Common Sense with Paul Jacob

Nichelle Nichols

Gene’s whole vision was that minorities weren’t on set because we were minorities, we were on set because in the future our diverse world would all be working together as equals. I understand that everyone needs to see role models that can inspire them and talk to them and represent them, but I believe we need to move to a future that transcends race, gender, or anything else. We’re all people.
Nichelle Nichols, in “Uhura Fest: ‘Star Trek’ legend Nichelle Nichols talks Wizard World Philly and transcending race,” by Jerome Maida, The Philadelphia Enquirer (May 29, 2017). Ms. Nichols, who died on July 30, 2022, played Lieutenant Nyota Uhura on the Star Trek television show and in the first six Star Trek movies.

Today

Declaration signed!

The Declaration of Independence was signed by members of the Continental Congress of the United States, on August 2, 1776.

Let’s note at the outset that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) did not “directly” threaten to shoot down House Speaker Pelosi’s plane on her possible upcoming visit to democratic and free Taiwan. That friendly suggestion was instead offered by a columnist for the “state-run” Global Times.

On Twitter.

Which, incidentally, is banned in China.

That being said, the totalitarians are indeed “bad folks.” In addition to continually threatening the invasion of Taiwan, they’re known to rough up defenseless old folks. For instance, browbeating 79-year-old President Joe Biden last week in a multi-hour phone call, in which, according to a Chinese foreign ministry read-out, Xi Jinping warned our president about standing with Taiwan: “Those who play with fire will perish by it.”

While no one in his right mind wants war with the Dragon, to avoid war with fear and cowardice may ultimately require ceding the world’s greatest democratic success story, Taiwan (the Republic of China), to the genocidal (and misnamed) People’s Republic of China.

Our cowardly leaders might opt to shut up and look the other way — especially if there is payola attached — but not the rest of us.

Should the United States tangle with a nuclear power over Taiwan?

Isn’t that like asking whether we should go to war over my mother or yours? Or your spouse . . . or your son or daughter?

Is one person — or a small nation of 24 million souls — worth such a risk?

When the Dragon demands a sacrifice, recognize it for what it is.

If one person, recognize it once.

If a nation, recognize it 24 million times.

Resist the Dragon.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Note: As I point out in last weekend’s podcast, Taiwan can successfully repel a Chinese invasion, especially with U.S. and Japanese assistance. And here, Ian Easton, author of The Chinese Invasion Threat, speaks to the issue.

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Thought

John Adams

Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people.
John Adams, Novanglus: or, A History of the Dispute with America, From Its Origin, in 1754, to the Present Time (1775), No. 3, first published in the Boston Gazette.

Today

Slavery Ends

On August 1, 1834, Great Britain’s Slavery Abolition Act of 1833 took force, freeing slaves throughout the British empire.

Technically, it freed slaves under the age of six. On the August 1 date in 1838 and 1840, the rest of the empire’s slaves were freed, practically speaking.

August 1 births include Francis Scott Key (1779), composer of the poem “The Star-Spangled Banner”; American authors Richard Henry Dana, Jr. (1815) and Herman Melville (1819); and Thomas E. Woods, Jr. (1972), historian and popularizer of Austrian economics, podcaster of the Tom Woods Show.

Thought

Samuel Adams

Freedom of thought and the right of private judgment, in matters of conscience, driven from every other corner of the earth, direct their course to this happy country as their last asylum.
Sam Adams, Speech, State House of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia (August 1, 1776).

by Paul Jacob video

Watch: We Have to Stop Being Scared

Post author By Redactor
Post date July 31, 2022
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Paul defends Taiwan. Won’t you?

Thought

Mary Wollstonecraft

We reason deeply, when we forcibly feel.

Today

Pelted with Flowers

On July 31, 1703, Daniel Defoe — who would later become famous as the author of Robinson Crusoe and other literary works — was placed in a pillory for the crime of seditious libel. The sedition pertained to a satirical pamphlet he had published, “The Shortest-Way with the Dissenters; Or, Proposals for the Establishment of the Church.” The mob pelted him with flowers.

On the same date in 1912, Milton Friedman was born. Friedman became one of the most influential economists of the 20th century, and one of the most effective advocates of free markets, as well. His books include Capitalism and Freedom and two famous collaborations, A Monetary History of the United States (with Anna Schwartz) and Free to Choose (with his wife, Rose Friedman).