Miscellaneous Musing #49

People nowadays think of conscience as a kind of substitute for moral authority, something that gives you permission to decide what is right no matter what someone of superior wisdom, e.g., God, has to say on the subject.  In actuality, conscience is something that compels you to do what may go against your will, but which you know to be right because someone of superior wisdom has established it as such.

Uncommon Commentary #283: Petty Officers, the Navy Needs; Petticoats, it Doesn't

Growing up, I thought it good to have women in the US military, because the military was thus larger (or so my immature reasoning went) than it would be if men alone went to war.  Having learned more about life since then, however, I now understand that the Gentle Sex really doesn't belong in the armed forces even during peacetime.  Further, the Navy is currently so desperate to bring its spending under control that it has resorted to giving petty officers unwanted discharges; instead,—be forewarned that my following question is rhetorical, since the Left has far too much influence over the US mindset for such a sensible proposal as this to actually be accepted—why not bar females from enlisting (or re-enlisting, if they are already in the service) and from becoming commissioned?

Uncommon Commentary #282: Or Are They Trying to Persuade People Not to Vote for Their Own Party, Which Is a Much Better Idea?

My dictionary defines a libertarian as (1) "an advocate of the doctrine of free will" or as (2) "one who upholds the principles of absolute and unrestricted liberty esp. of thought and action". As a Christian (who rejects the Calvinistic form of predestinarianism) I certainly make no objection to the libertarians of the first definition, but on the same grounds (less the parenthesized material) I have cause for disagreement with the libertarians of the second meaning. The latter are right most of the time, and indeed there evidently are Christians who profess libertarianism as their political philosophy, but if they should think more deeply about the matter they would find it impossible to reconcile that philosophy with what we ought to know as Christians: that the purpose of life is not to have as much liberty as possible but to do the will of God, "in whose service [to quote Saint Augustine] there is perfect freedom". Non-Christian libertarians carry their faulty logic to its inevitable end, and reason that people have a right even to do such un-Christian things as fornicate, use illegal drugs, kill unborn children, and marry a member of one's own sex.
And then there are those libertarians with a capital "L". This past week, the Libertarian Party put out a statement with a subject line that reads thus: "Libertarian Presidential Candidate Gov. Gary Johnson Could Deprive Mitt Romney of 5 battleground states, 74 Electoral Votes, 27% of the Electoral Votes needed to win in 2012". (I have no explanation for the inconsistency in capitalization, unless it's just that Libertarians feel that their unrestricted liberty gives them the right to disregard the rules of proper English.) Are Libertarians trying to give the election to the incumbent?

Uncommon Commentary #281: Holding the Lie-Able Liable for Libel

Slander and libel have become routine in our civilization, especially, it seems, in US politics, yet one almost never hears of lawsuits over these outrages.  Forbearance in the face of calumny can make one a better person, but if the defamed don't pursue justice for their own sake, they ought to do so for the sake of all other actual and potential victims of maligning.  Slanderers and libelists must be shown that there is a penalty to be paid, even in this life, for wrongdoing.

Uncommon Commentary #280: Common Sense Isn’t Common

Many of the best-known converts from the pro-fœticide to the pro-life viewpoint received their revelation because they viewed ultrasound images which show that, yes, an unborn child is more than just a "blob of tissue".  I'm glad that they've seen the light, yet I find it disturbing that so many persons need science to prove to them what logic ought to have told them anyway: that the offspring of two human beings is a human being, and that even if an embryo or a fœtus doesn't qualify as a baby yet, it will be one in fewer than nine months.