When Gunfire Interrupts Coffee

I had no idea there has been a spate of shootings in Seattle.

There was a big one yesterday I just found out this morning, from Drudge.

Immediate questions...

1. How come no one in the coffee shop was armed?  If you believe it is right to meet violence with violence, and if you believe in cops, and you do, and when seconds counts the cops will be there in minutes, why are you not armed?

2. How is it no one has noted the shooter is an outstanding, expert shot?  If he got 5 out of 6 dead, one critical, he is an exceptional, well trained shooter. Killing someone with a pistol with one shot is really quite difficult, near impossible if they are all moving.  Trained by whom (I am guessing military?)  In a time when more soldiers are dying from suicide than combat, what's going on?

Mayor McGlinn promises to work with the community to address the coincidence of several shootings.

For my part, thou shalt not kill.  Just because someone is shooting up a cafe does not mean that person should die.  In aikido we train to go straight at an attacker.  If someone starts shooting, game on.

Although I have no problem with people arming themselves, a second shooter in a cafe can be very confusing, even if shooter #2 is defending himself and the other patrons.  Much better defenders are unarmed, which is the case with aikido.

We train to not get hurt, but when there is a shooter, going straight at him, you are likely to get shot, no matter what your fighting system.  But going at a shooter, and being in control of yourself, at least you have some say so in whether a hit is lethal or not.  Not so the dead people who ducked.

Aikido is a martial art because it is designed for a combat situation.  It substitutes non-lethal response for lethal response.  An aikidoist like any other martial artist responds to threats.

We are told the problem is guns, when in fact it is failed state policies, which are backed by ... guns.  Obama put a 17 year old girl on his secret kill list.  What goes around comes around.

What we need is more people objecting conscientiously to violence and ready to meet it, even at a coffee break.

Peregrinations of a Master

One of my instructors, Lau Sensei, has taken on yet another life, this time in Chile.  I had spent eight years helping him write a book, which he managed to get out.  

Here we are, circa 1982 in his private dojo, he hosting a seminar by Terada Sensei.

Upon inquiring as to his well-being, he replied, in part:

"Best thing you ever did for me John was to tell me to take a hike -!-

Many thanks -!!!- What are friends for after all -!- Ja Ja -!-

b..."

We do what we can.

Ukrainian MPs Discuss Language

On the topic of language, specifically as to whether Russian will gain official status, some Ukrainian politicians decided to let their fists to their talking.  The fellow with the yellow and blue scarf is applying a pin in which pressure is applied to the nerves coming through holes in the jaw.  He is a little high, but in a fluid fight it is hard to apply.  Nice try though.  Later in the fight the larger fellow, when not so many hands are on him, delivers some pay back.

USA Foreign Policy

Here is a video on US Foreign Policy...

Its outline of the outrages is very good, its condemnation of free markets mistaken.  There is no "free market" in the teachings of Milton Friedman, since he believes in the supremacy of the state ultimately.  this is about 90 minutes long.

Just Following Orders/ Love it or Leave It

Those who love the state have two arguments in extremis:

1. I was just following orders.

2. If you don't like it, just leave.

The problem with these two comments is as follows:

1. "I was just following orders."  This begs the question, "Whose orders?"   Who had the authority to order you, and how come they came by such authority?  They had the authority because you pledged allegiance.  You willingly gave your consent to be governed, and then you just followed orders.  Those who wield power may absolve you for being just a soldier following orders, but will your Maker do so?

Some will object to evil in the face of orders.  Often if that question is asked, for example, at Abu Ghraib or Treblinka, the answer is clear or, often as not, the superior giving the evil order will reply,  "don't worry, I will take responsibility."  

Well no human being has the right (the power yes, but not the right) to pass off to another the blame for his own evil actions.  If you follow the order, you alone are guilty.

Now the funny thing is, any soldier can ask for orders in writing.  The worst that can happen is they will be transferred out.  Soldiers can be shot for failing to follow orders, but not for asking the orders to be in writing.

2.  If you do not like it, just leave (love it or leave it.)  Those who objected to the Vietnam war were told to love America or leave it.  Very strange.  But in natural law, one has property rights, and human action in natural law is superior to state prescriptive law.  If you own a home in a USA, "leaving" is hardly an option.  It is the ones who propose war, a lower level human activity, who ought to leave, to advance their agenda, in another country.

Our love for others is concrete and superior to "love of state."

Feel free to forward this by email to three of your friends.

War and Student Loans

We've crossed the line when the majority of the unemployed also have college education.  And it is accelerating, because the community colleges are packing them in, and forming waiting lists.  So it is a simple fact that in the majority of cases and education equals unemployment.

The disaster is systemic because courses offered in a community college mean more debt for the taxpayers.  You see, no matter what a student pays, the majority of the cost is covered by the taxpayers. And state institutions, being what they are, concentrate on teaching java coders to be roofers, and roofers to be java coders.  Now go be unemployed, but you cannot bankrupt your student loan.  And the congress is now working on legislation where you cannot get a passport if you owe the government money.  So if you fall behind on your student loan to become a java coder or roofer, and they need java coder or roofers badly overseas, the only way you are going overseas is if you carry a rifle and wear a uniform.  Oorah!  We already have a rule that banks cannot foreclose on active duty military, so save the house, join the army.  Semper fi to the politicians abusing you and the generals unworthy to lead you!

This downward spiral will get us to the point when our elders express a collective sigh of relief when the mass of unemployed young go off to war.  Human sacrifice to appease the gods.  There is an alternative path, but you have to think like a conscientious objector.

Medicine as Violence

Here is a paper, a part of a growing effort, in which 35 people decide that the other 350 million citizens should have injected into them.  This is a leverage of 1 over ten million.  Training in conscientious objection is not limited to war.  It's about comprehensive conscientious objection.

Two of the twenty Jewish children used formedical experiments.

rrz.uni-hamburg.de

An Act of War

Trade embargoes are an act of war, and they strengthen the hand of hardliners within a given country.  If you want to go to war, impose trade sanctions.  Iran has shown astonishing self control in the face of the USA-backed murderous sanctions, especially when it is a country who leaders believe God will avenge them on USA.  Perhaps He will.  But regardless, trade embargoes necessarily make for distorted markets and a ripple effect of hard feelings, where not outright war.

Brave Honest Woman

Making a difference speaking truth to crime.

Colonel Sanders and Just War

With the formation of the United States, the presumption was we would never have a standing army, and a civilian, the President, would be Commander in Chief of any Army.

If we needed an army, business people would form "companies" of private soldiers and serve to fight the enemy.  Companies would gather and assign themselves to ever more accomplished businesspeople, who would then seek and get commissions from the President.  All general officers would be approved by Congress, as they are to this day.

Now this is a hard way to run an empire, so we got rid of it.  People who have better things to do are not interested in pointless war.  Career military people all want war, because their career depends on it.  Move up or out.  War makes for promotion opportunities.  "Out" is something to be dreaded.

A Colonel Sanders has to be very ticked off by some bad people for him to abandon his work and raise a company to go fight.  And when the fight is over he is in a hurry to return to his work.  Military life is no good, and he wants out as soon as necessary.

Not so with the system we have now.  We need to return to the peace and prosperity we once had.

Peace & Free Markets

this is what the Catholic church teaches:

Jesus is the way the truth and the life

the church is in persona christi.

it has a government.  that government is the largest in terms of people governed and oldest on the world.  the essence of the church government is a concept called subsidiarity.  this is why it is also the most efficient government man has ever known.

it is polylingual, multicultural.

And entirely voluntary.  It uses moral authority to persuade, not violence to compel.

The family is in persona christi.  It is voluntary too, although some families are run like states, so they introduce violence.

The state is not in persona christi.  In fact, it is rejected by God himself.

See

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+Samuel+8&version=NIV

In particular: this section

1 Samuel 8

New International Version (NIV)

Israel Asks for a King

8 When Samuel grew old, he appointed his sons as Israel’s leaders.[a] 2 The name of his firstborn was Joel and the name of his second was Abijah, and they served at Beersheba. 3 But his sons did not follow his ways. They turned aside after dishonest gain and accepted bribes and perverted justice.

4 So all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah. 5 They said to him, “You are old, and your sons do not follow your ways; now appoint a king to lead[b] us, such as all the other nations have.”

6 But when they said, “Give us a king to lead us,” this displeased Samuel; so he prayed to the Lord. 7 And the Lord told him: “Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king. 8 As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you. 9 Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will claim as his rights.”

10 Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people who were asking him for a king. 11 He said, “This is what the king who will reign over you will claim as his rights: He will take your sons and make them serve with his chariots and horses, and they will run in front of his chariots. 12 Some he will assign to be commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and others to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and still others to make weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. 13 He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. 14 He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his attendants. 15 He will take a tenth of your grain and of your vintage and give it to his officials and attendants. 16 Your male and female servants and the best of your cattle[c] and donkeys he will take for his own use. 17 He will take a tenth of your flocks, and you yourselves will become his slaves. 18 When that day comes, you will cry out for relief from the king you have chosen, but the Lord will not answer you in that day. ”

19 But the people refused to listen to Samuel. “No!” they said. “We want a king over us. 20 Then we will be like all the other nations, with a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles.”

The state is predicated on violence and compulsion.  It is not voluntary.  See that last sentence?

 A king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles.”

There was occasional violence before 1 Samuel 8 but this is where the endless violence started.

Human desire, contrary to God’s will, is to get someone else to fight our battles,pick up our tab, for everything from transportation to housing to education to health care.

The free market, grounded in natural law,  does this, but you must take responsibility for your own battles.  You cannot pass them off to others.  This is the heart of the rejection of natural law and free markets.

Weber defined the state as a “a given territory with a monopoly on violence.”

Just because some cracker named Max makes such a definition means nothing, unless politicians worldwide order affairs to the end of the state being that which is a defined as a territory with a monopoly on violence.  Well, politicians worldwide order affairs to the end of the state being that which is a defined territory with a monopoly on violence.   The people get in return a promise  “a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles.” And free health care, education transportation and housing.  How do they do it!  Well, they don’t.  It costs more to have the state provide it, and it is worse for the process that distributes it.  You just do not notice your loss.  As JB Say noted, it’s what you don't see that you are missing.

In response to God’s warnings, the Jews said “deal.”   Most of mankind has said said “deal.”  

But if not violence, how can the state exist?  It cannot.  It must have violence, or no state. therefore I am an anarchist.  Anarchists love government.  the game of chess has a government.  your Wing Chun club has a government.  The catholic church has a government.  All work on a voluntary basis.  The Amish, the catholics and the wing chun and chess association all use shunning for those who refuse to live under the government.

No state required.

But given that violence is perpetual, how do we face it, if not with state and its permission to use violence, a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles.”?  We cannot just shun an ax murderer. We cannot ignore a Mongol Horde.

The premise is based on a photo, not a video, as Rabbi Lapin might argue.  The Golden horde spread quickly because the people they “conquered” were so oppressed by the state that promised  people it would “to go out before us and fight our battles.”  In time, that got so bad people welcomed the Mongol Hords as a relief.  This is how Islam spread,  This is how the Qing overtook china.  The people escaped to anarchy.

When USA is conquered by invaders, it will be to the ticker tape parades of Americans.    We see the films of the French welcoming Americans.  There are films of french welcoming the germans too.  That is  not unique to france.

Thou shalt not kill.  Not every lethal threat has to be met with lethal violence.  We cannot even desire to kill on our hearts.  We may have religious and philosophical nonviolent scruples, but we also have instincts which scruples cannot overcome.  An ax murderer finds himself dead in a free market. You need no “stand-your-ground laws” to have what instinct provides. Early.  The state spends extraordinary amounts to keep ax murderers and child molesters and rapists alive.

Well, we cannot have people taking the law into their own hands.

Defending yourself instinctively against a lethal threat is not taking the law into your own hands.  There are no laws against it.  Instinctual violence is necssary and sufficient to protect us. Killing suspects is dicey business.  When there is no state, the rules laid out in deuteronomy begin to make sense.  But those days are long gone.  We have the state, compliments of the event first recorded in 1 Samuel 8, but repeated ad nauseum ever since then.

There are laws against instinctively defending your life against a lethal threat from a police officer.  Only the state may kill first without provocation and escape any justice.

How is the power concentrated?

Love of money is the root of all evil.  Usury (what we call interest) is forbidden by all religions. the catholic church today forbids it.  It is forbidden because it does harm.  Paying and receiving interest concentrates power in the hands of the few over the many.

Making money on money, rice on rice, with no risk in participation to the lender is strictly forbidden because it is precisely the game.  By concentrating money in the hands of the few, they buy they create the commanding heights, which holds forth that mammon is god.

They say our modern society must have interest in order to have the good things we all have.  Nonsense.  We can have all of the good things without usury.  We get wars and poverty with usury.

They say with PVT that interest (usury)  is just because it represents a compensation for losses in lending money, and both parties volunteer to engage in the practice.  Voluntary is good.  But then, why do we not enforce voluntarily incurred gambling debts?

The problem with usury is moral hazard...  4 & 5th parties pay 3rd parties to protect first parties from second parties.  Very diffuse, and when you are assured it is for YOUR own good, you nod your head in vague assent.  We like to think of ourselves as for good things and against bad things. When we do not quite understand something, but we are told it is for our own good, we will nod our heads in vague agreement. We often nod our heads in vague assent  to the most egregious schemes.  (Nodding our heads is something we do before we fall asleep, too.)  And important skill to develop is when someone in authority tells you something is good for you, your first reaction should be to ask "why?"

18 year olds foolishly take on student loans.  The state enforces the collection and entrapment of foolish 18 year olds.  they back it with violence.

If no state violence, then what?  Collectively, people would shun disputing parties in a case in which a 21 year old agreed to pay the principle but not the interest on a student loan.  (Students were allowed to vote at 18, if they gave up their protection from exploitative contracts at 18).  The state makes arbitrary statues of who is guilty or not.  The mass of opinion is closer to justice,  A real abuser finds he starves to death because he cannot get anyone to give him a ham sandwich.  Reform, or no ham sandwich!

If people declined ot pay usury, then there is no means to amass exceptionally wealth.  there is no means to accumulate property beyond the natural rights definition of ‘what you mix with your labor.”  Free markets militate against exceptional wealth, but they promote innovation and more better cheaper faster of commodities.

When everything you need is affordable, where is the advantage o being rich and powerful? Free markets are not about amassed capital and power, it is about just and rational distribution of goods and services, especially the scarce.

Capitalism is about amassed wealth and power, and thus it is loved far and wide.  With massed wealth and power, you can  and get moral hazard...  4 & 5th parties pay 3rd parties to protect first parties from second parties. and get others to go out before us and fight our battles.”  Nice!

This is why I cannot be a capitalist, and where I part company with the Austrian school. Over usury.

This is what Jesus was offered by Satan at the temptation in the desert.  Free food.  Safety. Power.  Satan was sizing up Jesus, wasn't sure just who Jesus was.  This was the first time, but not the last, that anyone whom Satan had tempted declined the offer.  Satan began to realize who Jesus was. Satan is a liar, but Jesus knows the truth.   Jesus was tempted because Jesus knew Satan could deliver food, safety, power  Both Jesus and Satan knew that then.   They know it now.  Anyone who accepts power is following Satan.

Most economists and theologians point to Romans 13, “render unto caesar” and jesus paying the temple tax as biblical foundation for the state. Their reading of scripture is contumacious.    Those must be read in light of 1 Samuel 8.  They must be read in terms of love your enemy.  they must be read in terms of heaping coals on your tormenters head by turning the other cheek.  In the passages cited, the clear and present evil, slavery and taxes for example, are identified, and the way to overcome the evil is explicated.  Do not resist.  the government over you is condign punishment for your sins.  First christianize yourself, and then christianize your government,  then there will be no state.  the state is to be christianized out of existence, not something upon which to hitch a ride.  In the way most bishops are no different than Dan Savage.  Both want the state to use violence to advance their preferences, whether in health care delivery or the definition of marriage.

The Southern white slavers could read the Bible and understood it perfectly well.  AS Incidents in the life of a Slave Girl, Harriet Ann jacobs, who was there,  makes it clear the slavers were very much against, and suppressed reading, and evening hearing the Gospel. Nobody thought the bible supported slavery.  No, St Paul recognized great evil, and advised practical, effective means for fighting it.  He never advocated joining in.

Contemporary church/state relations are just that, recent and unusual.  For millenia there was an argument over divine right of kings vs divine right of the church.  Somestimes the church was up, sometimes down.  With modernism the argument between king and church was settled: the divine right of the state.

How can an entity that is not in persona Christi define terms for an entity that is?  How can an entity that depends on the state for funding object to the tune it calls?  The contmporary church needs the state.  Dan Savage does not need the state. the differences at that point are merely a matter aesthetics.  It’s all ugly when the state is involved.  But in the argument, advantage Dan Savage.

this is what the Scripture teaches.  those who love the state obfuscate the clear lessons.  When have you ever heard 1 Samuel 8 preached on?  Never?  Really?  is that a coincidence?

Instead we get theologians and economists paganizing christianity by claiming a Christian must pledge allegiance to the state. Blasphemy!

People confuse power and rights.  the state has power to do things, like search you at an airport, but not the right.  the state is a legal fiction, so it cannot be granted rights.  it only has power, as Eisenhower noted, both sought and unsought.  And it is only people exercising power.

it is people who have amassed property who control the commanding heights and direct the masses who clamor for a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles.”

Abraham was willing to slaughter his son to appease his God.  Abraham proved he believed he was dealing with a god, and then God revealed he was the God.  And The God does not want child sacrifice, or the state.  Today Catholics send priests to serve in the state military to attend to their children they sacrifice to the state so these christians can have a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles.”  those who pledge allegiance engage in child sacrifice, contrary to the wishes of the God of Abraham.  

We have the power to pledge allegiance to the state, but not the right.  We have the ability and right to form a government, but not to employ violence.  the state and violence are necessarily one.  God rejects the state, and Satan has it on offer.

it is one or the other, God or mammon, not both.