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Tag Archives: Ideology
Are We Innocent?
Posted on March 14, 2017 by Mandated Memoranda
Everyone's running around with their hair on fire. If it isn't one thing, it's another. In a context relevant to his time, G. K. Chesterton wrote:
A silent anarchy is eating out our society. I must pause upon the expression; because the true nature of anarchy is mostly misapprehended. It is not in the least necessary that anarchy should be violent; nor is it necessary that it should come from below. A government [and press] may grow anarchic as much as a people…
Anarchy is that condition of mind or methods in which you cannot stop yourself. It is the loss of that self-control which can return to the normal. It is not anarchy because men are permitted to begin uproar, extravagance, experiment, peril. It is anarchy when people cannot end these things…
Though Chesterton wrote solely about the State, we take the liberty to reflect our current situation by adding to his text: the Press. Both, in our day, are anarchic, if only at their extremes:
…The State [and the Press have] suddenly and quietly gone mad. [They're] talking nonsense; and [they] can't stop…The modern world is insane, not so much because it admits the abnormal as because it cannot recover the normal…
Now the name of all this is Anarchy. It not only does not know what it wants, but it does not even know what it hates…These people have not the decision and detachment of the doctrinal ages. They…do a monstrous action and still [cannot] see it is monstrous. Wherever they make a stride they make a rut. They cannot stop their own thoughts, though their thoughts are pouring into the pit…
After giving several examples of extremes from which his society could not recover, he says:
The vital point to which to return is this. That it is not necessarily, nor even specially, an anarchy in the populace. It is an anarchy in the organ of government [and the press]. It is the magistrates [and journalist/commentators]—voices of the governing class—who cannot distinguish between cruelty and carelessness…
In our time, we have ravings about Russian involvement in our elections, but these people don't consider their implied provocations. We must have immediate "pay fors" (which will happen anyway via other actions) for the three phased American Health Care Act out of a principle of austerity when millions of working and middle class voters will suffer health insurance loss if a replacement for the Affordable Care Act doesn't pass.
To loosely quote Chesterton, the anarchic voices of the governing class and press cannot distinguish between cruelty and carelessness. All the examples cited, and these are only the most prominent ones today, seem driven by blind adherence to ideology, and sometimes, no ideology.
Someday, a Man, who is King of Kings, will address each one of us:
…Then the King will say to those [i.e., sheep] on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.'
Then the righteous will answer him, saying, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? …And the King will answer them, 'Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.'
"Then he will say to those [i.e., goats] on his left, 'Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.'
Then they also will answer, saying, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?' Then he will answer them, saying, 'Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.'
Matthew 25:33-37, 40, 41-44, 45 English Standard Version (ESV)
Perhaps your hands are clean of this anarchy, perhaps not. This existence we've been given is not a game. Consider your life. Consider yourself forewarned.
Blood Red (America), The Call – Topic, YouTube, Lyrics
Posted in Ponderings	| Tagged Anarchy, Carelessness, Chesterton, Cruelty, Forewarned, Goats, Governing Class, Government, Ideology, Matthew 25, Normal, Press, Self-Control, Sheep, The Call
How Did We Get Here? – by Bernhardt Writer
Posted on October 10, 2016 by Mandated Memoranda
Matt Hennessy, writing for City Journal, characterized the state of the 2016 US election. He blames the Democrats for our situation. But, in my opinion, both parties are complicit:
…They've spent the last 100 years expanding the scope of executive authority, granting the federal administrative agencies the power of judge, jury, and executioner over their ever-widening dominion. If liberals and progressives didn't want that awesome, intrusive power to fall into the wrong hands, perhaps they should have heeded the warnings of small-government conservatives, who railed for a century against the bloat, rot, and corruption they saw metastasizing within the District of Columbia. Perhaps they shouldn't have declared the U.S. Constitution—with its bill of rights and enumerated powers—to be an antiquated relic.
John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge chronicled the rise of progressivism and statism over the past 100 years in their book: The Fourth Revolution: The Global Race to Reinvent the State. We reviewed it here on this blog over a multi-week period in 2015. Here are some excerpts describing progressivism's rise:
Beatrice Webb's vision—the state as the epitome of reason and truth—enabled her to develop the ideology adopted by pro-statists worldwide. To her, the state stood for: planning versus confusion, merit versus privilege, and science versus prejudice…Why cause revolution when the same change could be brought about more lastingly through subversion of society using propaganda and recognized committees of experts.
Beatrice and her husband Sidney founded the Fabian Society as guardians of this socialist transformation. They established the London School of Economics to train a global cohort of social engineers…The Webbs also founded the New Statesman, a weekly review of politics and literature, as the clarion of their revolution.
In the period 1905-1915, the Webbs helped enact redistributive taxation to pay for [British] programs and lessened the stigma of "Poor Laws." The poor became "victims," not layabouts…They embraced eugenics as eagerly as they did town planning. The Webbs trusted the judgment of professional experts over the "average sensual man" when it came to bettering the life of commoners.
A prominent liberal ally of the Webbs, John Maynard Keynes, advocated for government intervention to aid Adam Smith's hidden hand of the market. Although he spelled out caveats to his philosophy, these were conveniently forgotten over the years. His philosophy, Keynesianism, still powers big government.
The British Statist model was adopted by Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, Franco, and Peron. They all blended Hegelian state worship into their dictatorships and used the state to control their economies. America, however, took a different turn under the Roosevelts.
Theodore Roosevelt (US president 1901-1909) acknowledged that the Webbs were right when they said that laissez-faire capitalism was over. He established regulatory bodies to constrain the power of corporations over the American people…By not embracing European style statism, with its comprehensive welfare state, he squared-the-circle through his progressive republicanism and saved the US from Europe's excesses.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, for his part, imposed tighter regulation instead of nationalizing broad sectors of the economy in the face of economic collapse and world war. World War II demonstrated big government's ability to marshal all of industry to the service of war through detailed planning, financial incentives, and coercion.
The same occurred on both sides of the Atlantic and the Pacific…When Winston Churchill returned to power in October 1951, his government did nothing to roll back the welfare state. In the closing days of World War II, international supervisory organizations like the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank were created under Keynes influence as a result of the Bretton Woods international agreements.
In his article titled: "It's Not Your Founding Fathers' Republic Any More," which we reviewed in 2014 on this blog, Myron Magnet, former Editor-in-Chief of City Journal, says:
President Wilson established in the WWI era the doctrine of the "Living Constitution" administered by the Supreme Court thereby codifying judicial activism that undid civil liberty victories in the aftermath of the Civil War. Secondly, President Roosevelt established prior to and during the WWII era unelected extra-governmental commissions (aka agencies) that have independent legislative, administrative, and judicial powers within themselves. Agencies are created as a matter of course now by legislative action. FDR also strengthened the power of the judiciary to act as a permanent constitutional convention amending the document through their decisions.
Fred Siegel characterized the increasing alienation of the liberal left from common US citizens in his book: The Revolt Against the Masses: How Liberalism Has Undermined the Middle Class. We reviewed his book here and here in 2014. This is a brief excerpt from our review:
On July 30, 1916, at 2:08 AM, saboteurs caused a one kiloton explosion on Black Tom Island off the New Jersey coast, near Liberty Island, in NYC harbor. Two million pounds of munitions on their way to the allies were detonated through a series of fires.
This sabotage is viewed as the proximate cause for President Wilson to denounce Germany's supporters in America as "creatures" of "disloyalty and anarchy [who] must be crushed." He pushed for and got the Sedition Act of 1918 passed. The Sedition Act extended the Espionage Act of 1917.
Whereas, pre-war Progressives {in the US] hoped to reform a nation of immigrants grounded in the Protestant ethic, Liberals objected to wartime conscription, civil liberties repression, Prohibition, and the first Red Scare. They saw middle class values as a continuation of WWI repressions.
"Like most sensible people," liberal Harold Edmund Stearns said, "I regard Prohibition as an outrage and a direct invitation to revolution."
Those supporting Communism and the Soviets used the Sacco and Vanzetti trial (1926-27) as a wedge to draw prominent liberals to their cause. Drawing on declassified Comintern documents, Stephen Koch, in his Double Lives: Spies and Writers in the Secret Soviet War of Ideas Against the West, explains that Willi Münzenberg, the Comintern's master propagandist, intended:
to create for the right-thinking non-Communist West… the belief that…to criticize or challenge Soviet policy was the unfailing mark of a bad, bigoted, and probably stupid person, while support was equally infallible proof of a forward-looking mind committed to all that was best for humanity and mankind by an uplifting refinement of sensibility.
Münzenberg thought the "the idea of America" had to be countered. Koch noted that Soviet sympathizers used events such as the trial:
to instill a reflexive loathing of the United States and its people, to undermine the myth of the Land of Opportunity, the United States would be shown as an almost insanely xenophobic place, murderously hostile to foreigners.
In 1928, H. G. Wells described his alternative in his book The Open Conspiracy: Blue Prints for a World Revolution (revised and republished as What Are We to Do with Our Lives?) where he states: "the [instinctive fellowship] of the highly competent" ruling class would subject the masses to "the great processes of social reconstruction." and, through their rule, "escape from the distressful pettiness and mortality of the individual life." He also wrote:
We no longer want that breeding swarm of hefty sweaty bodies, without which the former civilizations could not have endured, we want watchful and understanding guardians and drivers of complex delicate machines, which can be mishandled and brutalized and spoilt all too easily.
…In this light, American liberalism of the early twentieth century, as distinct from classical liberalism of the nineteenth century, was driven by hatred of the common man, his morals, and his liberty.
Reflecting on the impact of such "liberal" ideology, Kenneth Minogue wrote: Alien Powers: The Pure Theory of Ideology. We reviewed it in this blog. Here is a synopsis of Minogue's thought on the outcome of implementing such philosophy in our society:
In Western societies, individuals follow customs or conduct projects of which others may dislike or disapprove and the result may be conflict.
However, Western society is predominantly peaceful in spite of potential (or actual) conflict because individuals master internalized rules of law and morality. Poverty, inequality, and disappointment are inevitable consequences of open participation in a risk based society even when it is free from iniquitous societal distortions (e.g., American slavery).
Ideologists say these consequences result from hidden structural flaws that can only be remedied through the destruction of the prevailing system. One must attain the perfection of social harmony. If material possessions cause envy, then all possessions must be jointly owned. Rather than insisting on moral decency to curb envy, ideologists will abolish ownership altogether.
This same approach, rooted in externals, is applied to all inequality and disappointment. Transcendent principles (e.g., morality) are not applicable to unruly minds. Once harmony is achieved there will be no need for the transcendent; all humanity will become one in thinking and affections.
Finally, Myron Magnet writes on how Tocqueville foresaw the "End of Democracy in America" in the 1830s. Magnet, speaking of current society says:
Today's sovereign…forces men to act as well as suppresses [their] action…As Tocqueville observed, "It is the state that has undertaken virtually alone to give bread to the hungry, aid and shelter to the sick, and work to the idle."
…And whatever traditional American mores defined as good and bad, moral and immoral, base and praiseworthy, the sovereign has redefined and redefined until all such ideas have lost their meaning. Is it any wonder that today's Americans feel that they have no say in how they are governed—or that they don't understand how that came about?
Such oppression is "less degrading" in democracies because, since the citizens elect the sovereign, "each citizen, hobbled and reduced to impotence though he may be, can still imagine that in obeying he is only submitting to himself."
Moreover, democratic citizens love equality more than liberty, and the love of equality grows as equality itself expands. Don't let him have or be more than me. Tocqueville despairingly concluded, "The only necessary condition for centralizing public power in a democratic society is to love equality or to make a show of loving it. Thus the science of despotism, can be reduced…to a single principle."
By this last statement, Tocqueville anticipated the controlling idea of Orwell's classic allegory, Animal Farm: "All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others."
Progressivism used to stand for progress and truth. But, collectively, we've abandoned that paradigm for historical revision and nihilism. Perhaps we should "adjust," as our leaders say, to a new normal: terrorism, crime, corruption, and complicity. Perhaps…
But, then I remember that the United States of America was founded not upon blood and soil as other nations were but on ideals summarized in our Declaration of Independence and Preamble of the Constitution.
In case you don't recollect these ideals word for word, the Declaration of Independence says:
…We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…
And the Preamble of the Constitution of the United States of America says:
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
If you profess Christ as Lord and Savior, why should you care about the direction this country is taking? The Prophet Jeremiah spoke to that question in his letter to all those whom King Nebuchadnezzar had taken into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon:
…Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. Jeremiah 29:7 English Standard Version (ESV)
While He dwelt among us, the Lord Jesus Christ pressed home this lesson:
"You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. Matthew 5:43-44 (ESV)
And, while characterizing the whole of God's law, He said:
The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these." Mark 12:31 (ESV)
After all this, maybe you're thinking: "What difference, at this point, does it make?"
I think that this election is about consolidating power of the unconstitutional administrative state and persecuting, either overtly or covertly, those opposed to its decisions versus a return to a constitutional republic of, by, and for the People of the United States of America, however tentative that return seems at the moment.
It's your choice.
Principles for Voting, R. C. Sproul, 27.5 minute MP3, 2012, Associated post, Declaration of Independence courtesy of the National Archives – Charters of Freedom
For your consideration:
Publius Decius Mus (pseudonym) on conserving the Republic
Abraham Lincoln on restoring the Republic after our Civil War
The Constitution of the United States of America.
Refounding of Conservatism
Magnet on Tocqueville foreseeing the End of Democracy in America
Posted in Reviews & Commentary	| Tagged #IAmDecius, Administrative State, Adrian Wooldridge, America, Beatrice Webb, Bigoted, Blood and Soil, Centralized Power, Christ, Churchill, City Journal, Claremont Institute, Classical Liberalism, Common Man, Complicity, Constitution, Constitutional Republic, Corruption, Crime, Declaration of Independence, Despotism, End of Democracy in America, Fred Siegel, H. G. Wells, Hatred, Hegelian State Worship, Historical Revisionism, Idea, Ideology, Jeremiah 29, John Micklethwait, Keynes, Land of Opportunity, Liberalism, liberty, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness, life, Ligonier, Limited Government, Living Constitution, Lord, Mark 12, Matt Hennessy, Matthew 5, Minogue, Morals, Myron Magnet, Nihilism, Preamble, Principles for Voting, Progressivism, Publius Decius Mus, Risk Based Society, Roosevelt, rule of law, Savior, Second Inaugural Address, Sproul, Statism, Structural Flaw, Terror, The Fourth Estate, The Fourth Revolution, The Open Conspiracy, The Pure Theory of Ideology, The Revolt Against the Masses, Tocqueville, Truth, Unconstitutional, United States of America, Vote, We the People, Wilson, Xenophobic
Settled Climate Science
Posted on July 9, 2015 by Mandated Memoranda
Let's admit that ideology and religion figure prominently in the firestorm of climate change. Even though climate changes' proponents decry the opposition, they seem reluctant to remedy the situation.
I always think of a statement attributed to Keynes:
"When my information changes, I alter my conclusions. What do you do, sir?"
We should reconsider our approaches for the sake of the next generation.
Trees do burn but don't let that stop us from replenishing the depleted rain forests all over the world. Plant trees where there were no trees before so long as it does no harm to citizens. Use long proven forest management techniques to reduce wildfire dangers.
Improve wind, solar, biomass, and nuclear power. Make them more efficient, and safer. Even the SDS was for nuclear power once. Consider cleaner fossil fuels instead of abstinence.
Don't keep Africa down. Help them modernize by any means possible unless you favor genocide, enslavement, and shorter lifetimes. Help with energy technology improvements over time. Let the people of Africa rise!
We've got to stop trying to oppress and coerce one another because we think we know what's best for everyone else. Change over time is possible if we're willing to cast off the hard sell, and adapt.
High Park Fire, US Air Force, 22 June 2012, 06:05:53, in the public domain
Posted in Ponderings	| Tagged Adapt, Africa, Alter, Biomass, Burn, Change, Changes, Climate, Climate Change, climate changes, Coercion, Conclusions, Deforestation, Efficient, Enslavement, Firestorm, Forest, Generation, Genocide, Ideology, Information, Keynes, Lifetimes, Next, Nuclear, nuclear power, Oppression, Plant, Port Huron, Power, Proponent, Rain Forest, Reconsider, religion, Remedy, Replenish, Safe, Science, SDS, Settled, Solar, Superstition, Tree, Trees, Wildfire, Wind
The Fourth Revolution – Beatrice and Sidney Webb Laid Foundations for the Welfare State
Posted on May 7, 2015 by Mandated Memoranda
Last week, we reviewed the book: The Fourth Revolution: The Global Race to Reinvent the State, by former Economist Editor in Chief John Micklethwait and Management Editor Adrian Wooldridge. This week, we summarize how two individuals: Beatrice and Sidney Webb, laid sure foundations for the third revolution: the welfare state.
The world lurched leftward in second half of the nineteenth century. The British elite recognized their poor needed support to escape crushing poverty. More insidiously, they realized hands off politics had left them unable to, as Lloyd George would later phrase it in the early twentieth century, "…maintain an A1 Empire with a C3 population." They were falling behind Germany with its successful government intervention in business and social welfare. In response, Britain embraced state activism.
Around the same time period, Abraham Lincoln said: "The legitimate object of government is to do for a community of people whatever they need to have done, but cannot do, at all, or cannot, so well do, for themselves, in their separate and individual capacities." Some would claim him as progressive, others as aspirational .
Marx formulated his communist ideology over the same half century. He theorized that government was merely the way one class controlled another. Once classes were abolished, the government would wither, reduced to the administration of things. The form of government did not much matter to Marx.
By ignoring Thomas Hobbes's statement [not original to him, of course] that a state is necessary for the peaceful conduct of human affairs, Marx prepared the way for dictatorships that treated people as nothing more than things to be administered. The next century would put Marx's theories into practice.
The Webbs
Living on her Victorian father's fortune, Beatrice Potter (b. 1858 – d. 1943) was characterized as: "the cleverest member of one of the cleverest families in the cleverest class of the cleverest nation in the world."
Beatrice met the tireless, brilliant, and homely Sidney Webb in 1890. She was swept off her feet by his vision for expanding government: "collective ownership wherever practicable; collective regulation everywhere else; collective provision according to need for all the impotent and sufferers; and collective taxation in proportion to wealth, especially surplus wealth."
Beatrice Webb's vision—the state as the epitome of reason and truth—enabled her to develop the ideology adopted by pro-statists worldwide. The state stood for: planning versus confusion, merit versus privilege, and science versus prejudice.
Her modus operandi to spread this ideology was one of progressive suffusion. Why cause revolution when the same change could be brought about more lastingly through subversion of society using propaganda and recognized committees of experts.
The Webbs founded the Fabian Society as guardians of this socialist transformation. They established the London School of Economics to train a global cohort of social engineers. The Webbs also founded the New Statesman, a weekly review of politics and literature, as the clarion of their revolution.
Since people are the constituents of the socialist state they wished to build, it made sense, the Webbs said, for Leviathan to regulate society's reproductive practice. They embraced eugenics as eagerly as they did town planning. The Webbs trusted the judgment of professional experts over the "average sensual man" when it came to bettering the life of commoners.
They ingeniously formed the inchoate anxieties and idealism of their age into political action of all three major British parties. The Webbs pushed collectivism using Labour's penchant for social justice, Liberal's national efficiency, and Conservatism's desire to preserve the Empire. Within a generation, they converted educated opinion to the view that the state must provide "a national minimum" of education and social welfare.
In the period 1905-1915, sympathetic British governments passed legislation that provided: free meals for needy school children (1906), old-age pensions (1908), anti-poverty budget provisions (1909), national sickness and unemployment insurance (1911), and sterilization for the unfit (1913).The Webbs helped enact redistributive taxation to pay for these programs and lessened the stigma of "Poor Laws." The poor became "victims," not layabouts.
The Webbs, through their vast influence, helped redefine classical liberal principles. Freedom, which used to mean freedom from external control, became "freedom from want" and equality before the law became "equality of opportunity" and, to a lesser extent, equality of respect. This shift required activist government intervention. The government now provided social services and primary and, to the talented poor, secondary education.
The Webbs were not alone in this socialist revolution. A prominent liberal ally, John Maynard Keynes, advocated for government intervention to aid Adam Smith's hidden hand of the market. Although he spelled out caveats to his philosophy, these were conveniently forgotten over the years. His philosophy, Keynesianism, still powers big government.
Theodore Roosevelt (US president 1901-1909) acknowledged that the Webbs were right when they said that laissez-faire capitalism was over. He established regulatory bodies to constrain the power of corporations over the American people: "The Corporation is the creature of the people, and must not be allowed to become the ruler of the people."
He was not a socialist. He saw capitalism for the wealth creator it was. However, he used state power to make it work better by suppressing "crony capitalism" which arose from the collusion of "corrupt politics" with "corrupt business."
TR's goal was to use the state to provide a "square deal," a safety net in rough times, and to improve the quality of America's workforce. By not embracing European style statism, with its comprehensive welfare state, he squared-the-circle through his progressive republicanism and saved the US from Europe's excesses.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, for his part, imposed tighter regulation instead of nationalizing broad sectors of the economy in the face of economic collapse and world war.
World War II demonstrated big government's ability to marshal all of industry to the service of war through detailed planning, financial incentives, and coercion. The same occurred on both sides of the Atlantic and the Pacific.
In post-war Britain, the Education Act, the National Insurance Act, and the National Health Service Act were formulated by a Conservative (Butler), a Liberal (Beveridge), and a socialist (Bevan), respectively. The Webb's cross-politics approach was further validated when the Conservative Party, under Winston Churchill, returned to power in October 1951 and did nothing to roll back the welfare state.
On the continent, the state ran companies, universities, research institutes, libraries, and broadcasting corporations. In the closing days of World War II, international supervisory organizations like the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank were created under Keynes influence as a result of the Bretton Woods international agreements.
As counterpoint, Philip Hamburger writes in his book about US executive branch agencies that administer regulations, Is Administrative Law Unlawful:
"There is a jarring disconnect between what is taught and celebrated in constitutional law and what is accepted in administrative law…" and "…[Only] the shell of [the American] republican experiment remains. Within it, however, another government has arisen, in which new masters once again assert themselves, issuing commands as if they were members of a ruling class, and as if the people were merely their servants. Self-government has given way to a system of submission." [Emphasis mine]
Hamburger reasons that judicial pushback at the Appellate and Supreme Court levels is necessary to head off a more Lockean approach. Read more about Hamburger's book in Myron Magnet's City Journal book review.
Finally, here is another lecture and Q&A by Micklethwait and Wooldridge:
John Micklethwait & Adrian Wooldridge, "The Fourth Revolution"
Posted in Reviews & Commentary	| Tagged Abraham Lincoln, Administrative Law, Adrian Wooldridge, Appellate, Beatrice, Beatrice Potter, Big Government, Business, Capitalism, Collective, Committee, Conservative, Constitutional Law, Corrupt, Court, Dictator, Dictatorship, Expert, Franklin, government intervention, Hamburger, Ideology, John Locke, John Maynard Keynes, Keynes, Keynesianism, Leviathan, Liberal, Lloyd George, London School of Economics, Marx, Micklethwait, Myron Magnet, National Minimum, New Statesmen, Party, Politics, Potter, Progressive, Propaganda, Regulation, Republicanism, Revolution, Roosevelt, Sidney, Sidney Webb, Socialist, Square deal, Statism, Statist, Supreme, Theodore, Thomas Hobbes, Webb, Welfare State, Winston Churchill, Wooldridge
The State and End State by Bernhardt Writer
Posted on April 16, 2015 by Mandated Memoranda
A while back we reviewed Kenneth Minogue's book: Alien Powers – The Pure Theory of Ideology. In it, he contends that Western civilization is in the throes of a conflict over a right understanding of the human condition. So, how does it all turn out in the end were ideology to win?
Politics and Democracy
Ideology masquerades as a political movement, but it is determined to destroy the circumstances underpinning politics. It draws out our moral instincts while it denies the possibility of morality. It affirms freedom while striving for a community in which only one right act will be possible for each circumstance. Ideology attacks inequality but seeks to destroy the individual human capable of achieving equality in a meaningful sense. It champions real democracy but advocates unanimity that makes democracy superfluous. Ideology's practitioners use criticism to attack opponents while claiming their own truths are incontrovertible.
Ideology portrays deficiencies of the human condition (i.e., personal sin) as structural flaws of an oppressive system. It must methodically destroy the political ideas and values that the system represents. These ideas and values merely hide the system's ulterior interests. Ideology can only be satisfied by a perfect democracy which is, by definition, unattainable. It is ideologically absurd to let those deluded by the system's structural faults to select leaders when the people (i.e., the vanguard) leading the way to the perfect community, alone, have the necessary knowledge.
Ideology and the State
States provide liberty by instituting legal rights. Individuals within the state exercise these rights as responsible agents of choice. The result is a world both unpredictable and uncontrollable because what people will do with their rights is unknowable until they decide and act.
Karl Marx, however, said that rights separated person from person (i.e., alienated them one from another). His ideal society would possess liberty without rights. Those in his transformed society would no longer mistrust or have disagreements of right and wrong. There would be complete harmony in which no one would need to exercise rights. In fact, there would no longer be individuals capable of exercising rights in such a perfect harmonious community.
Ideology says states foster citizens' independent actions, the soil in which oppression thrives. Oppression can only be prevented by destroying the state itself. Ideologies use "one party states" to destroy any remaining independence in a society enthralled to the ideology.
A capitalistic society provides laws under which the citizenry orders their life choices and actions. Under an ideology's social order, everyone is occupied with transforming society. Nothing prevents citizens in a modern state from creating communes, collective farms, or cooperatives. However, it is both criminal and regressive for those in an ideological state to set up a business or practice unsanctioned religion.
States provide rules according to which citizens choose how to satisfy their interests. The mistake ideological governments make is to decide between interests. By determining interests, ideologies show that their social criticism is aimed, not at the centralized state, but the private interests of citizens and associations that compose the state.
Impediment to Revolution
What stands in the way of ideology's revolutionary conquest is transcendent religion. Minogue says that someone is not fit for revolution who, like Adam Smith, believes:
"A wise man never complains of the destiny of Providence, nor thinks the universe in confusion when he is out-of-order."
Marx observed that engaging the wretched to carry out insurrection will never happen if they are lost in religious fantasies.
Perfect Community and the Individual
In an integrated community of individuals, each one is the proprietor of their own desires and the adjudicator of their own thoughts. Ideology sees this as the cause for aggression, greed, selfishness, and violence because some desire more than they have or want what others possess. Ideology rejects the possibility of personal responsibility and self-control as the foundation of relationships within a functioning society.
Should humans live as free agents making individual choices or as a collective species with no individuation in so-called perfection? Ideology says perfect community is not only desirable, but the only form possible (all other forms being ones of oppression).
Would these humans in perfect community have self-awareness and the ability to choose to cooperate? Ideology says that as long as they have real choice then their actions no longer depend on correct human consciousness but on contingent human will. In short: no. A community that freely chooses to cooperate could choose not to do so at some point in the future. If that were to happen, then the ideological terminus (perfect community) could itself be overthrown.
To give a sense of the import of such a transformation, Marx says:
When the laborer co-operates systematically with others, he strips off the fetters of his individuality, and develops the capabilities of his species…The present generation resembles the Jews whom Moses led through the wilderness. It must not only conquer a new world, it must also perish in order to make room for people who will be equal to a new world.
Further, Minogue says that in true community:
Each of us will be drops of water in a clear pond. We shall live at the level of the universal, sloughing off that involvement in particular passions and particular points of view which is the very definition of our present entrapment. There will be no self to be denied or subjected. Particular character and situation would have no reality in themselves.
Ideology's Results
Ideology's direct contribution to society is to set worker against capitalist, Black against White, men against women, etc. No one can doubt ideology has gotten results by calling out grave instances of oppression; but, in the process, it has multiplied pointless, diffuse antagonisms that have weakened the fabric of Western society and culture.
True community may be a thing of wonder. However, the resolution of strife between essences and existence leaves no one to contemplate that beauty since they both must be "resolved." The so-called alienated human being is abolished.
This means that ideology, carried to its terminus (and there is no other purpose), poses an existential threat to the West. Declaring Western civilization rotten to the core, ideology does away with the possibility of the individual human life in exchange for a myth of pure species. This is the equivalent of a suicide pact.
Russian 1st of May poster, Soviet, Public Domain in the US
Minogue's book is available (in part) on Google Books. As an example of the pervasive influence of ideology, the National Association of Scholars has recently addressed the sustainability movement as an ideology encroaching on academic freedom.
"Sustainability" is a key idea on college campuses in the United States and the rest of the Western world. To the unsuspecting, sustainability is just a new name for environmentalism. But the word really marks out a new and larger ideological territory in which curtailing economic, political, and intellectual liberty is the price that must be paid now to ensure the welfare of future generations. [Emphasis mine]
The movement is just another example of special interests seeking to "throw off oppression" using coercion and, if that fails, barbarity in a quest for supremacy.
As I've said before, I agree with Orwell's assessment of his novel Nineteen Eighty Four: "The moral to be drawn from this dangerous nightmare situation is a simple one: Don't let it happen. It depends on you."
Posted in Reviews & Commentary	| Tagged 1984, Absurd, Alien Powers, Barbarity, Book, Capitalism, Coercion, Community, Democracy, Destroy, Destruction, Drop, End, End State, Ethics, Flaw, George Orwell, Google+, Human, Ideology, Individual, Karl Marx, Kenneth Minogue, Marx, Minogue, Morals, Movement, National Association of Scholars, Nineteen Eighty Four, Oppression, Orwell, Perfect, perfect community, Politics, Pool, Pure Theory, Revolution, Society, Species, State, Structural, Suicide Pact, Sustainability, System, Theory of Ideology, Water, west, Western, Worker
Ideology's Characteristics by Bernhardt Writer
Posted on April 2, 2015 by Mandated Memoranda
A few weeks ago, we reviewed Kenneth Minogue's book: Alien Powers – The Pure Theory of Ideology. He writes that Western civilization is in the throes of a conflict over a right understanding of the human condition. Minogue suggests that the ideological approach is ascendant in our society while the transcendent is declining. He claims that there is a generally applicable pure theory of ideology best realized to date in Marxist ideology and its offspring. Let us touch on some of the general points from his book.
The common person on the street condemns the results of bad human actions. They attempt to rectify those results when possible through small corrective steps. These citizens view politics as the method to work together toward agreed-to ends within the context of the rule of law.
The ideologist takes bad actions as evidence of systemic structural oppression that can be remedied only through complete overhaul of the entire system (i.e., revolution). The ideologist sees incremental moral reform as the mystification (i.e., obscuration or concealment) by which an oppressive system strings its victims along. Politics is a question of power. Only the power of a unified oppressed group can wring concessions from the oppressors who have more power.
Ideologies disclose truths that the prevailing system has an interest in hiding. Ideologies claim all interactions within the system are power relationships. This truth is masked by societal constraints (i.e., moral and civil rules of conduct) and nefarious concealments perpetrated by the oppressive system. Denial of unmasked truths is proof of the system's betrayal and oppression at work.
Societal constraints serve the oppressors' interests. That these rules promote goodness and justice masks their real import which is the exercise of power over the oppressed. If the oppressed demand their right to overthrow these constraints they are rebuffed for not obeying a law, moral principle, or divine ordinance. But the real reason they are denied is because it conflicts with the oppressors interests in a zero-sum transaction.
Ideology reveals masked favoritism and domination throughout the corrupt system. The oppressed have rightful grievances (e.g., ones of class, gender, race, or ethnicity) against the system. Each oppressed person is imprisoned by the system's conditioning which divides the oppressed from each other and from their real source of being in the species. Their struggle for liberation will result in true community.
Science, philosophy, law, and the state are instruments of special interests according to ideology. Although the intellectual elite might root out interests in favor of inclusiveness, those ideologically driven look to those deprived by the system for remedy. These persons, excluded by the system, unqualified to represent themselves, are appointed to lead humankind to liberation. This oppressed group is qualified because it is least tainted by the system's corrupting influences. Of course, ideologists are ready and willing to indoctrinate the oppressed group in the ways of liberation and speak for them.
Ideology unveils for us the hidden truth otherwise mystified by the system's apologists. Cleansed of the system's mystifications we will see the truth of our essence and our consciences will rise to state of things as they actually exist. We will realize that the human species is defined by social (e.g., production) and material (e.g., eating) processes. We will arrive at this non-western reality through the struggle for liberation rather than through fruitless and pernicious contemplation.
Ideology is to revolution the way politics is to reform. Ideology does not debate whether theft, for instance, should be treated severely or mercifully but rather abolishes private property altogether making theft fictitious. Each resolution of this type typifies the true community. Any particular problem is solved only by solving all problems via revolution.
Ideology pledges a comprehensive and ultimate explanation of this material world (since it claims that the transcendent world to come does not exist). The explanation (i.e., ideological revelation) is not merely knowledge but leads to societal transformation which improves the earthly human condition. The difficulty of overcoming opposition and bringing about the transformation is evidence for the truth of the explanation.
The ideological model of human history is triadic: the primitive community in harmony gives way to a succession of societies characterized by domination. By overthrowing this progression man arrives at a higher form of his initial communal harmony.
Minogue credits Karl Marx as the sole individual responsible, not only for clear insights into capitalism, but for the creation of pure ideology. He claims Marx developed the theory further and more deeply than all others. It is this pure theory that Minogue describes in his book. We will cover the end result of the ideological project in a later post.
A Portrait of Karl Marx, John Jabez Edwin Mayall (1813–1901), Public Domain in the US
Posted in Reviews & Commentary	| Tagged Betrayal, Capitalism, Civil, Class, Communal, Community, Conceal, Constraint, Constraints, Domination, Ethics, Ethnicity, Gender, Grievance, Harmony, Human Condition, Ideological, Ideology, Indoctrinate, Indoctrination, Interests, Karl Marx, Kenneth Minogue, Liberation, Marx, Marxist ideology, Mask, Minogue, Moral, Morals, Mystification, Oppressed, oppressed group, Oppression, Pernicious, Power, Pure Theory, Race, Revelation, Revolution, rule of law, Rules, Societal, Society, Species, Structural, System, Systemic, Theory of Ideology, Transformation, triadic, True, Unmask, Zero Sum
Portrait of an Ideologist — by Bernhardt Writer
One of our reasons for reviewing Kenneth Minogue's book: Alien Powers – The Pure Theory of Ideology is that in it he promised a recipe book for constructing an ideology. The book didn't provide a step by step method but it did provide a portrait of an ideologist. It is this portrait we sketch next.
An ideologist believes that the modern world is evil and oppressive and that it must be overthrown. She sees particular incidences of evil as proof of ubiquitous, structural imperfection which can be remedied only by far-reaching and thorough change of the whole system. The difference between appearances and reality implies that the real truth is hidden by the system. Denial of this difference by the system's apologists demonstrates the deception.
The ideologist believes that incremental social and moral reform is a mystification of (i.e., a means to obscure or conceal) the oppressive system's real interests (i.e., the revealed secret) and a means to take its victims for a ride. Politics is a question of power and only a unified oppressed group can wrest their demands from more powerful oppressors.
The lead ideologist(s) owns the revealed secret, intimidating attackers and insubordinate followers via verbal abuse or direct action to maintain superiority. The full revelation is limited to only those who are attune to the shifting policies of the leader or leaders. This coterie is the vanguard of the movement.
Journalism is a conspiracy to suppress oppressor truths by defining facts and shaping how events are perceived:
"Communicative power is about the right to define and demarcate situations…In short, one must see the news as reflecting not the events of the world 'out there,' but as the manifestation of the collective cultural codes of those employed to do this selective and judgmental work for society."
Ideologists deny that news viewers have the ability to exercise discernment. All viewers are helpless victims of journalistic bias.
Social criticism is the tool ideologists use to reveal and undermine the system's structure of domination. While social criticism purports to discover truth, it finds fault with everyday modern society for the purpose of confirming the ideologist's theories of oppression. This oppression is imposed upon the masses via societal constraints (i.e., moral and civil rules of conduct).
By attacking so-called apologists for the status quo (i.e., structural oppression) the ideologists believe they perform the work of liberation. The ideologist as social critic is infallible because she's either right or, because of the corrupting influences of society's structural flaws, is wrong (and therefore right again having demonstrated those flaws in herself).
Ideologists' claims to superiority arise from their heroically escaping societal constraints by embracing universal and comprehensive knowledge; from having arrived at their special knowledge of how the oppressors operate even in the face of societal conditioning to the opposite; and from their practical work of change on behalf of the oppressed masses. The ideologist demonstrates courage, discipline, and unwavering constancy in her mission when confronted with opposition and peril.
The ideologist sees the world divided into those who know the central secret and those who don't. Those who don't must be tutored. The ideologist determines the conditions under which all will live and disseminates these dogmas via indoctrination rather than open inquiry and discussion because their truths are incontrovertible and settled.
Politics and Argument
Ordinary politics relies on the evenhanded assumption that other parties share similar values and goals. Debate centers on what means should be employed to achieve common ends. This is not the case for the ideologist who is always fighting to liberate the oppressed masses from their oppressors' central secret (and smaller subsidiary secrets).
When arguing, the skilled ideologist will establish that she recognizes reality, she is sensible, and that her approach is reasonable. She might make concessions to the opponent which may be sincere or merely a façade. All these remarks are made to set up a reversal signified by the words: 'but' or 'yet.' Then she reveals the hidden character of the domination she fights against. The ideologist derives power and force from using melodrama when unmasking her adversary's secrets.
The ideologist is slippery. They pretend to confront particular problems but their intent is to gain an upper hand over their opponent and the issues. No practical issue can be isolated from the system's universal imperfection. The only solution for the particular problem being discussed is comprehensive and total revolution to abolish the root causes (i.e., if coveting property is at issue then doing away with individual ownership is the fix).
The ideologist knows that arguments always reflect interests and do not objectively decide the truth or falsity of statements about reality. The ideologist must deny her opponent a position of neutrality on the issue under discussion. Arguments are a contest for power and dominance. Because the ideologist is struggling on behalf of the oppressed, she gains the moral high ground since truth always supports justice.
Ultimately, no real discussion is possible. The ideologist's role in arguments is to raise the opponent's consciousness via a tutorial since she possesses the truth whereas the opponent advocates for oppression. By demonstrating courage and intellectual insight against the conformist pressure of the domination structure, having rejected its mystifications, the ideologists portray themselves as heroic and superior.
Achieving the End State
In order to achieve the overthrow of the existing system and establishment of their goals, the ideologist must make a direct assault on freedom. The ideologist replaces freedom through deception (and violence, if necessary) with an enlightened dictatorship promising distant perfection. In this perfection (i.e., the ideological terminus) there is no freedom because there is no need for it. Only the one right option will be what everyone wants to do.
Once the end state is achieved there will be no possibility for a reversal. The historical (i.e., temporary) progress from capitalism and individuality to socialism and community is inevitable. The ideologists are the beneficiaries of this shift in power. They alone speak for the oppressed masses since they (the masses) are not capable of speaking for themselves. The ideologists have selected (and cultivated) the masses based on the principle that those who are most excluded from a corrupt society are least corrupted by that society.
Dogmatic in rhetoric and ruthless in practice, the ideologist fights to transcend the evils of the world. The inevitable twisting and turning of political upheavals indicate that humanity is waking up from the nightmare of history. "Every event is providential and every slaughter is the price paid" to bring about the end of history in perfection (i.e., the ideological terminus).
As we've said before, all political persuasions and any grievance focus can be made into an ideology. That's Minogue's thesis. Once you decide there is only one universal way for all to proceed, you are on your way to becoming either a god or his (or her) slave.
After the fiascos of the Twentieth century most ideologists see that their role is to slow walk the inevitable revolution. You'll recognize the tactics and techniques described above on our televisions, in our books, and from many claiming authority (especially on college campuses). Ideologists cultivate their oppressed masses even going so far as to prevent their rise from oppression. This, to me, is the most despicable aspect of the ideological project.
Again, I concur with Orwell's assessment of his novel Nineteen Eighty Four: "The moral to be drawn from this dangerous nightmare situation is a simple one: Don't let it happen. It depends on you."
William F. Buckley and Kenneth Minogue – part 1
Posted in Reviews & Commentary	| Tagged Civilization, Criticism, Dictatorship, Dogma, Dogmatic, Don't Let It Happen, Eric Blair, Ethics, Fight, freedom, George Orwell, Idealism, Ideologist, Ideologists, Ideology, It Depends On You, Kenneth Minogue, Liberate, Liberation, Minogue, Morals, Nightmare, Nineteen Eighty Four, Oppressed, Oppression, Oppressor, Orwell, Political, Politics, Pure Theory, Revolution, Ruthless, Slow Walk, Social, Society, Struggle, System, Tactics, Techniques, Terminus, William F. Buckley, YouTube
Pure Ideology – Kenneth Minogue's Alien Powers — Review and Commentary by Bernhardt Writer
Kenneth Minogue contends in his book: Alien Powers – The Pure Theory of Ideology that Western civilization is in the throes of a conflict over a right understanding of the human condition. In Western societies, individuals follow customs or conduct projects of which others may dislike or disapprove and the result may be conflict.
Minogue suggests the ideological approach is ascendant in our society while the transcendent is declining. But how is ideology commonly defined?
Ideology /ˌīdēˈäləjē,ˌidēˈäləjē/ noun: ideology; plural noun: ideologies
1. A system of ideas and ideals, especially one that forms the basis of economic or political theory and policy.
"The ideology of republicanism."
Synonyms: beliefs, ideas, ideals, principles, ethics, morals; doctrine, creed, credo, faith, teaching, theory, philosophy; tenets, canon(s); conviction(s), persuasion; informal: -ism
1b. The ideas and manner of thinking characteristic of a group, social class, or individual.
"A critique of bourgeois ideology."
"The party has to jettison outdated ideology and give up its stranglehold on power"
1c. Archaic: Visionary speculation, especially of an unrealistic or idealistic nature.
2. Archaic: The science of ideas; the study of their origin and nature.
Origin: late 18th century (sense 2): from French idéologie, from Greek idea 'form, pattern' + -logos (denoting discourse or compilation).
Not the most illuminating definitions. But this is one of Minogue's points. We use the word too generally. Minogue's contention is that there is a generally applicable pure theory of ideology best realized to date in Marxist ideology and its offspring.
The ideological end state (or terminus), typified by its Marxist form, harkens back to rule under the Egyptian Pharaohs or Chinese Emperors. Those rulers were worshipped as God (which they were not) and the populace, generally denied individuality, performed service to the ruler and his coterie (or vanguard). These dynasties persisted substantially unchanged for millennia. Ideology is anti-western in this sense: individualism is the problem and the vanguard in power is the solution.
If you think it through, all political persuasions and any grievance focus can be made into an ideology. That's Minogue's thesis. Once you decide there is only one universal way for all to proceed, you are on your way to becoming either a god or his (or her) slave.
Eric Arthur Blair (pen name: George Orwell, 1902 – 1950) parodied the outcome of what is described above in his novel Nineteen Eighty Four (1949). The following video is from a 1984 movie version of the book; it summarizes the main theme:
Orwell 1984 – O'Brien about Power
Over the past year or so, my other posts have dealt with politics in an effort to understand what America is experiencing. The articles are titled:
'It's Not Your Founding Fathers' Republic Any More,' Review and Commentary
The Revolt Against the Masses, A Review, Part 1
The Three Languages of Politics, A Review
'Inflammation.'
Also, over the next few weeks, I plan to post: "Portrait of an Ideologist," "Ideology's Characteristics," and "The State and End State."
Finally, I concur with Orwell's assessment of his novel Nineteen Eighty Four: "The moral to be drawn from this dangerous nightmare situation is a simple one: Don't let it happen. It depends on you."
Posted in Reviews & Commentary	| Tagged Abolish, Abolition, Ascendant, conflict, Decency, Declining, Definition, Disappointment, Distortion, Emperor, Envy, Eric Blair, Ethics, Externals, Flaw, George Orwell, God, Harmony, Hidden, Human, Human Condition, Ideological, Ideologist, Ideology, Individual, Inequality, Kenneth Minogue, Minogue, Moral, Morals, Mystification, Orwell, Ownership, Peace, Pharaoh, Poverty, Pure Theory, Societal, Society, Species, Structural, Theory, Theory of Ideology, Thinking, Transcendent, Vanguard, west, Western, Western civilization, worship
No Rest
Posted on January 15, 2015 by Mandated Memoranda
We are now planning Mandated Memoranda Publishing's next novel: Who Shall Be God. We have characters, certain scenes, and even a cover image in mind already. We're investigating background materials for the theme of the novel. Since it deals with political conflict reflected through two families, we're reading The Fourth Revolution by John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge and Alien Powers by Kenneth Minogue. However, we always have a biblical theme in mind too.
The scripture: Isaiah 57 jumped out at us based on our reading of The Art of Dramatic Writing by L. Egri. Here are the pertinent parts:
The righteous man perishes,
and no one lays it to heart;
devout men are taken away,
while no one understands.
For the righteous man is taken away from calamity;
he enters into peace;
they rest in their beds
who walk in their uprightness.
Isaiah 57:1-2 English Standard Version (ESV)
But the wicked are like the tossing sea;
for it cannot be quiet,
and its waters toss up mire and dirt.
There is no peace," says my God, "for the wicked."
Isaiah 57:20-21 (ESV)
We commonly know the last verse (repeated elsewhere in Isaiah 48:22, 57:20, 57:21) as the phrase:
"No rest for the wicked [or weary]".
As we always do, let's consult Calvin to get his take on Isaiah's verses:
The righteous man hath perished…And no man layeth it to heart. …The Lord holds out as a mirror this event of his providence, more remarkable than all others, that he takes away good and worthy men out of this life, when he determines to chastise his people severely. But no man considers it, or reflects that it is a token of approaching destruction, that God gathers them, and places them in safety from being distressed by prevailing afflictions.
…The general meaning is, that wicked men grievously deceive themselves by supposing that there is no greater happiness than to have life continued to a great age, and by thus pluming themselves on their superiority to the servants of God, who die early. Being attached to the world, they likewise harden themselves by this pretense that, by nothing else than a manifestation of God's favor towards them, while others die, they continue to be safe and sound…
Men of mercy are gathered. …But, since God, in many passages of Scripture, represents gentleness and kindness as a distinguishing mark of his children, this may be, as I have said, a definition of true righteousness.
Hence we see that the Lord, at that time, gathered many good men, whose death portended some dreadful calamity, and yet that the Jews [the Prophet's proximate audience] paid no regard to such forewarnings, and even proceeded to more daring lengths of wickedness; for they thought that all went well with them, when they were the survivors of many excellent men.
Peace shall come. The Prophet describes what shall be the condition of believers in death; for the wicked, who think that there is no life but the present, imagine that good men have perished; because in death they see nothing but ruin. For this reason he says that "Peace shall come," which is more desirable than a thousand lives full of trouble; as if he compared them to discharged soldiers, who are and allowed to enjoy case and quietness.
They shall rest in their beds. He adds the metaphor of sleep, in order to show that they shall be absolutely free from all the uneasiness of cares, just as if they were safely pleasantly asleep "on their beds."
Whosoever walketh before him. …as if he had said, "Whosoever walketh before God shall enjoy peace." Thus, when righteous men die, and their various labors are finished, and their course is ended, they are called to peace and repose. They "rest in their beds," because they do not yet enjoy perfect blessedness and glory; but they wail; for the last day of the resurrection, when everything shall be perfectly restored; and that, I think, is what Isaiah meant.
By these comments, Calvin seems to echo Revelation 18:4.
Then I heard another voice from heaven saying,
"Come out of her, my people,
lest you take part in her sins,
lest you share in her plagues;"
Revelation 18:4 (ESV)
As for Isaiah's second couplet, Calvin says:
But the wicked. …But because the reprobate make false pretensions to the name of God, and vainly glory in it, the Prophet shows that there is no reason why they should flatter themselves, or advance any claim, on the ground of this promise, since they can have no share in this peace. Nor will it avail them anything, that God, having compassion upon his people, receives them into favor, and commands peace to be proclaimed to them.
As the troubled sea. That metaphor of "the sea" is elegant and very well fitted to describe the uneasiness of the wicked; for of itself "the sea is troubled." …Most appropriately, therefore, has the Prophet compared them to a stormy and troubled sea. Whoever then wishes to avoid these alarms and this frightful agony of heart, let him not reject that peace which the Lord offers to him. There can be no middle course between them; for, if you do not lay aside sinful desires and accept of this peace, you must unavoidably be miserably distressed and tormented.
There is no peace to the wicked. He confirms the preceding statement, namely, that in vain shall the reprobate endeavor to seek peace, for everywhere they will meet with war. It is God who threatens war, and therefore there can be no hope of "peace." Wicked men would indeed wish to enjoy peace, and ardently long for it; for there is nothing which they more eagerly desire than to be at ease, and to lull their consciences, that they may freely take their pleasures and indulge in their vices.
They drive away all thoughts about the judgment of God, and endeavor to stupefy themselves and to repose in indolence, and think that these are the best ways and methods of obtaining peace. But they never shall enjoy it; for, until men have been reconciled to God, conscience will never cease to annoy and carry on war with them.
Saith my God. Thus he represents God as the only author of peace, that he may, by this dreadful threatening, tear from the Jews their dearest pleasures; and calls him "his God," in opposition to the vain boasting of those who falsely boasted of his name; for they cannot acknowledge God, so long as they reject his Prophet and his doctrine. For this reason the Prophet boldly declares that he has received a command from God to declare perpetual war against them.
There is no rest for the wicked; no rest now or in eternity. Turn away from evil ways and do good.
Triumph of Death, 1562, Pieter Breughel the Elder (1526/1530–1569), Museo del Prado, Madrid, Public Domain
Posted in Best Laid Plans, Reviews & Commentary	| Tagged Adrian Wooldridge, Alien Powers, Breughel, Breughel the Elder, Calamity, ebook, Eternity, Ideology, Isaiah, Kenneth Minogue, Mandated Memoranda Publishing, Mercy, Micklethwait, Minogue, Next Book, No Rest, No rest for the wicked, Peace, Prado, Pure Theory, Rest, Revelation, The Fourth Revolution, theology, Triumph of Death, Troubled, Who Shall Be God, Wicked, Wooldridge


text:
package org.jboss.weld.tests.contexts;

import jakarta.enterprise.context.Dependent;
import jakarta.inject.Inject;
import java.util.List;

@Dependent
public class StringHolder {

    @Inject
    private List<String> strings;

    public List<String> getStrings() {
        return strings;
    }

}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Newspapering: 50 Years of Reporting from Canada and Around the World by Norman Webster
Turks & Caicos Provo Perfection
Michele Peterson
Beatles Story Band presents ORCHESTRA! - November 17-19, Théâtre Maisonneuve
Photo: Peimin Tang
Clara Schumann according to Tony Siqi Yun – April 9-18, 2021
Orchestre Metropolitain presents
CLARA SCHUMANN ACCORDING TO TONY SIQI YUN
The young prodigy and first prize winner at the Inaugural China International Music Competition, Tony Siqi Yun is making his Canadian debut with a performance of Clara Schumann's Piano Concerto, a gem of the Romantic era. Known as a poet of the keyboard, Yun's performance of this incomparable work is at once masterful and expressive.
"Tony is a true poet of the keyboard. Expressive, and with his own distinct voice, yet elegant and poised."- Pianist Magazine
Brahms's famous lullaby takes dramatic twists and turns in his Second Symphony, going from bright and soothing to tragic introspection. But first, an orchestral transcription of African American composer Valerie Coleman's captivating wind quintet, Umoja, Anthem for Unity, starts the concert off on a cheerful note. Featuring syncopated rhythms and catchy melodies, this piece is a perfect introduction to the contemporary flautist and composer's work.
Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Conductor
Tony Siqi Yun, Piano
Tony Siqi Yun was born in Toronto, Canada in 2001. Tony is a recipient of the Jerome L. Greene Fellowship at the Juilliard School where he studies with Professors Matti Raekallio and Yoheved Kaplinsky.
With playing that combines poetry and elegance, this fiercely charismatic young pianist is already being invited to perform at major venues on the world stage, including upcoming debuts at BOZAR, the Luxembourg Philharmonie, Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, Museum Kunstpalast Düsseldorf, NDR Hannover, Leipzig Gewandhaus, and in Weimar.
This young pianist can already look back at an extraordinary concert career. In 2019, he made his debut with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Yannick Nézet-Séguin in the final round of the First China International Music Competition, and has since been invited to perform with Nézet-Séguin in North America. His outstanding debut with the China Philharmonic Orchestra at the Third Polish Culture Festival led to an invitation to tour with the orchestra in 2015. Yun appeared with the China Philharmonic Orchestra again in the 2018-2019 season including the 2019 CCTV New Year's Concert. In 2018, Yun successfully collaborated with the Cleveland Orchestra at the final round of the Thomas and Evon Cooper International Piano Competition and won First Prize and the Audience Prize.
As a soloist, Yun has given recitals in North America, Europe and Asia. Highlights include recitals at the renowned Salle Cortot Concert Hall in Paris, Opera & and Concert Hall of CCOM, The Juilliard School, New York's Steinway Hall and at the Heidelberger Frühling Music Festival.
COLEMAN, Umoja, Anthem for Unity
C. SCHUMANN, Piano Concerto
BRAHMS, Symphony No. 2
April 9, 2021 at 2:00pm
Webcast available until April 18, 11:59pm
Reserve your online tickets: https://orchestremetropolitain.com
ClassicalLive EventsMontrealmusiconlineOrchestraOrchestre MetropolitainpianoYannick Nézet-Séguin
Lex French Quintet – April 8, 2021 Bourgie Hall
Saint-Saëns: Chamber Musician – Live at Bourgie Hall and Online

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Kildow Awards 8th Grade Poet a Gold-medal Hug
January 1, 2000 SKI Magazine
From US Ski Team Release
SUGARLOAF, Maine (March 26) – Ben Adams is a 14-year-old eighth-grader from Granby, Conn., who races for the Ski Sundown Ski Team ("I'm probably better in GS, he says). He writes occasional poetry and expects to eventually enter law school.
But Ben Adams stole just about everybody's heart Saturday night with a poem about Lindsey Kildow (Vail, CO), which he read – with a mighty pick-me-up from Kildow – at Opening Ceremonies for the TD Banknorth U.S. Alpine Championships. Several thousand people attended the jam-packed schedule, which included alumni recognition awards, honors for the downhill winners early in the day (Bode Miller – Bretton Woods, NH, and Kirsten Clark – Raymond, ME) and a blockbuster autograph party that involved every U.S. Ski Team athletes plus hundreds of fans who formed a line that snaked its way around two floors of the base lodge and threaded its way out into the base village's Main Street.
The back story: a year ago, on a school assignment, Adams and his classmates were told to write a poem about their hero. He wrote about Miller, who was en route to becoming the first American to win an overall World Cup title since Phil Mahre in 1983. At Mom's urging, he added some lines and sent the poem to Ski Racing magazine, which published it and then invited the seventh grader to read his poem at the Oroweat U.S. Alpine Championships at Mammoth Mountain, Calif., as Miller was honored as the magazine's 2005 Male Skier of the Year.
Showing no fear for a seventh grader, Adams read his poem. Kildow, who was on stage as the Female Skier of the Year, laughingly asked, "Where's MY poem? So, Adams, who had driven with his parents and sister Hanna to Sugarloaf for the championships, presented it to her Saturday and Kildow – who was being honored once more as SR's Female Skier of the Year after a season that included three World Cup victories – invited him up on stage to read his latest poem.
The 24-line poem was inspired by Kildow's crash during the second downhill training run at the Olympics; she spent a night in a hospital but came out the next day and raced less than 48 hours after the crash, finishing eighth.) Coincidentally, Kildow had crashed Saturday in the downhill title race.)
When she called Adams up for a do-over reading as he had done a year ago, his voice was a little shaky. This was a BIG crowd, certainly not like standing in the front of a classroom to read your poem. Kildow walked over to him, put an arm around him and stayed with him, helping defuse anxieties and helping settle things so he could finish his reading without incident.
"What I didn't know, Adams said later, "was that she was in a lot of pain, but she didn't let anyone know.
Said his dad, John, a geologist and environmental sciences consultant, "Ben knew he had to come through. Jury verdict: gold medal for Ben Adams, the leading candidate for mythical poet laureate of the U.S. Ski Team.
Read the Poem
A Poem for Lindsey Kildow by Ben Adams, 8th grader, Granby (CT) Memorial Middle School
LINDSEY KILDOW, a skier we know well
So many victories, so many stories to tell
But the one that captured my heart and soul
Took place in the Olympics outside of Torino.
Down the hill, she was moving fast
When an edge caught and the crowd did grasp.
Tumbling, crashing, she landed in a heap.
Air-lifted to the hospital, no one could speak
But Lindsey, mighty Lindsey would make a return.
A miraculous choice given that crash and burn
At the top of the hill, she was ready to start
Little did we know, we were about to witness art
Through pain and stiffness, she tucked down low
Her courage and grit almost seemed to glow
Through every turn Lindsey Kildow made haste
Her body held strong and moved with grace
Our hearts were racing at every gate
At the finish line, we could hardlly wait
And then she appeared at the speed of light
She completed that race like a bird in flight
This run she had tackled was better than a win
It deserved so much more than a medal or pin
Lindsey, we Americans raised our hands to the sky
In praise of your spirit, the highest of high.
What the U.S. Ski Team Psychologist Says Make the Best Athletes, Well, The Best
Live From Exposure
Rick Sorensen
female skier
kirsten clark
lindsey kildow
male skier
Ski Sundown
ski team
Vail Mountain, Colorado
Long Live Waterskiing, the Sport of Purists
Accident Insurance Comes Free With Lift Access at One Colorado Resort This Season
In Warren Miller's "Winter Starts Now," Generation Next Is Bringing Diversity to Ski Racing


text:
How Dick Cheney Kicked off an Era of Cancer Clusters and Eco-Disasters from Fracking
Tue 7:58 pm +00:00, 18 Aug 2015 4
posted by Gordon
The Energy Policy Act of 2005, which holds the Halliburton Loophole, exempts oil and gas firms from environmental protection laws.
Photo Credit: Joseph Sohm/Shutterstock.com
By Wenonah Hauter / EcoWatch
This past Saturday, marked a notable 10th anniversary. But it was certainly nothing to celebrate. Ten years ago, President George W. Bush signed the Energy Policy Act of 2005. The giant energy bill included massive giveaways for the fossil fuel, nuclear and ethanol industries and provided only token incentives for renewables and improved energy efficiency. But the most infamous piece of the law was what is now commonly known as the "Halliburton Loophole," an egregious regulatory exemption that ushered in the disastrous era of widespread oil and gas fracking that currently grips our nation.
FrackingTestSubject @gardencatlady
Halliburton Loophole. @angelmouse4: "@gardencatlady: Fracking fluid. @TimShutters @worldmist1"
Fracking— the extreme oil and gas extraction method that involves blasting millions of gallons of water mixed with toxic chemicals underground at enormous pressures to break apart subterranean rock — has exploded in the last decade. More than 270,000 wells have been fracked in 25 states throughout the nation. More than 10 million Americans live within a mile of a fracking site. This means that 10 million Americans — and truly many more — have been placed directly in harm's way. Hundreds of peer-reviewed studies have connected fracking to serious human health effects, including cancer, asthma and birth defects.For this we can thank the Energy Policy Act of 2005, the law that holds the Halliburton Loophole. Named after Dick Cheney and the notorious corporation he led before becoming vice president, the law (championed by Cheney and disgraced Enron founder Kenneth Lay, among others) explicitly exempted fracking operations from key provisions of the Safe Drinking Water Act. These exemptions from one of America's most fundamental environmental protection laws provided the oil and gas industry the immunity it required to develop a highly polluting process on a grand national scale.
One of the most troubling repercussions is how fracking companies hide the contents of their toxic water and chemical solutions pumped into the ground. Contamination of underground drinking water sources from fracking fluids is a glaring threat to public health and safety. Yet even doctors responding to fracking-related health complaints can't access data on what particular chemicals their patients may have been exposed to.
But the Halliburton Loophole wasn't the only fracking enabler in the Energy Policy Act. The act granted the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) sweeping new authority to supersede state and local decision-making with regard to the citing of fracked gas pipelines and infrastructure. It also shifted to FERC industry oversight and compliance responsibility for the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969, another key law. This was akin to putting the fox in charge of the hen house.
As it stands, FERC is entirely unaccountable to public will. It is unaccountable to Congress and even the White House. Commissioners are appointed to five-year terms and can do as they please. Until a law reigning in FERC is passed, the commission will continue to act as a rubber-stamp for the fossil fuel industry.
Additionally, the Energy Policy Act repealed an important anti-monopoly law, the Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935 (PUHCA). PUHCA safeguarded consumers from the overreach of the oil and gas industry and banks that did business with those companies. It prevented the formation of giant state and regional energy cartels that could manipulate energy costs, engage in profiteering and exert undue influence over political debate. The Energy Policy Act transferred most of this oversight to FERC. Since then, the largest American energy companies have grown significantly more powerful and spent almost a billion dollars on federal lobbying, according to OpenSecrets.org.
The 10th anniversary of the Energy Policy Act is indeed a sad occasion, but it provides us with a ripe opportunity to reexamine our nation's disastrous policy of doubling-down on fossil fuels over the last decade, thanks to the extreme process of fracking. For the sake of countless Americans who are currently suffering health effects caused by fracking and the countless more who will suffer in the future, we must immediately curtail our dependence on oil and gas and turn decisively toward a truly clean, renewable energy future.
8 Dangerous Side Effects of Fracking That the Industry Doesn't Want You to Hear About
Fracking May Release Cancer-Causing Radioactive Gas, According to Surprising New Study
Maryland's Republican Gov Allows Fracking Ban
Fracking Has Now Been Linked to Low Birth Weight Babies
Big Texas Oil and Gas Torpedo a Small City's Effort to Ban Fracking — Bye Bye Local Democracy
Source: http://www.alternet.org/environment/10-years-later-fracking-and-halliburton-loophole
Groundbreaking Report Calculates Damage Done by Fracking here
As federal policy makers decide on rules for fracking on public lands, a new report calculates the toll of this dirty drilling on our environment, including 280 billion gallons of toxic wastewater generated by fracking in 2012—enough to flood all of Washington, DC, in a 22-foot deep toxic lagoon. The Environment America Research & Policy Center report, Fracking by the Numbers, is the first to measure the damaging footprint of fracking to date.
"The numbers don't lie—fracking has taken a dirty and destructive toll on our environment," said John Rumpler, senior attorney for Environment America. "If this dirty drilling continues unchecked, these numbers will only get worse."
4 Responses to "How Dick Cheney Kicked off an Era of Cancer Clusters and Eco-Disasters from Fracking"
Somebody should read "The Resolution 61/295 on the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of the Indigenous Peoples". Fracking can be banned on your ancesteral lands !!!
Bluefeather6 says:
http://www.landofthefree.co.uk
The metropolitan police under the management of Kellog Brown and Root aka Halliburton…. So for justice – who do we turn to?
ferryt says:
That looks like a useful resource. Had a quick ganders. Thanks BlueF.
On topic isn't the TPP TPIA all about foreign corporations writing legislation such as the above exemption for Haliburton to poison your water for profit? Camoron spouting his usual drivel in support of course. What a traitor. Puppet traitor.
Someone needs to tazer Cheney. Near his heart if I remember correctly. Should do the job. Honestly being this evil. Do people like Cheney not fear meeting their maker? If not what do they know?
They fear us. We hold the power!! Once the masses get off their couches, game on.
828,784,704,817,591,697,647,736,1017,1085,1156,1201,768,764,880,858,770,945,805,865,788,837,978,879


text:
Interieur review
Words by Helen Parton
Belgian, design, interieur, review, trade show
This biennial Belgian design show is now in its 25th edition, having begun life in that year of revolution 1968. Interieur, a short hop over the French border, has itself been radical, albeit in a quiet, modest fashion. It is a show that feels genuinely curated rather than overcommercialised, small but punching above its weight in terms of product launches and having an international focus but giving ample weight to local suppliers and designers.
If Interieur were married to the world of design this would be its silver anniversary and this happy marriage is celebrated in the Silver Lining installations curated by Belgian architect OFFICE Kersten Geers David van Severen. These break up the main stands, giving you a breather from product overload, with something a little more esoteric.
The offering from Swiss architects and designers Trix and Robert Haussmann was typical, playing with geometry and reflection. Others included Solo House an interiors concept based on self-sufficiency.
Design/art galleries were also present, such as Etage Projects' work by Fredrik Paulsen. The visual stimulation didn't stop when it came to bar and restaurant offerings, including Terra, with its display of mushrooms. And nigh on impossible to find, but a serendipitous treat when one did, was The Circus, a big top curated by agency King George, with brands such as Alessi, Duravit and Quick-Step. This year's designer of the year was Vincent Van Duysen who presented a rather beige installation to mark the occasion.
Previously more scattered around the city, this time activity was more concentrated in the Kortrijk Xpo. As far as a compact, quality-driven design show experience goes, Interieur has pretty much got it sewn up.
Allaert Aluminium commissioned Anglo-French design duo Studio Dessuant Bone for its Perpetual Motion installation. The much videoed display takes a sideways look at the product, especially the Otiima low profile frame system giving windows and doors a sculptural quality.
CorCrete
This winning entry in the Interieur awards by German firm Design Studio Niruk mixes the warmth of cork and the structure of concrete. The resulting hybrid is much lighter and absorbs more sound than concrete. The surface is treated with techniques such as grinding, cutting and polishing.
Lennart Van
Uffelen Young Antwerp-based Lennart Van Uffelen in collaboration with fellow Belgian studio Atelierdubbeloo has created a family of handmade furniture called Butler. Charles and Alfred can be combined as modular multifunctional tables which can be used as side tables or low seating. Alfred is available in black and white, with an option for a wood top. Their big brother James, meanwhile, is a high stool that can be used as part of a small workstation and stacked away when not in use.
The MWD writing desk is the work of designer Inesa Malafej. She wanted to produce a workstation for creative types that reduced clutter, which is why the storage is arranged around the tabletop but objects are easily within sight and reach. The high edges of the desk create what Malajej calls a "positive microclimate where things feel good in relationship to the user". It also features two drawers to store a laptop or other professional essentials and the legs can be twisted off for ease of transportation.
Z-editions
Designer Marc Th. van der Voorn is behind the Epic chair for Belgian firm Z-editions. The distinctive back of the design is achieved by splitting the frame in two with a team of craftsmen joining it back together. The collection comes in oak and the seat can be upholstered or painted.
This Canadian company caught our eye with a delicate range of lighting we could see as a feature in a reception or, larger scale, in an atrium. The components are made of unfinished brass and handblown glass with an LED lightbulb, combining modern lighting with traditional materials.
Belgium's biennial design fair, which took place in the city of Kortrijk in October, was compact but perfectly formed


This is better quality oil than the Goldcart .5 cartridge. It feels like it's stronger too. I prefer this over the other. I usually go with a hybrid as I like to have a nice head high and a body high to relax. Vaping is the way to go. I quit smoking years ago and find vape is the purest and least harmful to my lungs.
I tried this after I got the Bhang Black Private Reserve Sativa. I actually liked this Hybrid better. It lasted longer and I feel like it's smooth and just as quality. Looking forward to trying the Indica next!
Honestly one of the best oils on the market. This one is much better than the All Natural version of the Bhang cartridge. You feel it better with less puffs than you do almost draining the natural version. The oil in this pen is super viscous compared to the natural one, too, giving it a longer burning time and thicker vape. I would definitely recommend this to a friend!
I have bought 3 of these in the span of a month, not because I finish them quickly, but because the cart shorts out rendering them useless. The quality of their liquid is very good with a clean high. I wish they put more emphasis on the integrity of the actual cart and coil, which 3 of 3 were defective.
This has been a great end of the day pain reliever for me. I'm suffering from a repetitive stress injury and it takes the edge off the nerve pain I experience. Plus, it tastes great.


text:
[#]: subject: (3 key considerations for your trusted compute base)
[#]: via: (https://opensource.com/article/21/5/trusted-compute-base)
[#]: author: (Mike Bursell https://opensource.com/users/mikecamel)
[#]: collector: (lujun9972)
[#]: translator: ( )
[#]: reviewer: ( )
[#]: publisher: ( )
[#]: url: ( )

3 key considerations for your trusted compute base
======
The smaller your TCB, the less there is to attack, and that's a good
thing.
![Puzzle pieces coming together to form a computer screen][1]

This isn't the first article I've written about trusted computing bases (TCBs), so if the concept is new to you, I suggest you have a look at _[What's a trusted compute base?][2]_ to get an idea of what I'll be talking about here. In that article, I noted the importance of the size of the TCB: "What you want is a small, easily measurable and easily auditable TCB on which you can build the rest of your system—from which you can build a 'chain of trust' to the other parts of your system about which you care."

In this article, I want to discuss the importance of a TCB's size, how you might measure it, and how difficult it can be to reduce its size. Let's look at those issues in order.

### Sizing things up

However you measure it—and I'll get to that below—the size of the TCB matters for two reasons:

  1. The larger the TCB is, the more bugs there are likely to be.
  2. The larger the TCB is, the larger the attack surface.

The first of these is true of any system. Although there may be ways of reducing the number of bugs by proving the correctness of all (or, more likely, part) of the system, bugs are both tricky to remove and resilient; if you remove one, you may well introduce another (or worse, several). You can reduce the kinds and number of bugs through a multitude of techniques, from language choice (choosing Rust over C/C++ to decrease memory allocation errors, for instance), to better specification, and on to improved test coverage and fuzzing. In the end, however, the smaller the TCB, the less code (or hardware—don't forget we're considering the broader system here) you have to trust, the less space there is for bugs in it.

The concept of an attack surface is important (and, like TCBs, it's one I've introduced before—see _[What's an attack surface?][3]_). Like bugs, there may be no absolute measure of the ratio of _danger:attack surface_, but the smaller your TCB, the less there is to attack, and that's a good thing. As with bug reduction, there are many techniques you may want to apply to reduce your attack surface, but the smaller it is, by definition, the fewer opportunities attackers have to try to compromise your system.

### Measurement

Measuring the size of your TCB is really, really hard. Or maybe I should say that coming up with an absolute measure that you can compare to other TCBs is really, really hard. The problem is that there are so many measurements you might take. The ones you care about are probably those that can be related to the attack surface. But there are so many different attack vectors that _might_ be relevant to a TCB that there are likely to be multiple attack surfaces. Some of the possible measurements include:

  * Number of API methods
  * Amount of data that can be passed across each API method
  * Number of parameters that can be passed across each API method
  * Number of open network sockets
  * Number of open local (e.g., Unix) sockets
  * Number of files read from local storage
  * Number of dynamically loaded libraries
  * Number of Direct Memory Access (DMA) calls
  * Number of lines of code
  * Amount of compilation optimisation carried out
  * Size of binary
  * Size of executing code in memory
  * Amount of memory shared with other processes
  * Use of various caches (L1, L2, etc.)
  * Number of syscalls made
  * Number of strings visible using a `strings` command or similar
  * Number of cryptographic operations not subject to constant time checks

This is not meant to be an exhaustive list; it just shows the range of different areas where vulnerabilities might appear. Designing your application to reduce one may increase another; a very simple example is attempting to reduce the number of API calls exposed by increasing the number of parameters on each call; another might be reducing the size of the binary by using more dynamically linked libraries.

This leads me to an important point that I'm not going to address in detail in this article but is fundamental to understanding TCBs: without a threat model, there's very little point in considering what your TCB is.

### Reducing TCB size

I've just shown one of the main reasons that reducing your TCB size is difficult: it's likely to involve tradeoffs between different measures. If all you're trying to do is produce competitive marketing material where you say, "my TCB is smaller than yours," then you're likely to miss the point. The point of a TCB is to have a well-defined computing base that can protect against specific threats. This requires you to be clear about exactly what functionality _requires_ it to be trusted, where it sits in the system, and how the other components in the system rely on it. In other words, what trust relationships they have.

Recently, I was speaking to a colleague who relayed a story of a software project by saying, "we've reduced our TCB to this tiny component by designing it very carefully and checking how we implement it." But my colleague overlooked the fact that the rest of the stack—which contains a complete Linux distribution and applications—could not be trusted any more than before. The threat model (if there is one—we didn't get into details) seems to assume that only the TCB would be attacked. This misses the point entirely; it just adds another "[turtle][4]" to the stack without fixing the problem that is presumably at issue: improving the system's security.

Reducing the TCB by artificially defining what the TCB is to suit your capabilities or particular beliefs around what it should be protecting against is not only unhelpful but actively counterproductive. This is because it ignores the fact that a TCB is there to serve the needs of a broader system, and if it is considered in isolation, then it becomes irrelevant: what is it acting as a base _for_?

In conclusion, it's all very well saying, "we have a tiny TCB," but you need to know what you're protecting, from what, and how.

* * *

_This article was originally published on [Alice, Eve, and Bob][5] and is reprinted with the author's permission._

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

via: https://opensource.com/article/21/5/trusted-compute-base

作者:[Mike Bursell][a]
选题:[lujun9972][b]
译者:[译者ID](https://github.com/译者ID)
校对:[校对者ID](https://github.com/校对者ID)

本文由 [LCTT](https://github.com/LCTT/TranslateProject) 原创编译,[Linux中国](https://linux.cn/) 荣誉推出

[a]: https://opensource.com/users/mikecamel
[b]: https://github.com/lujun9972
[1]: https://opensource.com/sites/default/files/styles/image-full-size/public/lead-images/puzzle_computer_solve_fix_tool.png?itok=U0pH1uwj (Puzzle pieces coming together to form a computer screen)
[2]: https://aliceevebob.com/2019/10/22/whats-a-trusted-compute-base/
[3]: https://aliceevebob.com/2018/04/24/whats-an-attack-surface/
[4]: https://aliceevebob.com/2019/07/02/turtles-and-chains-of-trust/
[5]: https://aliceevebob.com/2021/05/11/does-my-tcb-look-big-in-this/


text:
Additional resources for the AU Game Lab
Projects related to the American University Game Lab
Speaker: Henry Jenkins on "Popular Culture as Politics, Politics as Popular Culture"
The Game Lab is proud to co-host Dr. Henry Jenkins, a pioneer in civic media, fan studies, and media literacy.
Monday, November 19 at 6:30 p.m., American University
Program will be followed by a cookie and coffee reception
A Reality Television Star and former professional wrestling personality is in the White House, while protestors outside are using imagery drawn from Handmaid's Tale, Game of Thrones, Harry Potter, and Star Wars to express their concerns. How can we make sense of the blurring between popular culture and politics which characterizes our current moment? The talk explores the concept of the civic imagination, suggesting ways that young activists in particular are turning their attention to the alternative worlds offered by fantasy and speculative fiction to construct alternatives to their frustration with current reality. Can we change the world without imagining what a better world looks like?
About Dr. Henry Jenkins
Henry Jenkins is the Provost Professor of Communication, Journalism, Cinematic Arts and Education at the University of Southern California. He arrived at USC in Fall 2009 after spending more than a decade as the Director of the MIT Comparative Media Studies Program and the Peter de Florez Professor of Humanities. He is the author and/or editor of seventeen books on various aspects of media and popular culture, including Textual Poachers: Television Fans and Participatory Culture, Hop on Pop: The Politics and Pleasures of Popular Culture, From Barbie to Mortal Kombat: Gender and Computer Games, Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide, Spreadable Media: Creating Meaning and Value in a Networked Culture, and By Any Media Necessary: The New Youth Activism. He is currently editing a handbook on the civic imagination and writing a book on "comics and stuff". He has written for Technology Review, Computer Games, Salon, and The Huffington Post.
This program is co-presented by the National Telemedia Council, Center for Media and Social Impact (CMSI), AU Game Lab, and the School of Communication at American University.
Author Benjamin StokesPosted on November 19, 2018 January 23, 2019
AU Game Lab (main website)
Maker Education + Games? Convening with Dept. of Education on January 10th
Global Game Jam 2020 – in DC @ AU Game Lab
Grads in the news: on gamers' soft skills in the Wall Street Journal
Speaker: Anita Sarkeesian of Feminist Frequency
Speaker: Andy Phelps on "An Intersection of Production, Research, Teaching and Play"
Additional resources for the AU Game Lab Proudly powered by WordPress


and I'll mix Spanish and English because this may be a good way for us to reach a wider audience.
to reach an understanding of the more complex issues we must first begin with the most simple.
the typical workings of a great lake, but which are also typical of great oceans.
do not act on the Mediterranean. For example, the Mediterranean does not have any sea ice, at least for now.
So, of course we don't have ice, but there are mechanisms and processes which are typical of oceans.
over the coming days and will be part of the main subjects with straightforward titles.
Temperature, salinity and density, fundamental properties for a physical understanding of the oceans.
as a reference to think about other types of annual evolutions of ocean features.
the sufficient density to sink. And finally, the Mediterranean as an estuary and as a small ocean.
and you will be able to see where you can find the answers to these.
The aim of the questions is simply to help in organizing the concepts.
those senses because they do not work or because the brain is unable to understand them.
and we must use a different brain to understand these.
and algorithms have been created, theories, and abstract knowledge to interpret and understand this information.
we'll say 'Great! We can swim here, we can sail here!'. The sailors among you will say, 'what great water!
A little cruise around here would be fantastic'.
and we can see that these waves go in a certain direction.
and other larger waves which flow in a different direction and have a different movement pattern.
Without any knowledge of oceanography we can say: Look at that, how curious, they're crossing!
or if there are any other substances dissolved in the water which may reduce the tension.
in places where the surface tension is not as high, flatter waves are formed.
and places where it has this type of flow and places where it flows like this.
dead leaves, particles and surfactants which change the surface tension accumulate on the surface.
a circulation which promotes this distribution at the surface'.
So in fact, there is information that we can collect, but we need to be able to interpret it correctly.
We take information from the scene in proportion to the prior information we have available.
The aim of this course is to increase that information, especially in terms of oceanography.
but it does tell us if there is a contrast in temperatures between the water and the atmosphere.
such as the Barcelona World Race entries, sensors to record data from across the globe.
data information and knowledge that we have of the Mediterranean.
and that complexity is what gives it the characteristic of an ocean on a small scale.
Therefore, we're going to use this first module as an introduction to the basic concepts based on the Mediterranean.
your knowledge of all of the concepts and the data we provide you with.