Muslim women routinely hear "whore, whore". Satellite dishes are not pointed to local TV stations, but to stations in the country of origin. In France school teachers are advised to avoid authors deemed offensive to Muslims, including Voltaire and Diderot; the same is increasingly true of Darwin. The history of the Holocaust can in many cases no longer be taught because of Muslim sensitivity.

In England sharia courts are now officially part of the British legal system. Many neighbourhoods in France are no-go areas for women without head scarves. Last week a man almost died after being beaten up by Muslims in Brussels, because he was drinking during the Ramadan. Jews are fleeing France in record numbers, on the run for the worst wave of anti-Semitism since World War II. French is now commonly spoken on the streets of Tel Aviv and Netanya, Israel. I could go on forever with stories like this. Stories about Islamization.

A total of fifty-four million Muslims now live in Europe. San Diego University recently calculated that a staggering 25 percent of the population in Europe will be Muslim just 12 years from now. Bernhard Lewis has predicted a Muslim majority by the end of this century.

Now these are just numbers. And the numbers would not be threatening if the Muslim-immigrants had a strong desire to assimilate. But there are few signs of that. The Pew Research Center reported that half of French Muslims see their loyalty to Islam as greater than their loyalty to France. One-third of French Muslims do not object to suicide attacks. The British Centre for Social Cohesion reported that one-third of British Muslim students are in favour of a worldwide caliphate. A Dutch study reported that half of Dutch Muslims admit they "understand" the 9/11 attacks.

Muslims demand what they call 'respect'. And this is how we give them respect. Our elites are willing to give in. To give up. In my own country we have gone from calls by one cabinet member to turn Muslim holidays into official state holidays, to statements by another cabinet member, that Islam is part of Dutch culture, to an affirmation by the Christian-Democratic attorney general that he is willing to accept sharia in the Netherlands if there is a Muslim majority. We have cabinet members with passports from Morocco and Turkey.

Muslim demands are supported by unlawful behaviour, ranging from petty crimes and random violence, for example against ambulance workers and bus drivers, to small-scale riots. Paris has seen its uprising in the low-income suburbs, the banlieus. Some prefer to see these as isolated incidents, but I call it a Muslim intifada. I call the perpetrators "settlers". Because that is what they are. They do not come to integrate into our societies, they come to integrate our society into their Dar-al-Islam. Therefore, they are settlers. Much of this street violence I mentioned is directed exclusively against non-Muslims, forcing many native people to leave their neighbourhoods, their cities, their countries.

Politicians shy away from taking a stand against this creeping sharia. They believe in the equality of all cultures. Moreover, on a mundane level, Muslims are now a swing vote not to be ignored.

Our many problems with Islam cannot be explained by poverty, repression or the European colonial past, as the Left claims. Nor does it have anything to do with Palestinians or American troops in Iraq. The problem is Islam itself.

Allow me to give you a brief Islam 101. The first thing you need to know about Islam is the importance of the book of the Quran. The Quran is Allah's personal word, revealed by an angel to Mohammed, the prophet. This is where the trouble starts. Every word in the Quran is Allah's word and therefore not open to discussion or interpretation. It is valid for every Muslim and for all times. Therefore, there is no such a thing as moderate Islam. Sure, there are a lot of moderate Muslims. But a moderate Islam is non-existent.

The Quran calls for hatred, violence, submission, murder, and terrorism. The Quran calls for Muslims to kill non-Muslims, to terrorize non-Muslims and to fulfil their duty to wage war: violent jihad. Jihad is a duty for every Muslim, Islam is to rule the world - by the sword. The Quran is clearly anti-Semitic, describing Jews as monkeys and pigs.

The second thing you need to know is the importance of Mohammed the prophet. His behaviour is an example to all Muslims and cannot be criticized. Now, if Mohammed had been a man of peace, let us say like Ghandi and Mother Theresa wrapped in one, there would be no problem. But Mohammed was a warlord, a mass murderer, a pedophile, and had several marriages - at the same time. Islamic tradition tells us how he fought in battles, how he had his enemies murdered and even had prisoners of war executed. Mohammed himself slaughtered the Jewish tribe of Banu Qurayza. He advised on matters of slavery, but never advised to liberate slaves. Islam has no other morality than the advancement of Islam. If it is good for Islam, it is good. If it is bad for Islam, it is bad. There is no gray area or other side.

Quran as Allah's own word and Mohammed as the perfect man are the two most important facets of Islam. Let no one fool you about Islam being a religion. Sure, it has a god, and a here-after, and 72 virgins. But in its essence Islam is a political ideology. It is a system that lays down detailed rules for society and the life of every person.

Islam wants to dictate every aspect of life. Islam means 'submission'. Islam is not compatible with freedom and democracy, because what it strives for is sharia. If you want to compare Islam to anything, compare it to communism or national-socialism, these are all totalitarian ideologies.

This is what you need to know about Islam, in order to understand what is going on in Europe. For millions of Muslims the Quran and the live of Mohammed are not 14 centuries old, but are an everyday reality, an ideal, that guide every aspect of their lives. Now you know why Winston Churchill called Islam "the most retrograde force in the world", and why he compared Mein Kampf to the Quran.

To be continued . . .

Meditation on the Text of the Week

Responding to Calamities

I tell you, no, but unless you repent you will all likewise perish.
Luke 13:3

There has always been a strong tendency for the human heart to draw either a definitive or an implicit cause and effect connection between suffering and just desserts. When someone suffers (calamity, accident, sickness and so forth) all cultures with strongly defined codes of right and wrong are likely to reason that calamity implies punishment of some kind.

The book of Job deals substantially with this error. Job suffered terribly—clearly at the hands of focused and deliberate divine intervention. His three friends spent a good deal of time and energy trying to get him to own up to whatever it was that had provoked God to such terrible wrath. They argued from the calamity to an underlying cause of Job's unknown and undefined evil. Job had to have done something terribly wrong, or God would not have dealt with him this way.

One of the crucial points of the book of Job is to demonstrate that one cannot draw such black and white conclusions from the sufferings of people. Things are a whole lot more complex and God's purposes are far too mysterious and multi-dimensional and multi-purposive than to allow such simplistic connections.

In our text, our Lord takes this subject one step further. It turns out, notwithstanding the lessons from the book of Job that there is always one black and white conclusion which we can always draw from human calamity and suffering. He insists upon a deep consciousness of one's own guilt and sinfulness when considering the suffering of others. Some people had come to him reporting that the Romans had slaughtered Jewish worshipers (“Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.”) Jesus asked the rhetorical question: “Do you suppose that these Galileans were greater sinners than all other Galileans, because they suffered this same fate?”

Well, it would appear so. Probably they were insurrectionists of some sort, maybe zealots or sicarri. At one level it would be perfectly reasonable to reason that this event would serve as a warning (but also a comforting reminder) that if one did not engage in rebellious activity against the Roman overlords, one would not suffer the fate of a criminal. I'm OK—I don't do that kind of stuff.

But our Lord presses the matter far more profoundly than that. He says, “Unless you repent, you will perish along with them.” He draws upon a deeper, more fundamental unspoken premise. Between the Galilean executed and all men there is no difference—all alike are sinners, evil, wicked and immoral. Therefore, don't think that because the sword has not fallen you are better or more ethical or more moral than the hapless Galileans. You will perish along with them if you do not repent of your own sin.

To drive the matter home more forcefully, our Lord repeats Himself:

Or do you suppose that those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them, were worse culprits than all the men who live in Jerusalem? I tell you, no, but, unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.
Luke 13: 4—5

Thus,the warning and admonition is clear. Whenever we see another person whose life is cut off due to accident or crime or foolishness, they serve as a message from God, a warning. It is a reminder that we, who are in principle no better than they, will perish along with them if we do not turn away from our own sin and evil living and turn to God, seeking His mercy and forgiveness.

One is reminded of the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector. The Pharisee stood before God and thanked Him that he was not like other men. He was better than they, more scrupulous, more holy, more dedicated. He fasted and tithed and did all that he thought he was supposed to. Meanwhile, the tax collector—a Roman stool pigeon who betrayed and oppressed his own people—beat his breast and cried out, “Lord, be merciful to me—as sinner.” The tax collector, said Jesus, left the Temple justified—declared righteous by God—while the Pharisee remained under the indictment and guilt of his sin.

The ancient Puritan oath, uttered as a notorious sinner passed, “There, but for God's grace, go I” is far nearer the mark. When terrible calamity strikes the first response of the heart should be to remind ourselves that we deserve such a fate, whilst we continue in our own sins and repent not of them.

Then, unlike Job's comforters, we will be able to extend true love and support to those who suffer.

Reforming the Resource Management Act

Theft, Plain and Simple

If you want to destroy a human being you can do it two ways: either suddenly or incrementally. Walking up to an individual and shooting them in the head is the sudden way. It is profoundly inhuman act. In the sudden murder of an innocent human being, all human beings are implicitly under threat. For if “that person” can be randomly murdered or killed today, I may be the selected victim tomorrow. People tend to be shocked on the one hand and feel an implicit threat to themselves and their families, on the other. They think, "What if it were me?"

Incremental destruction, however, works gradually and therefore more subtly. This has the tactical advantage of disguising the threat, which makes the general population more accepting. Therefore, the threat is disguised, as is the ethical evil of the act. As one imprisoned Christian put it during the Nazi terror—first they came for the Jews and I was silent; then they came for the gypsies, and I said nothing; finally, they came for me. But there are even more subtle gradual ways to destroy human beings.

The key is to work in phases. The first phase is to start with one's property. The gradual and systematic removal of property rights in favour of the Collective reduces individuals to a state of dependence. This is the road to serfdom; incremental slavery. It is only by means of property that an individual can clothe and feed and shelter himself and his family. Take his property away and he is defenceless, ineffectual, and largely helpless.

The second phase is to attack the household and family of the individual soul. The threat-system of “conform or we will take your children in the name of the Collective” is a worse form of slavery and intimidation than taking property. “At least we have each other” is no longer true. At that point an individual human soul is usually so dehumanised, he is ready to die.

As one philosopher once challenged—without telling me your name, your anything about your family, your children, your occupation or what you own—tell me who and what you are. It is a difficult challenge—which underscores just how much human identity and individual person hood is tied up with and connected to our jobs, our property and our families.

In the past fifty years we have seen a systematic erosion of private property rights in favour of the collective. It has been gradual, incremental, but relentless. And most people have accepted it, and got on with what was left of their lives. The human capacity to adapt has not served us well in this instance. “What can you do. It is the system. You cannot fight City Hall” has been the overwhelming response.

When a person is suddenly murdered we see the implicit threat to us all. Yet when property is incrementally taken from us, we foolishly fail to see the threat. Somehow it does not appear to be a clear and present danger.

In the pagan West, the overwhelming rationale for stealing property from human souls has been the “greater good.” Whatever the “greater good” is at the time will change from decade to decade. But each new threat to the “greater good du jour” has resulted in still further and further erosion of both property rights and private property. Consequently, the pagan West has become progressively more and more inhumane, moving its people closer and closer to conditions of slavery.

Imagine our consternation if our next door neighbour knocked on our door one morning and informed us he was going to use our car for the day, and needed the keys. We would likely retort, “Get lost. It's mine. Go get your own car.” But if I own a tree in a garden I am subject to that tree insofar as I cannot dispose of it or use it as I want without seeking permission and approval from the Collective. Fifty years ago, the very idea would have been as preposterous as the neighbour commandeering our car. But we now blithely accept it, for we have tolerated the notion that society, the nation, the people have an interest and ownership stake in my tree. I “share” ownership with the Collective. They have come for the gypsies.

The New Zealand Resource Management Act has done more to strip away private property rights than any other piece of legislation on our statute books. It has been systematically used to assert the prior rights of collective ownership of property over all property.

The present government is intending to “reform” the Act by tweaking it. Out of the woodwork have come the termites, seeking to defend the rights of the Collective. For example, under the tweaks, it is proposed that homeowners will not need resource consents any longer if they want to fell their own trees. The Tree Collective has expressed outrage:

Hueline Massey of the Tree Council (Auckland) Incorporated, said proposed changes to tree laws had come out of the blue. The Tree Council would be "horrified" if the change went ahead, as it had fought to get rules preventing trees of a certain size or type from being felled without consent since the 1980s.

Ms Massey said rules were brought in to stop the "destruction of good trees without a good reason", which could deprive the community and subsequent owners of the land of trees. If the change went ahead it would be "open slather" for people to remove trees just because they annoyed them, she said.

Nick Smith said councils would have the option of listing individual trees or groves of trees for protection, instead of blanket rules. He said there were parts of Auckland where people did not let trees grow over 3 metres for fear of invoking council tree controls. "It is a nonsense that we have approximately 5000 resource consents a year for tree trimming. We think there are far less costly and bureaucratic ways of providing protection for urban trees,"he said.

But Ms Massey said it was a huge exercise to list an individual tree for protection. As a result there were only about 120 such trees in the Rodney District and similarly few in Auckland, she said.

“Depriving the community of trees.” Yes, that says it all. But this is just one of the more extreme and vexatious attacks upon the property rights of private citizens in the Act. The RMA deliberately sets up a public ownership stake in all property. Public participation in scrutinizing all forms of change or development (from house extensions or renovations to multi-million dollar commercial projects) is established and protected by the Act. This means that an individual in Kaitaia can object to a proposed commercial development in Bluff—and be heard.

It is this doctrine of collective ownership rights, intrinsic to the Act itself, which must be changed. The current proposed changes are helpful, but miss the main point. We acknowledge that proposed developments may damage the property rights of others—particularly neighbours. For these, compensation must be paid. To take a simple example, if one's sea views being obstructed by a development diminish the value of one's property, the developer ought rightly to be made to compensate the damage to surrounding property.

Here is where a market pricing mechanism is so helpful. There have been cases of people being sued because others were “offended” at a development. One person alleged that they liked to walk down the road and commune with a tree in a neighbour's garden from the footpath: therefore, they opposed the removal of the tree and sought compensation for a diminished quality of life. Such stupid claims can be easily dismissed by the question, Is there a market for your “communing.” Would other people buy it? If not, to all intents and practical purposes you simply do not have a property right—only a personal lifestyle preference. And your object of communing is likely to be another's eyesore.

The Resource Management Act is an inhuman piece of legislation. It requires far more than a tweak at the edges. The protection of rights of private property needs to be a core and fundamental principle of the Act if it is to avoid its current assault upon human beings.

The Eighth Command, “Thou shalt not steal” applies not just to individuals, but particularly to the Collective. For it is the Collective that has done more to assail and attack the property of human beings over the past fifty years than individuals and neighbours and criminals. It is the Collective which is incrementally enslaving and destroying human beings. Finally, they came for me. . . .

The S-Files

A Small But Significant Accomplishment

Contra Celsum has decided to bestow an S-Award on Dr Lockwood Smith, the new Speaker of the New Zealand Parliament.

Background:

In New Zealand, our constitutional fabric is thin and therefore vulnerable. Much of it depends upon the commitment of all political parties and participants to "play fair" within the spirit of the unwritten rules of historical practice, as much as their explicit content. Consequently, constitutional conventions have little sanction or protection if a dominant government chooses to ignore them.

The former Labour administration rent asunder constitutional conventions with breathtaking arrogance. In the end, the electorate had had enough. One of those disgusting and dangerous actions was the politicisation of parliamentary question time. Under the reign of the former Labour speaker, Margaret Wilson question time descended into a political farce. Ministers were allowed to ignore questions at will.

The dignity and place of parliament had denigrated to the point where a minister could completely ignore a formal question, speak about something entirely different, or use it in an attempt to disparage political opponents. All the minister had to do is "address" the question, which under Wilson's regimen was twisted to mean something completely vague. Wilson would allow the following kind of gross non sequitur as acceptable and within the rules:

Q: Will the Minister please tell us how many prisoners have died in Police or Corrections custody in the last year?

A: With respect to that question, we confirm that the moon is not made of green cheese.

Wilson ruled repeatedly that answers of such inane ilk were within the rules because they "addressed" (that is, mentioned) the question.

Under Wilson's regime, the principle that government is accountable to parliament was seriously undermined. The new speaker is seeking to repair the gaping rent torn in our constitution by the previous speaker.

Citation:

The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Dr Lockwood Smith yesterday insisted that government ministers answer questions. He has ruled that where questions are submitted in advance, so that time has been provided to research factually correct answers, ministers must answer the question, providing the relevant data and material.

This ruling reflects the historical and conventional interpretation of parliamentary rules which requires that ministers "address" the question. Thus, a small piece of constitutional fabric was restored yesterday. The benefits to the body politic will be both immediate and long term.

Firstly, the government will be required to operate with more respect towards the parliament and parliamentary institutions. The deliberately vaunted power of the executive, so evident under the previous government, has been diminished accordingly.

Secondly, the government's accountability to parliament--and therefore to the people--has been significantly restored. This serves to underscore the democratic nature and foundations of our system of government.

Thirdly, the quality of political discourse might improve substantially as a result. Political debate and discussion might escape the truly awful pattern of relentless ad hominem attacks--which does more than any other factor to erode public respect for politicians and leaders.

Fourthly, with increased broadcasting of parliament's sessions question time might now be influential in raising the wider public's understanding of government and the processes and workings of our democracy. Previously, most listening to or looking at question time either ended up being disgusted or frustrated or both.

These are not insignificant steps forward.

Dr Lockwood Smith, Speaker of the House of Representatives: S-Award Class I for actions in the course of public duty that are Smart, Sound and Salutary.

Why Were the Fires So Bad?

The Anti-Human Greens Strike Again

Let's set the Victorian bush fires in their ecological and meteorological context. Victoria had been sitting at the tail end of a fourteen year drought; things were pretty dry, then, in the first place. Then there was the extraordinary heat wave pushing temperatures to over 45 degrees. Then there were the gale force winds, with immensely strong gusts, often in random directions. The conditions for raging bush fires were excellent, to say the least.

But the Australian media are now starting to look a bit deeper. Who or what is to blame? Now there are those who shrug their shoulders at the inanity of the question. Natural disasters happen. They are without any direct human causality. Why bother with the blame game? There is merit to this line of thought. Or is there?

In the face of threats from natural disasters, human beings have always sought to adapt and take actions that lessen the impact of such catastrophes. The Greenist, both in Australia and New Zealand have been quick to the chase. Global warming is to blame, they tell us. The only long term response to tragedies such as the bush fires that makes any sense is to combat global warming. Anything less is simply polishing brass on a sinking ship. So, maybe the Greens have got it right this time. Maybe anti-global warming strategies are the best and most sane human adaptation strategy to bush fires.

Think again. Let's put the bush fires not just in their meteorological context, but in the context of the environmental policy regime in which they occurred. Over the past few days, several leading Australian newspapers have carried articles on how greenist inspired policy and lobbying turned out to have the unexpected consequence of exacerbating the bush fires significantly. Get this right: Greenist progammes and policies are now alleged to have made the bush fires many times worse. Why? Because Greens have succeeded in banning prudent preventative strategies throughout Victoria.

First up, Miranda Devine, in the Sydney Morning Herald, provides a succinct sketch of the conditions which led to some of the worst fires in fifty years.

It wasn't climate change which killed as many as 300 people in Victoria last weekend. It wasn't arsonists. It was the unstoppable intensity of a bushfire, turbo-charged by huge quantities of ground fuel which had been allowed to accumulate over years of drought. It was the power of green ideology over government to oppose attempts to reduce fuel hazards before a megafire erupts, and which prevents landholders from clearing vegetation to protect themselves. (Emphasis, ours)

Green ideology prevented landholders from clearing vegetation away. Come on! That's a bit of a long bow, Miranda. Surely? Miranda clearly thinks not. She is calling for figurative blood.

So many people need not have died so horribly. The warnings have been there for a decade. If politicians are intent on whipping up a lynch mob to divert attention from their own culpability, it is not arsonists who should be hanging from lamp-posts but greenies.

Mmmm. Greenies from lamp-posts. Is Greenist ideology really to blame?

Governments appeasing the green beast have ignored numerous state and federal bushfire inquiries over the past decade, almost all of which have recommended increasing the practice of "prescribed burning". Also known as "hazard reduction", it is a methodical regime of burning off flammable ground cover in cooler months, in a controlled fashion, so it does not fuel the inevitable summer bushfires.

In July 2007 Scott Gentle, the Victorian manager of Timber Communities Australia, who lives in Healesville where two fires were still burning yesterday, gave testimony to a Victorian parliamentary bushfire inquiry so prescient it sends a chill down your spine.

"Living in an area like Healesville, whether because of dumb luck or whatever, we have not experienced a fire … since … about 1963. God help us if we ever do, because it will make Ash Wednesday look like a picnic." God help him, he was right.

Gentle complained of obstruction from green local government authorities of any type of fire mitigation strategies. He told of green interference at Kinglake - at the epicentre of Saturday's disaster, where at least 147 people died - during a smaller fire there in 2007.

"The contractors were out working on the fire lines. They put in containment lines and cleared off some of the fire trails. Two weeks later that fire broke out, but unfortunately those trails had been blocked up again [by greens] to turn it back to its natural state … Instances like that are just too numerous to mention. Governments … have been in too much of a rush to appease green idealism … This thing about locking up forests is just not working."

Around about now we suspect you are starting to get a bit mad. Us too. Greens preventing controlled burn offs in the quiet season. Greens stopping or obstructing fire mitigation strategies. Greens blocking up trails. Greens trying to "protect" gum forests by keeping humans and their mitigation strategies out.

The Kinglake area was a nature-loving community of tree-changers, organic farmers and artists to the north of Melbourne. A council committed to reducing carbon emissions dominates the Nillumbik shire, a so-called "green wedge" area, where restrictions on removing vegetation around houses reportedly added to the dangers. In nearby St Andrews, where more than 20 people are believed to have died, surviving residents have spoken angrily of "greenies" who prevented them from cutting back trees near their property, including in one case, a tea tree that went "whoomp". Dr Phil Cheney, the former head of the CSIRO's bushfire research unit and one of the pioneers of prescribed burning, said yesterday if the fire-ravaged Victorian areas had been hazard-reduced, the flames would not have been as intense.

Kinglake and Maryville, now crime scenes, are built among tall forests of messmate stringy bark trees which pose a special fire hazard, with peeling bark creating firebrands that carry fire five kilometres out. "The only way to reduce the flammability of the bark is by prescribed burning" every five to seven years, Cheney said. He estimates between 35 and 50 tonnes a hectare of dry fuel were waiting to be gobbled up by Saturday's inferno.

Fuel loads above about eight tonnes a hectare are considered a fire hazard. A federal parliamentary inquiry into bushfires in 2003 heard that a fourfold increase in ground fuel leads to a 13-fold increase in the heat generated by a fire. . . .

Only seven months ago, the Victorian Parliament's Environment and Natural Resources Committee tabled its report into the impact of public land management on bushfires, with five recommendations to enhance prescribed burning. This included tripling the amount of land to be hazard-reduced from 130,000 to 385,000 hectares a year. There has been little but lip service from the Government in response. Teary politicians might pepper their talking points with opportunistic intimations of "climate change" and "unprecedented" weather, but they are only diverting the blame. With yes-minister fudging and craven inclusion of green lobbyists in decision-making, they have greatly exacerbated this tragedy.

Well, maybe it's just Miranda. She is known as a bit of a hothead. She is a professing Christian, and after all you know how weird those people are. Let's engage in a bit of good old fashioned ad hominem, and go chain ourselves to a few more trees. Not so fast.

The issue here is pretty simple. Even stupid people like us can see how build-ups of tinder dry vegetation would exacerbate a fire. Even simpletons know that controlled burn offs to prevent a worse fire later make sense. But is it really the Greenists and their controlled councils that are to blame.

Yup. It would seem so. Consider this article in the Melbourne Age:

Angry survivors blame council 'green' policy

* Andrea Petrie, Arthurs Creek
* February 11, 2009

ANGRY residents last night accused local authorities of contributing to the bushfire toll by failing to let residents chop down trees and clear up bushland that posed a fire risk.

During question time at a packed community meeting in Arthurs Creek on Melbourne's northern fringe, Warwick Spooner — whose mother Marilyn and brother Damien perished along with their home in the Strathewen blaze — criticised the Nillumbik council for the limitations it placed on residents wanting the council's help or permission to clean up around their properties in preparation for the bushfire season. "We've lost two people in my family because you dickheads won't cut trees down," he said.

"We wanted trees cut down on the side of the road … and you can't even cut the grass for God's sake."

Later, the meeting was cut short when Mr Spooner's father, Dennis, collapsed in his chair and an ambulance had to be called. Despite losing his wife and son and everything he owned, a friend later said he had not stopped or slept since the weekend.

So, it's real then--not just a wild allegation. Homeowners have faced local council force and prevention of them carrying out the simplest of prudent preventative strategies because of Greenist pressure upon councils.

And then there was the article in The Australian two days ago. (This article was publicised in the NZ blogosphere by Adolf, then later by Whaleoil)

THE shire council covering some of the areas hit hardest by the bushfires was warned five years ago that its policy of encouraging people to grow trees near their homes to give the appearance of a forest would lead to disaster. One of Australia's leading bushfire experts, Rod Incoll, warned Nillumbik Shire Council in a 2003 report that it risked devastation if it went ahead with changes to planning laws proposed by green groups that restricted the removal of vegetation.

Mr Incoll, the Victorian fire chief from 1990 to 1996, and David Packham, a former CSIRO bushfire scientist and academic who also produced a report on the issue, argued against the regulations, which actively encouraged the builders of new homes to plant trees around the houses for aesthetic reasons.

Mr Incoll told The Australian yesterday the proposed planning rules were "foolhardy and dangerous and ought not to be proceeded with". . . .

Mr Incoll said that in 2003, green groups were pushing for changes to planning laws that included restrictions on the removal of vegetation, "and worse still, the requirement for planting vegetation around and almost over houses, as part of any planning permit to build a house in the shire of Nillumbik, so it gave the appearance from the outside of being a forest". . . .

Victoria's auditor-general warned 17 years ago that a failure to carry out controlled burn-offs placed the state at risk of bushfires. In a 1992 report to parliament, the auditor-general criticised the Department of Conservation and Environment for letting combustible material build up on the forest floor.

"The failure of the department to achieve its planned fuel reduction burns each year has resulted in an increasing accumulation of fuel on forest floors," the report stated. "This makes Victoria's forests and protected lands more susceptible to the occurrence offires."

The report said the department was not burning in "priority1 zones" because they were too close to houses".

"Those areas warranting the highest level of protection to human life, property and public assets had in fact received the lowest level of protection," it said.

The auditor-general's audit found "fuel loads" of combustible material on the forest floors in the range of 20 to 60 tonnes a hectare in the Alexandra and Orbost regions and at Blackwood near Geelong - seven times higher than the department's target.

So there we have it. To the Greenists, trees are holy icons. They are not to be touched. Protect them at all costs.

Will this lead to a change in policy? Sadly, we do not expect so. Greenism is part of Athenian religion which is always interested in the self-destruction and self-degradation of man and it has a thousand ways and policies and ideologies to achieve it. The trees and "nature" will remain sacrosanct. It is people who will be banned. Councils will hop to it. People will not be allowed to live any more in the countryside. "Remember the terrible bush fires of 2009," the council bureaucrats will sanctimoniously intone, while passing more an more restrictive measures stopping people from subduing the earth, managing it, and husbanding it.

People-free forests is what the Greenists really want. Well, no, actually they would really prefer a people-free planet.

Australia the Unlucky Country

The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same

Kevin Rudd has fired his big bang, announcing billions and billions of dollars of government spending, in an attempt to ameliorate recession in Australia. The outcome is likely to be fatty deposits, waste, coagulation and blood clots in the body-economic.

Consider one of the more ludicrous proposals: every school is to have a new building project. Whether it needs it or not, whether it makes sound investment sense or not, you are jolly well going to have one. It's your national duty to have something. How fanciful, wasteful and stupid is that. The man has obviously never worked in a commercial enterprise of any sort. He has only worked as a career diplomat apart from political positions.

If Rudd is successful in implementing his "vision" of a new world order for Australia, things are likely to turn out to be decidedly unlucky for our neighbour. This piece in the Asian Wall Street Journal is right on target.

From Washington to Tokyo to London, politicians the world over are using the global financial crisis as cover to extend their powers. In Australia, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is taking that tack a step further -- he's manufacturing a philosophy to justify his actions.

In an essay published in the February issue of the Monthly magazine, Mr. Rudd lays out his vision for "social capitalism"; a kind of halfway house between what he calls "extreme capitalism" and "an all-providing state." "Whatever the nomenclature," he writes, "the concept is clear: a system of open markets, unambiguously regulated by an activist state, and one in which the state intervenes to reduce the greater inequalities that competitive markets will inevitably generate."

This is a vision for a greatly expanded state cloaked under the rubric of "free markets," one in which Canberra would decide what inequalities were worth smoothing out and which ones weren't. Australia had that model once; it was called the Gough Whitlam government. In the 1970s, Mr. Whitlam nationalized health and higher education, hiked public-sector wages, increased government spending and pandered to labor unions, a key Labor Party constituency. The result was one of the worst recessions in Australia's modern history.

That's why the Labor Party -- the same Labor Party that Mr. Rudd belongs to -- embraced truly free markets, trade liberalization and deregulation in the 1980s and 1990s. Those reforms underpinned 17 consecutive years of economic expansion. Mr. Rudd makes only a passing reference to this record, acknowledging the Bob Hawke and Paul Keating Labor governments' "ambitious and unapologetic program of economic modernization." He goes further: "Neo-liberalism, and the free-market fundamentalism it has produced, has been revealed as little more than personal greed dressed up as an economic philosophy," he writes. This is a far cry from the economic conservatism for which Mr. Rudd was elected in 2007.

In his essay, Mr. Rudd uses the global financial crisis as a cover to attack his political opponents and talk up his own recent record. The opposition Liberal Party, Mr. Rudd writes, is "the political home of neo-liberalism in Australia" and bears blame for the current financial crisis, while Labor "has acted decisively through state action to maintain the stability of the Australian financial system."

The irony is that Australia was better prepared to deal with the financial crisis because of its long record of liberalization and sound regulatory oversight. Australia wasn't hit by a slew of subprime mortgage defaults or bank runs. Its problems came courtesy of muddled government interventions on foreign shores. Mr. Rudd's Labor government reacted by guaranteeing bank deposits at taxpayer expense, banning short selling and proposing huge public spending programs.

Milton Friedman once wrote: "What most people really object to when they object to a free market is that it is so hard for them to shape it to their own will." It's not necessary to read between the lines of Mr. Rudd's essay to understand that that's what's going on here.

How fortunate we are in New Zealand to have a Prime Minister who had had decent and successful commercial front-line experience. Anyone who has had even a modicum of commercial experience knows that the marketplace constantly disciplines you and works against you by producing unexpected perverse outcomes, unless you work with market forces, not ignore them. Market forces and dynamics don't disappear simply because someone tells them to, or because one pronounces a new world economic order. That is why the market is such an effective and powerful discipline. We fear that Rudd, with no commercial experience, does not understand how markets work in any real, practical, and micro sense. His patois on the diplomatic cocktail circuit has not prepared him for real life. He is showing up as a naive babe in arms.

Australia's "luck" may well be about to change for the worse.

Meditation on the Text of the Week

The True Superman

Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
Matthew 5:5

There have been those in the history of Western thought who have argued that Jerusalem has done a great deal of harm to humankind. In particular Nietzsche believed that Christianity had emasculated man and turned him into a wimp. Man needed to re-claim his rightful place in the cosmos which was to thrust his chest forth in arrogance and do battle, once again, with the gods.

Texts such as “blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth”, are usually seen in a Nietzschean light. This particular text is often seen as calling for a life of self-negation, a life of poverty, chastity, non-violence, and withdrawal from the power structures of the world. Francis of Assisi would be a typical exponent of this “ideal.”

But such interpretations or glosses miss the mark completely. First is the need to understand what is meant by “meek” or “humble”. Moses is declared in scripture to be the humblest man of his generation in all the earth. But Moses was a warrior, a leader, a commander, a judge, a lawgiver, a wielder of the staff of God and of divine curses and blessings. He defeated and annihilated Pharaoh and his armies singlehandedly. The contrast between Moses and the self-negation of Francis of Assisi could not be deeper or stronger. It is clear that the meekness of which the Scriptures speak is very different from what is commonly understood.

The term meekness here means to be under the authority, command, and instruction of God. In this sense it does indeed refer to the opposite of Nietzsche's Superman—he with the swollen chest and the strutting step—for Moses and those to whom our Lord referred are people who live with bowed knee before the Almighty in reverent fear. They are not their own. They are bondslaves of the Lord Jesus Christ and bear His slave-yoke.

But in the world-view of Jerusalem and of the Scriptures to be under authority is to bear and exercise authority. When God commands no human authority can interdict. One of the most graphic examples of the meekness of which the Scriptures speak is given to us by our Lord before Caiaphas. There is a steely quietness, a resolution, a determined willfulness, a “setting of the face like a flint” over which Caiaphas and Herod and Pilate and their minions have no control.

Christ, as bondslave of the Father, is captive before Caiaphas, but is about to inherit the heavens and the earth. He will descend to Hell, and will be raised up to the right hand of God the Father, Almighty. All power and authority in the heavens and upon the earth is to be given to Him. We, as bondslaves of Christ, inherit in Him and with Him. As He rules, so we are ruled and rule in our turn.

The earth that is our inheritance is very tangible, here and now, and real-worldly. The Greek word employed by our Lord is the word from which we get “geography” and “geology” and “geo-physics”. It refers to the tangible material world. The bondslaves of Christ, the citizens of Jerusalem, inherit the Americas, the Indian sub-continent, Africa, Asia, the Southern Ocean—and so forth. As Christ's stewards, they come to rule over the entire globe, in His Name.

Now this process is not yet complete. But it will be. This is as certain as Christ's sitting at the right hand of God. Even as all authority in heaven and upon earth has been granted to Him, so through His servants on earth He will progressively implement His authority over all nations, until all are discipled and all are meek and all bow the knee to Him alone.

Thus, the meekness of which Jesus speaks, and upon which He bestows His blessing is meekness which carries within it the realities of power and dominion. Rule and dominion over self, so that heart mind and soul are progressively conquered for service to the Lord. Rule and dominion over family, so that children are raised after the image and character of Christ. Rule over extended families, so that the needy and the weak are nurtured and strengthened. Rule and dominion over scholarship, commerce, health, welfare, agriculture, the natural environment—as far as the curse is found.

We live amongst a people who see themselves as Nietzschean supermen. They strut, swagger, and lord it over others. They despise the weak and the down trodden. Their voices are like brazen trumpets. Their deeds are fell and hard. They forficate humanity into “us” and “them” and despise the latter.

But neither the earth, nor humanity belongs to them. In their dividing they shall not conquer. Christ alone has conquered through meek obedience to the Father, and has inherited all the lands of earth—all that is in them and upon them. We, His followers, walk in His train and summon all who will to share in His inheritance. Bit by bit the Kingdom comes and the curse removed.

The S-Files

Starting on the Long Road Back


Contra Celsum has nominated Anne Tolley, Education Minister of New Zealand for an S-Award.

Background:

Public health concerns and the rise of obesity "epidemics" have lead to more and more strident calls for the government to do "something." Inevitably, that something turns out to involve public schools. Last year, under prompting from the Green Party, the Department of Education required that schools offer healthy food options only. More extremely, schools were expected and required to ensure that their pupils were eating healthily.

This led to the widespread practice of inspecting children's lunches, and the writing of notes of rebuke and exhortation to parents whose lunches were deemed to be inferior.

The new Minister of Education, Ann Tolley has removed the ban on "unhealthy" food, to a sigh of relief all around the country, except for the inner sanctums of the social engineers. The Minister's press release stated:

The Government considers regulation in this area unnecessary," Education Minister Anne Tolley said yesterday in announcing her deletion of the Labour rule. "I believe boards of trustees should be able to make their own decisions about appropriate food and drink options... I am confident they will act responsibly.

Schools will still be responsible to promote healthy eating. So, it will be a regime of education, not enforcement--which is sort of consistent with being a school, really. At least the new policy will play to the core competencies of a school, not try perversely try to make a school something that it is not.

Citation:

1. Athens regards education as the primary and most powerful means of salvation to engineer, create, and build a sinless or less-sinful world. All social problems are supposed to be able to be solved by more education. Consequently, schools have become burdened with more and more socialising and social-engineering tasks and responsibilities, leading to a decline in education standards in core subjects.

Teachers complain of being required to act more and more as an agency of the Ministry of Social Development and less and less as an agent of education. While this one act by the Minister will not solve the problem, it is one step in the battle to recapture the school system for purposes of education not social engineering.

2. The announced expectation that school boards and parents will act responsibly and holding them accountable represents a partial rejection of Athenian ideology. The alternative of legislating, regulation, and enforcement to make people responsible and do the right thing has evil consequences. It encourages irresponsibility ("It is someone else's job to make sure my children are eating the right food.") It leads to blameshifting and guilt transferrence. ("My children are fat and the system has failed them. They and I deserve compensation.")

3. It means that principals and staff can better manage their own schools. According to The Herald:

Principals welcomed the change and some said they had defied the rule with frequent sausage fund-raisers.

They now expected sausage sizzles would be upped to monthly and that some unhealthy foods might return to canteens - but ruled out a wholesale return to fatty and sugary fare. . . .

"Now we've got our tuckshop all geared up for healthy food, the children are used to it and we'll be staying with it," said David Crickmer, principal of Bruce McLaren Intermediate in West Auckland.

And now his "conscience would be clear" about his weekly chocolate fish awards to pupils. "I can do it with no worries about the food police breathing down my neck."

Mt Albert Grammar headmaster Dale Burden said: "We got a little bit tired of every time they wanted to change something in society they legislated for it rather than educating for it. We educate our kids [about healthy food] and so should the parents."

4. We are sure that there will be school boards and many parents who do not do the responsible thing, and will not strive to ensure that their children are eating properly.

However, for school boards and staff there is significant self-interest in being concerned about the kind of food available for sale at school. There is plenty of evidence to indicate that when their diet is healthy, kids behave better, their attention spans extend, and their test scores rise. That alone should motivate school boards and teachers to work towards forging an alliance with parents over diet.

For those who disregard the responsibility, by far and above the best policy approach would be to inculcate, educate, then name and shame appropriately--not for diet infractions, but for the likely unruly behaviour and less than acceptable test averages.

We believe that a far more powerful approach to parents would be for the Ministry of Health to write a letter once a year to every parent of every enrolled school child, mailed out by each school--should the school decide to participate--which made clear to parents how important a proper diet is to their children, ways to get information and help in planning and delivering a balanced diet, the likely positive effect upon their children's education, and a clear statement that it is the duty of parents to ensure that these things are done. The letter should be countersigned by the school principal and the student's "form" or "home" teacher.

Anne Tolley has taken a small step in the struggle to reform our sub-standard state education system. A small step, but a good one.

Anne Tolley, Minister of Education: S-Award Class I for actions in the course of duty that are Smart, Sound, and Salutary.

More Greenist Nonsense

Cordial, Anyone?

It seems that Gordon "Debt-slaver" Brown has filled his government with ideologues, fellow travellers and the barking mad. Presumably he finds them to be kindred spirits and he has reproduced after his own kind.

Sir Jonathon Porritt is the British government's “green adviser”. He chairs the government's Sustainable Development Commission. He has finally come out and said in public what greenists clandestinely whisper about in their secret gatherings. In order to combat global warming, the human population will have to be restricted or reduced.

The Times of London, carries a report as follows:

Jonathon Porritt, who chairs the government’s Sustainable Development Commission, says curbing population growth through contraception and abortion must be at the heart of policies to fight global warming. He says political leaders and green campaigners should stop dodging the issue of environmental harm caused by an expanding population.

A report by the commission, to be published next month, will say that governments must reduce population growth through better family planning.

“I am unapologetic about asking people to connect up their own responsibility for their total environmental footprint and how they decide to procreate and how many children they think are appropriate,” Porritt said. “I think we will work our way towards a position that says that having more than two children is irresponsible. It is the ghost at the table. We have all these big issues that everybody is looking at and then you don’t really hear anyone say the “p” word.” . . .

Porritt, a former chairman of the Green party, says the government must improve family planning, even if it means shifting money from curing illness to increasing contraception and abortion.

Now, let's understand that Porritt is not a green persona non grata, at the lunatic fringe of the Greenist movement. He is at its heart. He has official status. He has the imprimatur of government. But he has done us a service insofar as he has made explicit what we have feared implicitly about the Greens all along.

1. Greenism is anti-human. Greenism believes that human beings are the biggest polluting species on the planet. The bottom line is that if pollution (the curbing of which is the ultimate ethic by which all other human action is to be judged) cannot be controlled, there is an ultimate solution at hand to the problem: the human race will have to be curtailed.

It is better to have the ill die, to abort babies, to limit families to two (or one child, or no children) than for man to continue to despoil and pollute the planet.

2. Greenism is statist. It cannot work by persuasion, by converting people to its cause. That is never enough. The danger and the threat is too dire. It must be faced with drastic measures—with, well, force. People must be forced to obey and conform and “be responsible”. Thus the government must move to extend a necessary tyranny over parents and families, controlling how many children they may be permitted to have; the terms and conditions under which they will have them; who may live and who must die—all to meet the desperate threats with which we are allegedly faced.

3. Greenism is totalitarian. The course of humanity upon the earth shows us that there is nothing more dangerous than human beings who believe that the end justifies the means. The achievement of a necessary ideal or greater good becomes so important in the minds of the believer that they would cut any corners to achieve it. Deaths and injustices along the way are regarded as mere collateral damage.

People forget that the Nazi Ultimate Solution grew out of a (then) reasonable proposition, widely believed throughout Germany—that jewry had conspired against Germany in World War I engineering its defeat, and had used its capital and financial resources to keep Germans in subjection. Once this “clear and present danger” became believable, the Ultimate Solution became acceptable. In order for Germany to survive it had to cleanse its world of Jews.

Greenism has filled the world with its talk of a clear and present danger—global warming. The ultimate goal is the salvation of the planet. This end leads Greens to be prepared to do whatever it takes—even to waging war upon the human race.

However, Greenism is cowardly and hypocritical. In comparison, Jim Jones (of Jonestown infamy) was courageous and truthful. Jones believed the authorities were out to get him and his followers. His paranoia led him to believe it would be better for him and his followers to die. So the mass suicide followed. At least Jones and his followers lived out their beliefs in a kind of depraved consistent way.

Greenists, by contrast, lack the courage of their convictions and they say one thing and do another. If Porritt and his fellow Green travelers believe that the world would be better off with less people, he and they should lead the way by taking their own lives. They should become faithful witnesses to their cause by self-sacrifice for the race and the planet, rather than hectoring everyone else.

One would expect that the Greenist movement--at least all those in it who agree with Porritt--would be gathering devotees and believers into groups, writing their collective witness and testimony to the world, and for the sake of the planet drinking “Jonestown cordial” in acts of mass suicide. Then at least we could regard them as people of a measure of integrity, albeit worthy of our pity.

But as it stands Greenists of the ilk of Porritt are contemptible. They lack the courage of their convictions. They are without any basic integrity. Standing on their soap-boxes, three feet above contradiction, they lecture others to do as they say, but not as they do. They are the moral and intellectual pygmies of our age. We challenge them to lead by example.

If they really believe what they are advocating for others, they should lead the way and help the planet by getting off it. If they are not so prepared to act, we are entitled to conclude that their cause is disbelieved by them and, therefore, Greenists of Porritt's ilk should be ignored when it comes to stewardship over the environment.

The S-Files

The Passing of Spin and Spiteful Partisanship

Contra Celsum has decided to present John Key, Prime Minister of New Zealand with an S-Award.

Citation

The Government has opened a first front to combat the economic downturn in New Zealand. John Key recently announced a cluster of changes aimed at helping smaller businesses with cash flow, by reducing or removing some of the more onerous and draconian provisions of the tax system.

Critics have slammed the changes as a pathetic whimper, when a big bang is required. But for our money, Key has got it exactly right.

1. "Micro" is where the real action is. Removing some of the senseless and unnecessary dead weight of bureaucracy from business and freeing up cash flow may not seem like much to those wedded to the grand, the symbolic, and the titanesque, but it is precisely what needs to be done. While it may be acceptable for big-box retailers to shout "Big Is Good" we believe it is completely unacceptable for governments to adopt a similar posture. Such grandiloquence, we suspect, has more to assuage their own demands for the historic and the need to manufacture their own moments of destiny.

Key shows that he understands that it is private capital and private labour that generates sustainable, long-term economic wealth and economic growth. Government can help by getting out of the way as much as possible.

2. Key has stated clearly what he believes the true role of government is in these times. He has also made clear what it is not. This is a salutary change. He has artgued that it is not the role of the government to become the economic engine of the country. One shudders to think where former Prime Minister Clark and her coterie would have led us by now. (Drastic slash and burn measures, huge increases in government spending, empty symbolic actions like nationalising key industries, higher taxes, and so forth. And, oh, we forgot--parading like mutton dressed as lamb around the world stage.)

Read carefully the following account of Key's remarks in the New Zealand Herald and you will get a sense of just how commonsensical and realistic he appears to be in tackling this challenge.

Speaking after outlining a $480 million relief package for small business, John Key said the role of the Government was not to become the economic engine of the country "but to do all it could to keep the engine humming, tuned and free to go up a gear".

And its actions to stave off the crisis should not undermine the economy in the future.

"This is a very fine balancing act between doing more, ensuring confidence is out there, but also making sure we don't blow up the Crown," he said.

"There is a limit here to what can happen. There has got to be a balance so we don't get downgraded as a country or at least don't precipitate a downgrade.

"A short-term sugar fix today could lead to a diet of debt later."

3. Key is not wasting his time and energy blaming the previous government for the problems--although there is plenty that could be sheeted home fairly and properly. However tempting, he has avoided the trap. (One groans to recall how the previous government, even after being in government nine years, routinely blamed the former National government for every continuing problem, or answered criticisms by claiming, "Yes, but we are better than they were." What a relief to be freed from such public and dispiriting peurility.)

4. If Key continues in the "removing impediments to the economy" vein, and focuses upon the details, the micro-economic realities, the positive impact will be far greater and extensive than all who are wedded to statist solutions could possibly conceive. It is at the micro-level that true wealth creation takes place. To remove impediments at the micro-level is like removing leg irons from a marathon runner--and not just "a" marathon runner, but hundreds of thousands of them. Every one of them is likely to perform better as a result.

5. Finally, we wish to acknowledge that Key has a Douglas-esque mantle about him. Sure, different personality, different style. But he conveys a clear conviction and sense about what needs to be done and where we need to go to address the fundamental problems. There is a realism that inspires confidence. He does not waste time trying to gild the lily. But neither does he sensationalise.

He reminds us a great deal of Roger Douglas at his best--albeit without the "shock and awe components" although to be fair to Douglas, the Muldoonist garotte that was choking the life out of New Zealand required radical action. Douglas delivered--warts and all. We are intrigued to see that political commentator, John Armstrong sees the influence of Douglas upon Key in this most recent announcement and that it is not a bad thing.

Been there, done that. Sir Roger Douglas had some sage advice for John Key prior to the Prime Minister unveiling his Government's $480 million small and medium business "relief package" yesterday.

Whatever critics might say about Labour's most radical and most polarising finance minister, there is no dispute Sir Roger was a dab hand at selling his policies to voters during difficult economic times in the 1980s.

He suggested the Government - likely facing deep and prolonged recession - follow his example and take the public into its confidence. It should explain exactly what was happening to the economy, what it was doing about that and be honest about the downsides, as well as the upsides, of policies tackling the crisis.

Otherwise, the public would start thinking there was a vacuum.

Key has called the government's approach to the economic challenges as a "rolling maul", which for those of you who do not understand the game of rugby, refers to a team of rugby forwards keeping in tight formation, holding the ball up off the ground, and rumbling forward in different shapes and directions, depending upon what the opposition are trying to do. Keeping in tight formation yet responding and adapting as things unfold and eventuate is the essence.

John Key, Prime Minister of New Zealand: S-Award, Class I for actions in the course of public duty that have been Smart, Sound, and Salutary.

Let's See What You are Made Of

Update on the Spectre of a Trade War

In an interview with Fox News, President Obama has come out and expressed disapproval of the "Buy America" clause in the House version of the stimulus bill, which would require that all iron and steel used in federally funded construction be sourced completely from the US. We blogged recently on how this risks re-igniting a trade war which would surely send the world into a deep depression.

As we expected there has been a strong reaction from United States' trading partners. For example, The Times reports:

The European Union warned the US yesterday against plunging the world into depression by adopting a planned “Buy American” policy, intensifying fears of a trade war.

The EU threatened to retaliate if the US Congress went ahead with sweeping measures in its $800 billion (£554 billion) stimulus plan to restrict spending to American goods and services.

Gordon Brown was caught in the crossfire as John Bruton, the EU Ambassador to Washington, said that “history has shown us” where the closing of markets leads — a clear reference to the Depression of the 1930s, triggered by US protectionist laws.

Last night Mr Obama gave a strong signal that he would remove the most provocative passages from the Bill.

“I agree that we can’t send a protectionist message,” he said in an interview with Fox TV. “I want to see what kind of language we can work on this issue. I think it would be a mistake, though, at a time when worldwide trade is declining, for us to start sending a message that somehow we’re just looking after ourselves and not concerned with world trade.”

However, it is not at all clear what might be done. The Bill belongs to the Congress in the end: Obama's hands are tied. Presidential power is power to persuade, not command. He cannot control what goes into the Bill or what is taken out of it. And there is strong Democratic support for protectionism, it would seem. According to the Sydney Morning Herald today, the Senate Democrats have extended the "Buy America" rule to include all goods and services funded by the federal government as a result of this Bill.

This is unbelievable, but presumably true. We are looking at the beginnings of a genuine trade war--somewhat akin to a rogue state mobilising its armed forced prior to an invasion. The options available to Obama are limited, as the Sydney Morning Herald notes:

Mr Obama has no power to knock out the individual provisions; he can only veto the entire bill. His alternatives are to ensure the clause is either removed, he is given a waiver clause, or it is somehow made consistent with existing trade law.

We doubt very much that if Buy America were to remain in the final bill Obama would veto it. He has invested far too much political capital in getting a stimulus bill passed, and we know that he has demonstrated strong protectionist instincts in the past. If it remains in the bill and is signed by Obama, we would expect massive and swift trade retaliation, plus a host of legal challenges under existing treaties and cases before the World Trade Organization. The genie would be out of the bottle.

There may be a significant risk that New Zealand would be caught in the cross fire and effectively shut out of our export markets. If that were to happen we should run a poll on how long the dole queues in New Zealand would stretch. On the other hand, maybe we would weather the storm better than most. In a trade sense, New Zealand is quite non-aligned. It is friends with all, and enemies of none. Moreover, it produces foodstuffs which would likely continue to be in high global demand and escape the worst of protectionist measures--particularly in the Middle East and Asia. Depressions lead people to focus upon the basics--and there is nothing more basic than food.

On the other hand New Zealand has some significant structural and "secular" problems that make it vulnerable and weak. We labour under the burden of generations of socialist welfare and entitlement policies, so that over half our households depend upon government payments to live--and that is after having gone through nine years of economic growth and prosperity. A significant and growing number of people are unemployable, will never work, and will take from others all of their lives. Our notoriously low savings rate coupled with our propensity to high debt and consumer spending means that we are as dependant upon overseas lenders as a drug addict on the next fix. The Athenian dogma of human rights and entitlements is a poisonous brew that kills in the end.

In the event of a severe downturn, the entitlement-millstone would get bigger and heavier; government finances would deteriorate rapidly, and an international credit downgrade would be almost inevitable. That would push the cost of borrowing up for everyone, including the government. And so the vicious cycle would turn.

If a world-wide depression were to eventuate, it would likely not be a pretty sight. Let's hope "Buy America" gets skewered.

A Politician Foolishly Believing His Press

What On Earth To Make of Kevin Rudd

The Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd recently wrote a 7700 word essay entitled The Global Financial Crisis. It has been published in The Monthly (Feb 2009, No 42). In the essay, written apparently during his holiday, Mr Rudd calls for a new world economic order. (Choke, choke.)

To get a sense of the grandiloquent and grandiose nature of the essay consider the following "lead" in The Monthly:

In "The Global Financial Crisis", Kevin Rudd offers a comprehensive and lucid analysis of the current economic situation. In mid January, while on annual leave, the prime minister wrote this 7700-word essay that brings historical perspective to bear on the causes, precedents and ramifications of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Sheeting home much of the blame to the neo-liberal agenda that has prevailed in Western economies over the past 30 years, he outlines a series of broad reforms - many of which, he argues, must be undertaken on an unprecedented, global scale. This major essay on the most pressing issue of our time is a unique contribution from a sitting prime minister.

"From time to time in human history there occur events of a truly seismic significance, events that mark a turning point between one epoch and the next, when one orthodoxy is overthrown and another takes its place. The significance of these events is rarely apparent as they unfold: it becomes clear only in retrospect, when observed from the commanding heights of history. By such time it is often too late to act to shape the course of such events and their effects on the day-to-day working lives of men and women and the families they support ..."

Well, we are obviously in the presence of greatness. The modern politician seems to represent a breed of people running around in desperate search for a crisis to provide a backdrop before which they can both proclaim and declaim in theatrical flourishes the truly historic times in which they lead. Crises have become little more than photo-ops. Since photo-ops are part of a politician's necessary wardrobe, we had better hunt them out.

Sadly for Rudd, the Aussies have no respect for theatrics--at least other people's. After all, no-one likes competition. So poor old Kevin has had his "photo-op" dissected in the Sydney Morning Herald. All this proves that there are dimwits out there who are obviously unaware of the epoch changing nature of our times and the implicit greatness of those trying to lead the nation through them.

Rudd neo-liberal with the facts

Gerard Henderson
February 3, 2009

So, now we all know how Kevin Rudd spent his summer holiday at Kirribilli House on Sydney Harbour - writing an almost 8000-word article on the global financial crisis for The Monthly.

The Prime Minister's message is a simple one. The world has just witnessed the overthrow of what he terms neo-liberalism, which he defines as "that particular brand of free-market fundamentalism, extreme capitalism and excessive greed which became the economic orthodoxy of our time". Rudd maintains that neo-liberalism triumphed about 30 years ago, when the governments led by Margaret Thatcher in Britain and Ronald Reagan in the United States gave political voice to the "neo-liberal movement of anti-tax, anti-regulation, anti-government conservatives".

Towards the end of his essay, he writes "the political home of neo-liberalism in Australia is, of course, the Liberal Party itself" and criticises John Howard for the Coalition's performance. Rudd specifically castigates his predecessor for failing to do enough to regulate the financial system.

The Prime Minister was scheduled to address the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week. In view of the impact of the global financial crisis in Australia, he withdrew and sent Julia Gillard in his place.

The Deputy Prime Minister addressed a reception there last Thursday and said Australia came to the current financial challenge with many remarkable strengths: "Australia has strong financial institutions. Of the 11 banks around the world that are rated AA and above, four of them are Australian. Australia has an AAA foreign currency rating. We have open and competitive markets backed up by a world-class financial and prudential regulatory system." Gillard pointed out that Australia has an independent Reserve Bank and, at the end of the last financial year, had a significant budget surplus.

Who do you believe? According to the view from Kirribilli, Howard and the Coalition were heavily into neo-liberalism and were opposed to taxation and regulation. But according to the view from Davos, Australia has the best financial regulation system in the world, along with a strong budget outcome which was obviously contributed to by taxation. Since Labor has been in office for just over a year, this cannot be solely the work of Rudd.

The essential problem with Rudd's essay is that it is ahistorical.

"Ahistorical". Now there is a polite way of saying that Rudd has been writing a work of fiction. He has created a fantasy history. True. It is an exciting one. It has demons and evils. It has threats to civilisation. It has the age old battle between good (Rudd) and evil (neo-liberalism). It would have made Tolkien proud.

The fact is that what he terms neo-liberalism has not prevailed in Britain, the US or Australia. Moreover, if it did, then the likes of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown in Britain, Bill Clinton in the US, and Bob Hawke and Paul Keating in Australia did nothing to turn it back. The conservatives in these three nations did not substantially cut regulation or taxation or spending (along with the welfare state that it underpins). Indeed, in Australia, it was Hawke and Keating who started the economic reform process in the early 1980s. Rudd mentions this briefly in his essay but does not seem to appreciate that this reality undermines his thesis.

The Prime Minister's dalliance with theory has been inconsistent. Writing in The Monthly in November 2006, shortly before he became Labor leader, Rudd used the term "brutopia" - which he linked to Howard - to refer to what he variously termed free-market fundamentalism, neo-liberalism and unrestrained market capitalism. Yet it was never clear what he had in mind.

Rudd is rightly proud of his wife's achievements in business. Yet Therese Rein's business success essentially resulted from the privatisation of formerly government-run employment services. And Rudd chose to sound off against capitalism in The Monthly, which is run by the wealthy property developer Morry Schwartz.

So, clearly, Rudd is not opposed to business, or even capitalism. The Prime Minister made this clear in the lead-up to the 2007 election when he described himself as an economic conservative. But now he has written again, bagging what he now terms "extreme capitalism and unrestrained greed" and criticising conservatives.

The Prime Minister makes some valuable points in his very detailed essay. Certainly there is reason to attack greed, incompetence and inadequate regulation in the financial markets. The errors that occurred have been acknowledged by Alan Greenspan (the former chairman of the US Federal Reserve) and Sir John Gieve (the deputy governor of the Bank of England).

However, what mistakes were made occurred when both social democrats and conservatives were in office. Also, the essential cause of the subprime housing crisis in the US was not harsh neo-liberalism, but rather the misguided attempt to make it possible for low-income earners and welfare recipients to purchase their own homes. This policy was introduced when the social democrat Jimmy Carter was in the White House.

Australia will suffer from the global financial crisis. But our financial institutions are stronger now than they were during the recession of the early 1990s. And the fact that Rudd Labor can readily put the budget into deficit stands testimony to the fact that John Howard and Peter Costello produced strong surpluses during the boom years. This was not achieved by George Bush and the conservatives in the US, nor by the Blair/Brown social democrats in Britain.

Obviously, Rudd and his colleagues are constrained about what they can do to ward off or limit a recession in Australia. But they can do something to junk or delay two pieces of coming legislation that will act as a disincentive to employment. Namely, the re-introduction of unfair dismissal laws covering small businesses and the start in 2010 of what will be a tax on carbon. This would not be a concession to conservatives or neo-liberalism. Just common sense.

Gerard Henderson is executive director of The Sydney Institute.

Now here are the disturbing questions. Does Rudd really believe his rendition of recent economic history? If yes, he is neither intelligent nor educated. Australia is being led by an ignoramus.

If no, (he does not really believe it) why dissemble, distort, or lie? What can his motive be? What is he trying to achieve? One is reminded of the recent Labour government in New Zealand which spent a great deal to time, heat, and energy attempting to demonise Roger Douglas and the economic reform programme of the late eighties and nineties--distancing themselves from it at every opportunity. At the same time, when pressed, they defended and supported pretty much everything Douglas and his successors argued for and achieved (removal of tarrifs, free trade, independent Reserve Bank, Fiscal Responsibility Act, free floating currency, the GST tax regime, and so on). How can such inconsistency, such hypocrisy be justified? What kind of breed of people are modern political leaders?

One is left with the unpalatable conclusion that such economy of the truth and dissembling of the facts is believed to be simply part of the political game--which increasingly requires a willing suspension of disbelief amongst those who play the game (politicians) and those who watch it being played (the people).

It is ironic that Rudd, in proclaiming his new epoch for humanity, employs the same old political acting tricks that establish immediately that the new epoch is nothing more than yesterday's re-run.

Maybe, though, Kevin Rudd will make a lasting contribution to western discourse. Maybe (if the people refuse to suspend their disbelief) his name will become synonymous with new terms to describe the emptiness and vanity of modern political leaders.

ruddism: (n) the act of painting one's times by a politician as momentous in order to project oneself as historic, significant, and important.

ruddite: (n, adj) an extravagant, ridiculous claim to greatness; grandiloquent posturing; Don Quixote-like behaviour.

Cindy Kiro is Moving On

Was Dr Kiro the Problem, or the Office Itself

We have posted recently on some of the characteristics of the Liberal Mind. Dr Cindy Kiro, the Commissioner for Children for most of the years of the previous Labour Government, has recently announced her retirement from the position. No doubt there will be a collective sigh of relief in many quarters.

In so many ways, Dr Kiro has been a walking epitome of the Liberal Mind. She conceived of her role and office as a spokesperson for children to be one of advocating the removal of restraints and controls, training and discipline which inhibit the natural and intrinsic goodness of children. Therefore, while families were sometimes good, they were certainly not necessary to the proper raising of children. They could be replaced at any time, and relatively easily, by the organs and committees of the State. All that was needed was more state funding to do the task.

True to the Liberal Mind, Kiro had only a one-dimensional, simplistic response to family violence, breakdown, and abuse: a massive increase in state regulation, control, and supervision of families to remove the conditions of abuse and create a conducive environment for rearing children. If only that were done, the intrinsic goodness of parents and children would shine forth.

Family Integrity has provided a trenchant summary of the symptoms of Kiro's incompetence, inconsistency, and naive superficiality.

Cindy Kiro’s term ending!

Herald on Sunday 25 January 2009

Controversial Children’s Commissioner Cindy Kiro will finish her five-year term in April. The Ministry of Social Development has advertised the high-profile role, with an annual salary of $195,100 . Critics have accused Kiro as being a toothless figurehead, but she has defended her record as an independent voice for children.

Family First Comment : Cindy Kiro has been openly hostile towards Family First, and in fact to any people who may have a Christian faith - no matter how qualified they are to speak up.

Apart from completely misrepresenting the facts in the smacking debate and mispresenting Family First’s position, last February she attempted to discredit the 300,000+ NZ’ers who had signed the petitions on the anti-smacking law by saying that previous generations of parents didn’t parent as positively and were less qualified in knowing how to raise their children than parents of today !!

We also would like to know why she was

- silent after the pathetic sentence handed down to the caregivers of Ngatikauri Ngati who abused the little 3 year old to death

- silent during the Trevor Mallard incident during the “It’s Never OK” Violence Campaign funded by the government.

- silent when the prostitution report from South Auckland was released last year highlighting the number of young teenagers prostituting themselves

- silent when Police refused to prosecute a 21 year old who got a 13 year old pregnant (after starting the relationship when she was 11)

- silent over the recent cancelling of the sentence for a woman who pleaded guilty to infanticide
- silent over the ultimate child abuse of abortion

….yet is more interested in the rights of children to be able to purchase spray cans of paint for the purposes of tagging, and wanting to monitor every child with a social worker as soon as they are born!!!

The problem is not just with Dr Kiro but with the office itself. Children’s interests are best served in the context of their own family . Government support for children must be through their families, not apart from families. Any office or structure which even appears to separate children from their parents and families will be destructive in the long run - no matter how well intentioned. Laws are already in place which protect children in seriously dysfunctional families.

If the National government is serious about doing away with unnecessary governmental spending , this would be a good place to start - rather than just cancelling a few conferences. So why are they advertising for a new Commissioner?????

The question is worthy of being put: Why have a Commissioner for Children at all? The assumption of an "independent" voice for children--that is, independent of their parents, or considering the needs of children outside of the context of family, is an oxymoron. Far better, we would suggest to change the Office to a Commission for Parents and Families. But better still do away with the Children's Commission and the Families Commission entirely.

At best they are an irresponsible and inevitably ineffectual waste of people's money. At worst, they inevitably undermine and suborn the institution of the Family itself to perpetual dependence upon the State.

Meditation on the Text of the Week

As Meek as a Lamb, as Hard as Steel

And now, Lord, take note of their threats, and grant that Thy bond-servants may speak Thy word with all confidence.
Acts 4: 29

People who sit in darkness have very little, if any, understanding of what the Bible really is. They cannot help but see it through the glasses of their Unbelief. To them, at best, it is just one more religious book amongst many, possibly to be respected because of its age or significance in shaping human culture. At worst, it is disparaged as a book of superstitious fables and a monument to the collective ignorance of ignorant ages.

But the Bible remains what it always has been: the very Word of the Living God. Every syllable, every clause carries behind it the eternal and infinite integrity of the Lord Himself. Therefore, the Bible is powerful—not in the sense of some shamanistic divination such as tea-leaves or bones—but in the sense that God has bound Himself to His Word to carry it out and apply its truth to mankind.

When the Word of God comes to a people in the Spirit—which means that the Spirit of God is removing the glasses of Unbelief and is causing men to see and believe the truth of God—usually those who remain in Unbelief react with great hostility and anger—particularly those who control the structures and institutions of power at the time. This is understandable insofar as the powerful of the day find they are confronted with a Power beyond their control or influence. The implicit threat to their power base and the Unbelief upon which it depends usually generates great enmity against the Christians.

Thus it was that Caiaphas, High Priest of the Jewish people, declared that it was politically expedient that the Messiah had to be executed for the sake of everyone else. What Caiaphas meant, of course, is that killing the Lord would preserve the power base of his faction. The following conversation, recorded in the Gospel of John, provides the prototype which has applied when the powerful of the earth are confronted by a Power over which they have no control, and their subjects are turning from Unbelief to belief in the Lord as revealed in the Bible.

Therefore, the chief priests and the Pharisees convened a council, and were saying, “What are we doing? For this man (Christ) is performing many signs. If we let Him go on like this, all men will believe in Him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.”

But a certain one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, “You know nothing at all, nor do you take into account that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation should not perish.”

Then, John adds:

Now this he did not say on his own initiative; but being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the nation; and that not for the nation only, but that He might also gather together into one the children of God who are scattered abroad. So from that day on they planned to kill Him.

John 10: 47—53

Caiaphas was not only a prophet, he was also a prototype of how political leaders and governors in places of Unbelief respond and react when the Word of God comes with power amongst their subjects. There are the inevitable warnings, threats, intimidation, fines, seizing of children and property, imprisonment, and eventually murder. But none of these suffice. For the Word of God represents and is controlled by the infinite, eternal and unchangeable God. His Word accomplishes what He determines, the opposition of the powerful of the earth notwithstanding. When God converts a soul from Unbelief to Belief there is no power of earth that can successfully gainsay or prevent the conversion.

So, if Caiaphas provides a prototype of how kings and princes of the earth take their stand against the Lord and His Messiah, our text for this week provides a prototype of how God's people are to respond to their threats and intimidation.

Firstly, there is the formal action of asking the Lord to deal with those who oppose. Lord, note their threats. Mark them. When facing opposition, particularly political opposition the citizens of Jerusalem are not to respond in kind, deploying the venal weapons of the enemy. Instead they ask the King of all kings to “sort them out”.

Secondly, they pray for continuing empowerment from God to carry on doing exactly what they have been doing—which is to proclaim the Word of God with all confidence and boldness—that Word which tears down nations and shatters the rock.

Thirdly, they pray that as they do this, God might accompany the Word of God with power—performing healing, signs and wonders. The particular signs and wonders which belonged to the apostolic age—signs which authenticated the Word and the Apostles as God's authoritative and inspired spokesmen, and which warned Israel of imminent judgment and destruction (which eventually came in AD 70—have ceased with the passing of that age.

Nevertheless there are signs and wonders which continue to attend the powerful application of the Gospel to human hearts to this day. Central amongst them is the powerful transformation of broken lives coming out of death to life and of pointed and powerful answers to prayer. There is often a sense that people are in the very presence of God and that they stand upon holy ground. Things are happening far above and beyond what they could ask or think.

This is how the Kingdom comes. These are the weapons of our warfare. They are powerful for the tearing down of every fortress and edifice raised up against the Lord and His Anointed.