“Progress always involves risk; you can’t steal second base and keep your foot on first base.”
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Thinly Veiled
Representative Paul Ryan’s budget plan famously elicited from the president a bizarre accusation about “social Darwinism.” Now Georgetown University’s faculty and priests warn that his “spending blueprint would hurt society’s most vulnerable.”
Ryan undoubtedly laughed off the Darwinism charge, but Georgetown U. is Catholic, and so is Ryan, making his response especially interesting:
“I suppose that there are some Catholics who for a long time thought they had a monopoly of sorts, not exactly on heaven, but on the social teaching of our Church,” Mr Ryan said, adding: “There can be differences among faithful Catholics on this.”
He also argued that a “preferential option for the poor,” a tenet of Catholic teaching, means that people should not become “dependent on the government so they stay stuck at their station in life.”
The latter point is especially telling, for upward social mobility is surely a prime goal of all who are truly concerned about improving the lot of the less well-off.
Interestingly, social mobility and improvement via voluntary co-operation were also major concerns of the two 19th century liberals who have since been labelled the Social Darwinists Nos. 1 and 2: Herbert Spencer and William Graham Sumner. But then, careless charges regarding “social Darwinism” have never had much intellectual substance, and are, almost certainly, irrelevant to Ryan’s actually quite modest plan, which spends 50 percent more than Clinton’s 2000 budget. This fact led Reason’s Nick Gillespie to quip, “If that’s what passes for ‘thinly veiled social Darwinism’ . . . the English language is as broke as the federal treasury.”
I think that’s pretty clear, at this point.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
On April 30, 1492, Spain gave Christopher Columbus his commission of exploration.
On April 30, 1789, George Washington was sworn in as the first American president and delivered the first inaugural speech at Federal Hall in New York City.
On April 30, 1945, Nazi dictator Adolph Hitler committed suicide in his underground bunker in Berlin, Germany.
“Don’t let your mouth write no checks that your tail can’t cash.”
On April 29, 1429, Joan of Arc entered the eastern gate of the city of Orleans to relieve French forces badly in need of supplies and more soldiers. Barely a week later, on May 8, the English siege of Orleans was broken by the French.
On April 29, 1945, the U.S. Seventh Army’s 45th Infantry Division liberated Dachau, the first concentration camp established by Germany’s Nazi regime, just five weeks after Hitler became chancellor in 1933.
On April 29, 1992, three days of rioting erupted after four Los Angeles police officers — videotaped beating Rodney King with Billy clubs, after a high-speed car chase and subsequent confrontation — were acquitted of wrongdoing. Rioters in south-central Los Angeles blocked freeway traffic and beat motorists, damaged and looted downtown stores and buildings, and set more than 100 fires. On May 1, President George Bush ordered military troops and riot-trained federal officers to LA and by the end of the next day the city was under control. In three days of disorder, 55 people were killed, almost 2,000 injured, 7,000 people were arrested, and nearly $1 billion in property damage reported, including the burnings of nearly 4,000 buildings. Rodney King had been released without charges after his arrest. The four police officers, acquitted of state charges on this day, were later prosecuted under federal law for violating Rodney King’s constitutional rights. Two officers were convicted, and sentenced to 2½ years in prison, and two were acquitted of the federal charges.
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Thomas Jefferson
“The will of the majority, the natural law of every society, is the only sure guardian of the rights of man. Perhaps even this may sometimes err; but its errors are honest, solitary and short-lived.”
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Townhall: No Fight Club
Guess: What is the first rule of No Fight Club? For the answer, go to Townhall.com. Then come back here to check the source material:
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Muhammad Ali
“I know where I’m going and I know the truth and I don’t have to be what you want me to be. I’m free to be what I want.”
On April 28, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson launched an invasion of the Dominican Republic by more than 20,000 U.S. troops, claiming the military action prevented a “communist dictatorship.” Johnson’s evidence was flimsy, but U.S. military power dominant.
On April 28, 1967, boxing champion Muhammad Ali refused to be inducted into the U.S. Army and was immediately stripped of his heavyweight title. Ali, a Muslim, cited religious reasons for his decision to forgo military service, and added, “I ain’t got no quarrel with those Vietcong.”
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Video: Don’t crucify me, EPA dude
Strained analogy or “giving away the game”?
This video, brought to public attention by Sen. James Inhofe, has received no small amount of attention: