Innocent Until Proven

Living according to principle is a good thing, generally. Better than random and unprincipled living. But what if you’re living by principles that are not true? That leads you to bad ends. Possibly harmful to yourself and others.

We’re witnessing an example. Some of us live by the freedom principle of “innocent until proven guilty,” with equality before the law, rather than preferential treatment for certain classes. Some others of us live by a different principle: “Always believe women accusers.” Notice the lack of evidence and the presence of special class.

Found on Facebook. Credited to Occupy Democrats Logic

They’re using the phrase “Always believe the survivor.” But a person is a survivor only if they actually went through something to survive. You don’t know they’re a survivor just because they’re alive, because you don’t know what they’ve gone through.

How do you come to know what they’ve gone through? Their say so and other evidence. You can’t just delete “and other evidence” because of their tribe, such as their being female.

Senator Feinstein corners Senator
Murkowski between testimonies
Thurday, image found here

The principles of freedom that we adhere to, that are embodied in our Constitution, aren’t the normal way for humans throughout history. They’re a rare discovery, a way to perpetuate the occasional decent society. The norm in human experience is tyranny, poverty, and savagery. Those things are easy to get. Freedom, prosperity for the masses, and civilization are rare, and ought to be treasured and protected.

When people yell at our senators in elevators that they have to believe the survivor because she’s a woman, or collar our senators in the hallways, and then our senators weaken—we have reason to be upset about that. This isn’t about one Supreme Court nominee; this is about the rule of law and the maintenance of our 230-year experiment in self-governing through a constitutional republic of limited government and guaranteed rights—rather than the alternative of any popular flavor of tyranny.

How do we know the “always believe the woman accuser” principle is false? Evidence. History.

Let’s start way back. Joseph was falsely accused by his slave master Potiphar’s wife, for which he was imprisoned. Michelle Malkin recounts this story on a Facebook live. She says,

"Joseph and Potiphar's Wife" by Guido Reni, 1630
image from Wikipedia

The sad fact is that people—yes, that includes women—tell lies about all sorts of things all the time. And, yes, that includes lies about sexual harassment, assault, and rape. Women have told these types of lies from the beginning of time.

Other examples include Emmitt Till, a 14-year-old black boy from Chicago, visiting relatives in the south in the 1950s, accused of raping a white woman—absolutely falsely accused. Obviously so at the time, but racial prejudice led powerful people to disregard his human value and set his murderers free. In 2007 his accuser admitted she had lied. Too late.

Emmett Till
Meme found on Facebook, credited to Penny Whitehead

More recently there’s the Duke Lacrosse players, and football player Brian Banks. 

Brian Banks
Meme found on Facebook, credited to Stanley Trump Ziel

And this story, of a man who spent 28 years of a 48-year sentence after being falsely accused of rape—even though the actual perpetrator was named at the time. The accuser had a dream, and this guy’s face came to mind, so she recounted her previous story and blamed this man. The real perpetrator eventually confessed, leading to the case being overturned.  

Clarence Moses-EL, who spent 28 years in prison
after being falsely accused of rape.
Image from here.

And let’s not forget this one, which is eerily similar to the current witch hunt—and which has proven over time that character certainly wasn’t the problem: Justice Clarence Thomas. 

Clarence Thomas, during his nomination hearing
screen shot from here

In literature, we have To Kill a Mockingbird, which looks very similar to the Emmitt Till story. We like to think we would be on the side of Atticus Finch, the lawyer who defended the accused. But if you’re the kind of person who believes Christine Blasey Ford only because she’s a woman accuser, and you’re ignoring her lack of evidence, including the refutation of her story or refusal to corroborate by all her named witnesses, up against Brett Kavanaugh’s life reputation, contemporaneous evidence (calendar), six previous deep FBI character investigations, many character witness who have known him for decades both in work and private situations, and his own testimony—then I can guarantee you are the very kind of person who would have sided against Atticus Finch’s accused, and against Emmitt Till, because tribe means more to you than truth.

from the movie To Kill a Mockingbird, with updated graphics
Meme found on Facebook, credited to Fred McCarty

And that’s why we don’t want you or anyone like you to have power over us. You are not fit for causing anything but tyranny.

What does your tyranny of tribe look like for real humans? Take a look at what you’re doing to a good man and his family. Ted Cruz talked about what Kavanaugh meant by his "family being destroyed":

To some that may sound like hyperbole. I don’t think it is. Judge Kavanaugh has two young daughters, a ten-year-old and a thirteen-year-old. For the rest of their lives, their daughters will go to school, will interact with people, many of whom are convinced their father is a rapist.

I want you to think of the effect that has, when those are the allegations. That’s where it starts. Not, “I disagree with your jurisprudence.” Not, “I think you’re wrong in how you interpret the Constitution.” But “You are…” And let’s be clear: he has been accused of, among other things, participating in repeatedly drugging and gang raping women, to take some of the more sensational, I think ludicrous, claims that have been aired.

These little girls are going to have classmates of theirs repeat those charges to them.

Some of the most poignant testimony yesterday was when Judge Kavanaugh described how he’s taught law at Harvard Law School for over a decade, and he said he may never get to teach law again. And that’s entirely possible. That’s entirely possible, even if Judge Kavanaugh is confirmed to the US Supreme Court as a sitting justice, in our polarized world. I’m a graduate of the Harvard Law School. I think it is entirely possible those on the left would say, “We don’t want someone we believe is a rapist ever teaching again.”

He also talked about how much he has loved coaching girls’ basketball, coaching his daughters in basketball. He mentioned he may never coach again. That’s a very real possible consequence of the mudslinging and irresponsible behavior of the last two weeks. It may well be, in this tribalized, partisan, divided world that the parents of the other girls say, “No, we don’t want him as a coach anymore.”

Real damage has been done. A lifetime of good living has been buried by one suspiciously timed and unsupported allegation.

People who want power that is not limited by the Constitution caused this damage. I don’t know whether Blasey Ford was merely a tool or simply a liar. But the real victims here are Brett Kavanaugh, his family, and justice—and all of us who love justice.

Don't we ever believe victims, then? Most of the time. Because most of the time they are telling the truth and the evidence, especially when gathered fresh, is likely to show that. We do the best we can, in an imperfect but best ever justice system, to hold wrongdoers accountable. Sometimes, with "innocent until proven guilty" as a principle, we feel frustrated that justice can't always done. But that's a sacrifice we make so that justice can be done as often as possible, and tribal preference is never substituted for blind justice. Because we know that's where tyranny lies.

Oneness

There’s a feeling we had on this day seventeen years ago that we hadn’t felt three days earlier. There was compassion, hurt, worry, also resolve. And more than anything there was a sense of oneness. A sense that we are all Americans now. Party didn’t matter. Ethnicity didn’t matter. People around the world stood with us—not looking down on us, or pitying us, but loving us and standing alongside us in our time of distress.

Flag in the aftermath 9-11-2018
image from NBC News

There’s a feeling we had a year ago in Houston last year, after the 50+-inch deluge that came with Hurricane Harvey. Neighbors helped neighbors. And everyone was our neighbor. People came in from well outside Houston. The Cajun Navy, as they came to be called, were neighbors with boats that set out from Louisiana to bring their small fishing boats to help rescue flood victims. People fed one another, and housed one another. Sometimes long term, since it took from several months to more than a year to get many homes back to habitable—some are still not. People helped each other muck out the debris, and clean, and dry out, and then begin the rebuild. People gave of their time and money.

Nobody asked, before offering help, “Are you part of my tribe?” No one cared about race, ethnicity, religion, political party. We were all people. We were all Houstonians. Even people from far outside the city, and even beyond the country’s borders.

My friends Derrick and Gloria, after Harvey (their 3rd flood)
The photo is his.

Right now there’s a disaster about to hit the southern east coast, aiming at Georgia and the Carolinas. More than a million have been evacuated. Sometimes these things turn out to be less than predicted, but sometimes—as we know around here—the worst case scenario shows up. So right now we’re all sending our prayers that direction. I heard there was a call for the Cajun Navy to re-deploy. Again, no one will be asking whether those in need are of a particular tribe: color, party, ideology. We’re all Americans, all humans, pulling together for those of us in harm’s way.

radar screen shot from CBS News

Can we agree that the oneness we feel under these circumstances is a good thing? I’m assuming if you’re reading this, you’re civilized enough to believe this is true.

We know how to get the unity: suffer a calamity.

What we need to know is how to get the unity without the calamity.

I don’t know the answer. Well, not true. I do know. Choose life in the freedom, prosperity, and civilization zones. Live by the rules that get us there. Do it individually, and then share your ways with the next generation, and with your larger circle of influence.

So, individually choose ultimate good: that’s the way to move from the fragmented, tribal culture that is making us simultaneously less unified and less individual. Persuading people—many people persuaded one by one—to choose ultimate good, that’s the challenge. I’m not sure how we’ll accomplish that.

But, in my personal, very small crusade toward that end, here’s a review of the ways to get ourselves up into freedom, prosperity, and civilization, according to the Spherical Model.

Into Freedom, Out of Tyranny

The Political Sphere

·         Keep government limited to the proper role of government: protection of life, liberty, and property.

·         Ask these questions:

o   Is the policy being debated something that an individual has the right to do, and therefore has the right to delegate to his/her government?

o   Does the policy infringe in any way on the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights?

Into Prosperity, Out of Poverty

We’re born naked, impoverished, and inexperienced. It is by growth, hard work, and gaining in expertise that we try to overcome this condition throughout our life. We are born with the right to life, the right to live free (not enslaved), and the right to pursue our own path to overcome the naked impoverished state.

The Economic Sphere

Prosperity comes when we are free to work, build our wealth (the results of work beyond subsistence), and choose how to spend the results of our work. In short, we need a free market. Not a crony capitalist economy. Not a highly regulated economy with government favoring various players. Not an economy of monopolies. But a true free market.

Policies should always be guaranteeing the right to enjoy the fruits of your labor.

Prosperity is tightly tied to civilization. Because we need people acting honestly, people who are trustworthy.

And we also need generous people who are willing to help those who cannot help themselves.

So the answer to prosperity is a free market—which is the engine for creation of wealth—combined with philanthropy.

Into Civilization, Out of Savagery

Civilization requires a critical mass of people living the laws of civilization. These are simple but not easy things:

·         A religious people.

·         Strong families.

The religion we’re talking about is fairly broad and free. We need to believe that God is our creator, and we are held accountable to Him for how we live our life. He has provided a moral code that we are bound to follow.

The Social Sphere

The moral code is identified in the Ten Commandments, among other places: honor God, family, life, truth, and property.

These laws can be lived individually. But the smallest unit of civilization—living among civilized people—is the family. So we need to clarify what valuing family looks like.

Religious freedom is required for civilization. God is essential, because He is the giver of rights. Anything excluding God limits our rights to whatever the person or entity chooses to grant.

Civilized societies value family as the most important and basic unit of governance. Alternatively, a hallmark of totalitarian regimes, which are savage, is the replacement of the family with the state. Totalitarianism resents loyalty to any societal unit other than itself. And it is this absolute weakness that will always prevent a totalitarian state from offering true Civilization as you’d find it in a free strong-family society.

We have a lot of evidence, from thousands of years of history, to show that strong families, and hence strong civilizations, do not happen without protecting marriage: a man and woman committed and exclusive for life, raising their own children. Such families allow civilization to perpetuate, against the strong pull of chaos and tyranny.

So, if we’re going to be united, without being compelled by catastrophe, we need to do it by being a people who love freedom, prosperity, and civilization, and willingly live the laws that get us there.

Tribalism vs. Truth

Last Friday, August 24th, the editorial board opinion piece in the Houston Chronicle said some things that I would normally just ignore, because I know the editorial board is biased in a way that doesn’t align with my beliefs. But sometimes it’s worth taking a look at how the other side thinks—and try to figure out why they think that way.

Here’s a section of the piece; I’ve highlighted a portion I want to talk about:

Yes, President Obama lied when he continued to say you could keep your health plan. He was wrong, but he did it to help millions of Americans get heath insurance.

But Trumps lies are wrong, the piece goes on to say, because they are for his own purposes. I don’t know if the editorial writer recognizes it, but he/she just said, “Lying is OK if your purpose aligns with what we on our side want. Lying is not OK if your purpose doesn’t align with what we on our side want.”

I would like to note that, while Trump’s lies are supposedly so plentiful, the editorial doesn’t list a single one in the entire piece. I’m sure there are some, especially if you’re someone who reads his every stylistic superlative as a literal lie, and yet the only actual lie listed is Obama’s, for comparison. And the lies the editorial writer is telling. Such as this one:

The presidential candidate who chanted “lock her up!” about an opponent who stored sensitive email on a home server has now been implicated in an actual crime.

In actual truth, Hillary Clinton committed a felony when she purposely put classified material on her private, unsecure server. The basic facts tell us that.[i] Those who have held security clearances all know this. Intent is not required, even though that is what Comey used as the excuse for not indicting her. And even though intent in this case was very likely provable.

But there is no indictment, or pending indictment, of President Trump for campaign fraud. Even if his former lawyer ends up facing charges, the incident is much less egregious than the John Edwards case, which ended in a hung jury. Not everything that tangentially could affect public opinion is necessarily part of a campaign. Nor is there any evidence of colluding with Russia to commit voter fraud, which was supposedly the reason for the special counsel investigation in the first place.

I don’t want to be put in the position of defending a person who is covering up for sex with a porn star so his wife doesn’t find out. Even though she probably knows. And even though the “billionaire playboy” image was well known to voters before the election. That behavior is disgusting and anathema to civilized men. Almost as savage as diddling an intern in the oval office, one might say—although actually doing it while president still strikes me as more egregious.

Further, a campaign finance violation committed by an employee is probably part and parcel of every major political campaign—because the laws are convoluted and unevenly applied. But when they are applied, the usual remedy is a fine, probably taken out of campaign funds, not removal from office. Unlike the usual remedy for leaving classified materials in unsecured locations: “Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.”[ii]

So there seems to be a disconnect regarding truth and facts.

The Wednesday, August 22^nd, opinion page of the Houston Chronicle featured a piece by Paul Krugman, who is also worthy of being dismissed, based on his past commentary. But I’ll use this one as a sample today. His piece is titled, “The Orwellification of the GOP didn’t start with Trump.” He’s referring to George Orwell’s book 1984. He does give some examples of Trump lies:

Donald Trump operates on the principle that truth—whether it involves inauguration crowd sizes, immigrant crime or economic performance—is what he says It is. And that truth can change at a moment’s notice.

Again, I don’t want to be put in the position of apologetic for Trump. But I do somewhat understand language and language style. Trump is not the person to go to for details, or data, or exact facts. He uses words for effect, and for big picture messaging. So some translating needs to be done. Like, crowd size. What other president would the news media go to for crowd size measures? But they claimed erroneously that the crowd was very small, not because it was particularly small, but because saying so would denigrate the president. And then other people showed the crowd on social media, revealing that the media had used a particular angle to hide the crowd.

So Trump was responding to a media lie, and, as he does because it’s his personality to do so, he made sure we all knew the crowd was big. Really big. He might have even thrown in a number for effect.

Trump wasn’t lying about the crowd size; the media outlets who tried to denigrate the president by claiming the crowd was less than it was did the lying.

Trump also hasn’t been lying about illegal immigrant crime; but leftist media have made erroneous and now refuted claims that illegals are more law-abiding than other immigrants or other Americans—and they’ve repeated that lie in the very moments following the revelation that Mollie Tibbetts was murdered by an illegal alien.

And the economy? Let’s just say, if you’re an American who lived through the Great Recession that lasted, coincidentally, all eight years of the Obama presidency, and you’re a young person, or a black person, or one of the other demographics now facing the lowest unemployment rates in decades, maybe you know the one not in touch with facts might be so-called economist Paul Krugman.

Krugman asks,

Why did the party’s belief in objective reality collapse so suddenly and completely?

Let me do some more language and style translation: he means, “No one in their right mind could possibly disagree with me, so the whole Republican party is demented.” And there’s no self-reflection, no inkling of recognition that he’s unaware of actual objective reality.

Since I’m a truth seeker, I’m also the kind of person who frequently asks, “Could I be wrong?” So I do the exploration for facts, which is why I can fairly clearly see both good things and bad things Trump has done. (I’m not the only one. Ben Shapiro often has a segment on his show called “Good Trump/Bad Trump,” where he shows evidence in both directions.)

But this particular president seems to bring out irrational hatred toward both Trump and anyone who disagrees with them—along with an absolute certainty of rightness. As Mark Twain put it, “It’s not what we don’t know that gets us in trouble. It’s what we know for sure that just ain’t so.”

Jane Clark Scharl, in a piece for Intercollegiate Review, asks the question “How Dangerous Is Jordan Peterson?” She concludes that he and his ideas are indeed dangerous, but not at all in the way his detractors believe. He’s dangerous because he’s revealing the lies being inculcated by various interrelated political tribes. As Scharl puts it:

In universities, high schools, and increasingly as early as elementary and preschools, children and young people are being taught not to think critically about topics like gender, sex, race, privilege, culture, liberty, wealth and success, and religion; instead, they are being presented with a series of platitudes and told to accept them or be punished.

Having someone who can get people to question the platitudes is dangerous to the tribes.

Jordan Peterson
image from here

I think there’s at least a partial explanation for the sense of danger Jordan Peterson stirs up, in the introduction to his book 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos. He spent many years looking into the atrocities of the past century, and asking how people could believe what they believed to such an extent:

I couldn’t understand how belief systems could be so important to people that they were willing to risk the destruction of the world to protect them. I came to realize that shared belief systems made people intelligible to one another—and that the systems weren’t just about belief.

People who live by the same code are rendered mutually predictable to one another. They act in keeping with each other’s expectations and desires. They can cooperate. They can even compete peacefully, because everyone knows what to expect from everyone else. A shared belief system, partly psychological, partly acted out, simplifies everyone—in their own eyes, and in the eyes of others. Shared beliefs simplify the world, as well, because people who know what to expect from one another can act together to tame the world. There is perhaps nothing more important than the maintenance of this organization—the simplification. If it’s threatened, the great ship of state rocks.

It isn’t precisely that people will fight for what they believe. They will fight, instead, to maintain the match between what they believe, what they expect, and what they desire. They will fight to maintain the match between what they expect and how everyone is acting. It is precisely the maintenance of that match that enables everyone to live together peacefully, predictably and productively. It reduces uncertainty and the chaotic mix of intolerable emotions that uncertainty inevitably produces [p. xxx].

So, people tribalize to fend off chaos. They have a vested interest in maintaining the tribe—along with its beliefs, values, and traditions—regardless of whether the beliefs are accurate or not. But disagreeing tribes clash.

That’s a problem. How do I know I’m the one who’s got the truth, when Krugman and the Chronicle editorial writer are so sure they’re the ones with the facts?

I have a number of clues. One is data from trusted sources, and probably multiple trusted sources. I would say the objective measures provided by nonpartisan government sources, at least for economic data, are probably accurate. And there are a few other sources I think have held up reliably well. Then it’s a matter of interpreting the data, to make sure you draw accurate conclusions. You need some tried and true principles for that.

Those of us on the conservative side—or, as we would put it in Spherical Model language, those of us in the northern hemisphere, where we find freedom, prosperity, and civilization—have an advantage over those in the southern hemisphere, who seize or cling to statist tyranny in order to fend off the tyranny of chaos. Up here, we encounter opposing viewpoints every day, from nearly any mainstream news source. So we question everything. If it doesn’t coincide with our experience and those around us, maybe there’s more to the story, so we start seeking it.

Those in a southern hemisphere bubble, those who admit to never encountering an actual conservative in their day-to-day lives, might not have a very clear or complete picture.

The Daily Wire did an interview with Brandon Straka, the guy who started the #WalkAway movement a few months ago. He talked about the bubble he used to be in. He would hang out with Ivy League educated smart people, who all saw things the same way. At first, when he thought what they said didn't make sense, he assumed he must be wrong, because they were so smart.

Brandon Straka
image from The Daily Wire

But then, when he started speaking up and voicing his questions, friends either abandoned or persecuted him for not staying on script. When he left that side, because they were, in his words, "intolerant, inflexible, illogical, hateful, misguided, ill-informed, un-American, hypocritical, menacing, callous, narrow-minded, and even blatantly fascistic," he still didn’t consider becoming a Republican. He told himself, "Well, I’m not a liberal, but I’m sure as hell not going to become a Republican because those people are crazy and racist, etc." Because that’s what he’d always been told to believe.

At first he didn’t really listen to the other side—our side. But after being abandoned by so many now hostile friends, he started really listening to Tucker Carlson, Ben Shapiro, Jordan Peterson, Ann Coulter, and Michelle Malkin. Now he gladly calls himself a conservative and is a registered Republican.

There’s this interesting part of the interview:

DW: Do you see any of the behavior that you witnessed on the Left mirrored in the Republican Party? For example—the identity politics, the pitting of groups against one another, the tribalism, the cruel rhetoric or violence.

STRAKA: No, I’m not seeing or experiencing anything like that, which is why I think I’ve come to embrace the conservative philosophy as much as I have. It’s all about the individual, personal empowerment, encouraging people to try hard, and work hard. You can have the life you want if you’re willing to work for it, be a decent person, and contribute to society.

One thing that opened him up to new information was a personal change, from alcoholic drug addict. As he says,

My life was all about self-pity and what the world owed me. After I got sober, I really started to learn about accountability, taking responsibility for your actions, and making amends to people when you've made mistakes. I started seeing the rewards of that.

So what he saw as true, when he was in that downward spiral, wasn’t true at all. Once he got free of the brain fog of addiction, he also got free of some untrue beliefs and found some better-serving true beliefs.

There’s an interview with Jordan Peterson—and I’ve heard him say this in several interviews—about learning to tell the truth. It relates to Rule 10 in his book: “Be precise in your speech.” He tries to never say anything that makes him feel weak. The interviewer thought that was an odd thing to base something on, just whether he personally felt more powerful or not. But he didn’t say more powerful over others; he said less weak personally. It’s a signal. You can pay attention and feel it, and that’s a way to find truth.

I would word it differently, based on my religious understanding. But there is a feeling you can have associated with finding truth. It’s a still, small voice, but if you practice and pay attention, you can use it as a built-in truth detector.

I tend to be overly trusting, and assume others tell the truth, because I do. And sometimes that ends up kicking me where it hurts. But many times, an uneasiness, something confusing or unsettling, or physically weakening is what I feel around untruth. I don’t like that feeling. I feel a wholeness, and a wholesomeness, around truth, even unpleasant truth when it needs to be faced.

If you want truth, you have to ask for it. Question tribalism. Question pitting one group of people against another. Question your prejudices. And learn what truth looks like and feels like. Civilization depends upon each of us doing just that.

---

[i] 18 U.S. Code § 798 - Disclosure of classified information,  https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/798 . And 46 CFR 503.59 - Safeguarding classified information, https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/46/503.59

[ii] 18 U.S. Code § 798 - Disclosure of classified information (see link above).

Contrasting Civilization and Savagery in Ferguson

It has been a week now since the verdict came from the grand jury in Ferguson, MO, not to indict police officer Darren Wilson. I watched the press announcement by the district attorney (video and transcript available through C-SPAN). He was clear; he was thorough. He also provided a packet of material, including pretty much every iota of information set before the grand jury (available here).

Robert McCulloch, St. Louis, MO, Prosecutor
photo from here

There were, in the streets, people waiting for the announcement without the details. They did not want to know why a grand jury would not indict; they wanted an excuse to riot.

We have here the contrast between civilization and savagery.

Civilization abides by the law, and when it sees unfairness in the law, seeks to change the law through the appropriate process at the appropriate level for that law.

Savagery breaks the law and blames society for the negative consequences, and breaks more laws in defiance of their civilizing purpose.

It is a tragedy that a young man had to die. But I haven’t heard a single good suggestion on how to change a broken system—or even anything broken about the system. A very large young man, on drugs, robs a store, shoving the (Asian) store owner on his way out with unpaid-for merchandise. Minutes later, when a report of the robbery is being sent to police officers nearby, he’s walking down the middle of the street, where he will attract the attention of law enforcement. He doesn’t take direction to get out of the street, but reaches in to a police vehicle, attacks the officer, goes for his gun, threatens his life.

When the officer shoots, still with the perpetrator looming over him within the police car, the man begins to run away. He has just represented himself as a threat; it is the officer’s duty to pursue to see where he goes, particularly because this is near residential areas; people could be harmed by this man. In Officer Wilson’s statement, he never intended to apprehend the big, dangerous man alone. He had called for backup and was just keeping eye contact. But Michael Brown turned around and started coming at the officer.

Considering the previous attempt on the officer’s life, just moments before, there were a lot of things the officer could fear: another physical attack that might knock him out; losing control of the weapon and having it used on him and on other innocent civilians. He fired several rounds at the charging man. He saw a flinch, so he knew he had hit him. He paused. Michael Brown didn’t do the normal thing—stop, hold up his empty hands, surrender. After being shot, he continued to charge at the officer. He kept charging, despite additional bullet wounds. Nothing stopped him but the final head shot—when he was within three yards of the officer.

Unarmed does not mean not dangerous. Clearly this man was dangerous and was exhibiting threatening behavior. Would it have been nice if we had some sort of instantaneous tranquilizer gun, instead of real bullets? Maybe. But when you’re up against a criminal with real bullets, you might not want to risk a slow response to his getting hit. And you might not know in the moment all the details that get examined after the fact. So officers carry guns, and I think we’re in agreement that’s for our protection and theirs.

What about Tasers? Good in some circumstances. But you have to be quite close, with all circumstances right. And there is always a chance they could still cause death. So I’m still waiting to hear what problem exists with the system.

There was one sure, certain way this tragedy could have been avoided: Michael Brown could have behaved less like a thuggish threat and more like a civilized human being.

He could have raised his hands to show he had no weapon. He could have respectfully obeyed the officer. He would probably still be alive if he had done everything wrong except for charging at Officer Wilson even after receiving bullet wounds. Stopping at any point would have saved his life.

The circumstances would have been the same if a man of a different color had behaved as Michael Brown did. It’s sad that this young man didn’t get straightened out in time to see a better future. But his choices that day made it so that any police officer simply doing his job would follow essentially the same procedures as Officer Wilson.

It would have been a travesty to put this officer on trial when all the evidence validated his version and discounted the contradictory eye-witness accounts. (Witness 10 corroborates, for example. Paul Cassell, for Volokh Conspiracy, a law blog, discusses that here.)

There has been discussion about how rare it is for a DA not to recommend an outcome for the jury. There’s some context for that. Usually a DA is certain he has enough evidence for probable cause—and probably for an eventual conviction. The grand jury is there to make sure there’s not corruption in the process; the DA must actually have the evidence. In this case the DA knew he did not have sufficient evidence to prosecute the officer. In normal circumstances (i.e., without the media circus and riot instigation), the officer would simply have been examined and dismissed, since he followed procedure. The grand jury was only used in this case to satisfy those claiming an injustice had been done. If the DA simply dismissed, the complaints could continue. (Paul Cassell again gives a good rundown of the grand jury procedure, here. Cassell has spent the week going through the reports. He also has good commentary on the self-defense argument and the supporting physical evidence.)

What is puzzling in the aftermath is to see, in the face of clear evidence, that a “tribe” of racist blacks, mainly, insist on demonstrating their displeasure through rioting, looting, burning—of unrelated business people. (We talked about “tribalism” last month, including mentioning this case. It’s worth a re-read.) One store taken down the first night was a cake decorating shop, owned by a young black woman, who had saved up after starting small and mobile, and had put everything into her business, opening up just in June.

First of all, the narrative about this case being anti-black is bogus; it’s about someone being prevented from acting savagely among civilized people. People who do what Michael Brown did don't get a pass just because of their skin tone. Second, how does it prove society is unfair and uncivilized to blacks when blacks go out afterward and savagely cause mayhem? It doesn’t. And third, targeting innocent businesses—even black-owned ones—is a particularly ineffective way of claiming society is unfair to these otherwise deserving blacks. “We’re more civilized than you, and that’s what we’re showing you by going out and destroying random property.” Hmm.

But one thing I’d like to point out here is that love of goodness—love of fellow human beings, love of civilization—will win. We have seen some stories this week.

As Mr. Rogers is quoted as saying, “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’” That is true now, as in any civilization.

image found on Pinterest

One example concerns Natalie Debose, the cake decorator whose place was trashed. Online, people started gathering money to help her rebuild, and last report I read the crowdsourcing had raise $140,000 for her, without government help.

One example is a group of four young black men, who armed themselves and descended on a business—to protect it from the rioters. Some confusion ensued, and the business owner had to validate to police that they were there to help. So it took more than a little bravery on their part. But they saw good that needed doing, and they did it.

Another story mentioned a woman who stood up to armed thugs about to attack a Papa John’s pizza shop. She wasn’t the owner, didn’t even work there. She just saw where the thugs were headed and stood up to them. I don’t know her name (or even her race), but she’s very brave.

Standing up against tyranny—including the chaotic kind—is what civilized people do. Civilized people think, build, love, and stand strong. Savages gnash their teeth, hate, hurt, and destroy.

The civilized world is a better place to live. Anyone willing to live the rules that bring about civilization is welcome to live among the civilized.

Character Trumps Tribe, Part III

We’ve spent a couple of posts so far talking about “tribes.” I’m using this term to mean group, or identity, such as race or ethnicity. But it can be other things, whatever is part of an identity grouping. In part I we covered Houston Mayor Annise Parker and her LGBT tribal loyalty overriding principles important to the larger population. In part II we talked about the tribalism in the black community, standing in the way of freedom, prosperity, and civilization.

Another “tribe” that’s being put forward to get “firsts” is women, which we’ll cover in today’s part III, along with some conclusions.

Wendy Davis, running for Texas Governor, is an example of the “tribe” of women. She claims there is a war on women, and voting for her puts you on the right side of the war. But that’s tribal. What is she saying that would lead to freedom, prosperity, and civilization for men in Texas? Or for women? Because the same principles apply if you want to go north on the sphere.

Other than our age and gender, I find nothing in Wendy Davis that puts us in any similar group. We agree on almost nothing, and I would never want a person with her lack of character and capability to represent or lead me. I certainly would not give her my vote just because of her gender. Especially when a man of great character and capability, Greg Abbott, is our blessed alternative.

Hillary Clinton will not be the first female to run for president; but she is pressing the “tribalism first” goal of getting the vote because she is nominally a woman. Her lack of character and capability are almost legendary. The only thing she thinks will work for her is tribalism—“Vote for me to prove you don't hate women.”

What does this "feminist tribe" stand for? Sex without consequence. “Right” to kill unborn babies at any point (and leading to even after birth in some cases). Disdain for motherhood, and especially for stay-at-home motherhood. Pushing to ignore physiological differences between men and women. Claiming that there’s still a pay difference between men and women (outlawed decades ago, when you’re comparing apples to apples situations). Pretending to be men, while pretending men are evil and inconsequential. There's nothing in there that even shows an understanding of women, let alone a love and appreciation for divine womanhood.

The feminist tribe pushes for power to be men, to replace men. It’s illogical. It’s ugly. It’s hate-filled. And because it’s so anti-family, it can only lead to tyranny, poverty, and savagery.

That is not to say women can’t be good in government, leadership, or just about any profession they choose. But it has to be based on the character and capability of individual women—nothing to do with the feminist tribe.

You can't assume goodness based on tribal association. So the next question is, how do you tell when a person is likely to promote their tribe over the common good?

In Harris County right now there is an interesting race for District Attorney. Both party’s candidates are women. The incumbent, Devon Anderson, was appointed a little over a year ago, upon the death from cancer of the very capable Mike Anderson, who had not been in that job long enough. He was her husband. She is a former prosecutor and was serving effectively as a judge. And she has been effective thus far, just a little over a year into the job.

But her opponent, Kim Ogg, also a woman, is fairly impressive. She is tough on crime, has some good data to show how things have been (up to 2012, when Mike Anderson was elected, so no data on how things are currently being done). One of the issues is about prosecution of minor drug offenses. I don’t agree with Ogg, but she did support her stance fairly well, and got some support at our Tea Party, where we have some libertarian leanings.

I got the chance to ask her this question: “We seem to agree with being tough on crime and fiscally responsible. Those aren’t things we usually go to the Democratic party for. So what attracts you to the Democrats?”

I give her credit for coming to a Tea Party in the first place; more Democrats should. And she was forthright and honest in the Texas way. I appreciate that. But her answer essentially was that she couldn’t get elected in a Republican primary. She thinks of herself as an old-time conservative democrat, like her father. She voted Republican in the 1990s, and has now gone back with the democrats. Yes, she did vote for Obama, but only once.

But here’s the telling detail: she voted for McCain in 2008; she liked him a lot. And then she voted for Obama in 2012. So, after four years of evidence against Obama, she thought he was a better option than Romney. (If you missed the contrast, start here.) She has revealed a severe lack of judgment. And she added to that by admitting without being asked that she supports Wendy Davis for Governor. In other words, even though we agree on a couple of principles, she identifies with a party that I simply don’t relate to. She's not about conserving the Constitution; she may not even know what the word means.

So maybe the most important detail is party—which is another tribe.

This may not have always been so, but today I find it very difficult to find a Democrat with character—the values that lead to freedom, prosperity and civilization. They tend to want power over others. Often power for their tribe (their group, their identity, their coalition of groups) trumps the good of all. Democrats, in Spherical Model terms, live in the southern hemisphere, with no awareness that there’s a better alternative.

So, regardless of tribe, let’s start with the agreement that the Democrat party right now is wrong for America, and their principles are wrong anywhere else in the world that might want freedom, prosperity, and civilization.

That doesn’t necessarily mean being part of the Republican tribe is the answer. Same is true for libertarians, or any party. You might get a little further by looking at someone’s religious affiliation. But even then, if it’s a tribal affiliation rather than connecting on principles, it’s misplaced loyalty.

So, in a party where you find a number of like-minded people, keeping the Constitution in mind, find candidates with character and capability. And once you find those things, look at agreement with the principles that lead to freedom, prosperity, and civilization. You can find a good list of questions to ask here.

Connect with others to influence and support one another with love. But be loyal only to God and to your soul. Any other tribe is an incidental connection, unworthy of unquestioned loyalty.

Character Trumps Tribe, Part II

In "Character Trumps Tribe, Part I" we started talking about the difference between loyalty to tribe and loyalty to goodness. This is a bigger discussion than race, but we have some examples in racism to describe the problem. So today’s Part II is about that particular type of tribe.

In Obama’s first term, a Boston area professor caused a kerfuffle at his doorstep when police arrived to follow up on a tip from a neighbor of what looked like a break-in. The police did nothing but come to the door and ask questions, and learn that the professor indeed lived at the residence and was not an intruder. But the professor decided the police had no right to follow up at his house, because he was a black man, and that meant the complaint came because of his race. When this hit the news, it should have been a non-story. But the president inserted himself, saying the police acted foolishly—without even checking to find out the police had done nothing amiss. The president has a knee-jerk racism reaction. He’s for tribe over character.

This showed up again with the Trayvon Martin case. The president decided, before all the facts were known, that a black teen had been killed because of his race, when he was just innocently walking through the neighborhood. And he announced that, if he had a son, he’d likely look like Trayvon Martin. He failed to wait for evidence that the “innocent” teen had beaten up the (Hispanic) man (with a non-Hispanic name) who shot him in self-defense. It was a tragedy. But it would have been avoided if the “innocent black teen” had not attacked the man to whom he looked like a hood-wearing black teen unknown in the neighborhood.

Then, recently there was the situation in Ferguson, MO. It was immediately purported to be a white cop shooting an unarmed young black man, Michael Brown, for no reason beyond race. Stories were even told that Brown was fleeing and was shot in the back. Based on this invention, race riots were instigated. The president apologized to the UN that racist tensions such as in Ferguson happen in the US, comparable to human rights violations like beheadings elsewhere in the world.

Except that the “black man murdered by cop” story differed from the story of the injured police officer and some other witnesses. Almost right away there was evidence the “victim” had just robbed a convenience store. Immediate evidence showed the victim was not shot while fleeing. And the eventual autopsy report matched the police officer’s original story, that the first shot came inside the car, with the man trying to attack the officer and get his gun, and that he seemed to be rushing the officer when the final shots were fired. Witnesses corroborating the officer’s story are afraid to allow their identities to be revealed, because their disagreement with the racism story makes them enemy targets of those pushing that story.

The victim was a very large, very strong nearly 300 pounds of muscle, judgment impaired by drugs, who had just committed a crime, refused to follow directions to get out of the middle of the street, and instead attacked a police officer in his car. He was shot because of his race? Really?
In each of these instances, the appropriate response from a civilized person (not to mention a person in a powerful position such as president) should be to stand back, wait for the facts, and say and do whatever is needed to further truth and justice. Instead, in each instance we got people putting forward their tribe—as though belonging to the tribe equates to rightness, regardless of behavior, regardless of facts.

This isn’t a singular problem with our president; it’s a problem with the overall “tribe.” Think back to the O. J. Simpson trial. It was constantly in the news, so simply waiting to observe the outcome was hardly allowed as an option. But, really, it was a murder trial little different from other trials—except that it involved a famous person. And the famous person—wildly successful in sports, media, and even movies, so not what you'd call oppressed—happened to be black. So there was a tribal defense of him—as though his actual guilt or innocence didn’t matter; what mattered was his color. Because there was perceived unfairness toward that “tribe” somewhere historically, he should be acquitted—for the sake of the tribe.

The tribe called that justice. But civilization does not.

There’s a conversation going on lately about “white privilege.” [I'm curious about the movie Dear White People, which I won't see, because I choose not to see R-rated movies. But some reviews say it is an intelligent, nuanced view, instead of just an attack on all of us as racists.] I don’t feel privileged. But I do have the advantage that, when people see me, they don’t grab their purses and fear I might be a criminal. But some of that has more to do with how I place myself in society—a law-abiding, modestly dressed, educated, middle-aged woman. Women in like categories—differing only in race—get treated pretty much the way I do.

What do we do when we meet blacks at Tea Party meetings, or Republican rallies? We welcome them. Their very being there separates them out from the 90% of their tribe who value tribal identity above character. Just by showing up and joining with those who think like we do, they have declared their preference for freedom, prosperity, and civilization. That puts them in the American greater society, even though it probably causes them ostracism from their race tribe. Their statement is a show of character. And to those of us who value character, we’re glad to welcome them.

So let’s consider behavior and choices. Think back to times when western settlers faced various native tribes. If you found yourself surrounded by natives dressed in the clothing and symbols of Apaches, you’d feel more fearful than you would in a group of peaceful Pueblos. The difference is not because you know the individuals involved; it’s from experience with those particular tribes.

In some urban centers, where the black “tribe” is a large segment of the population, you get a lot of crime, a lot of poverty. But it may relate more to the 70% of children being born without fathers in the home than with outside oppression. When families fail, in large numbers, you get savagery.

But if people escape the trappings of the tribe, dress as though they respect themselves, and follow the formula for success in America, they’re a lot less likely to strike fear in their neighbors as they walk down the street.

What is the formula? Again, it is:

• Don’t have sex before age 20.
• Don’t have sex until after marriage.
• Stay married.
• Obtain at least a high school diploma.

In Charles Murray’s book Coming Apart, he claims that part of the problem is that the successful fail to share this secret. There’s probably more to getting into the elite neighborhood Murray talks about, but this formula works so well that it practically guarantees getting out of poverty and into the middle class. And it builds social capital for the next generation. This formula works for any tribe—any group.

Character—living according to principles of ultimate good—brings about civilization. Squabbles between and among tribes can do no more than change the flavor of tyrannical power.

That is the main point of this discussion. But there’s another “tribe” in the ongoing intertribal war worth covering—the gender war. So we’ll take Part III to look at the so-called “war on women” and what that really means.

Character Trumps Tribe, Part I

The attack on freedom of religion by Houston Mayor Annise Parker brought to mind a point about identity politics. Or, to frame it from a better position, character trumps tribe.


Martin Luther King, Jr., gave his speech on the steps of the Lincoln Monument.
His dream was that we would judge each other by the content of our character,
rather than the color of our skin.

I mentioned last week that, when Annise Parker was running for mayor, she downplayed her connection to the LGBT community. She ran as a sensible businessperson with skills the city needed. And she just happened to be a lesbian, but that didn’t affect her skills. That, however, was a lie to get elected. She did not have adequate skills to overcome her tribal connection.

She has reigned as the first openly homosexual mayor of a major American city. Ah, the glory! And she has used the power of her position, time and again, to press the agenda of her tribe, rather than the overall needs of all the citizens. She may even believe that putting forward her tribal agenda is best for all. But it isn’t. She’s blinded by that overriding agenda.

She can’t see that pressing her agenda at the risk of giving sexual predators legal, unquestioned access to women’s bathrooms is not good for the community as a whole. She can’t even hear the huge outcry from the community who see that obvious danger. And she’s so sure she’s right that she arbitrarily throws out the 55,000 signatures of the people who want to put the question on the ballot. When she’s called on that illegality and must defend her actions in a lawsuit, she uses that opportunity to intimidate churches for speaking on this moral issue.

So, now that we have had a first openly homosexual mayor of a major US city, what do we know? The agenda of the tribe trumps the character of the candidate. Will that always be true? Perhaps not, but she has given us reason to beware. If her actual goal was to move members of her tribe into acceptance among the broader community, she set back that work a generation or more.

We have a similar situation with our first black president. [Style note: I do not know which changing term is best to use for the race previously referred to as black. Referring to it as African-American is inaccurate, since not all Africans are of the black race, nor are all blacks from Africa, nor are all people of that race Americans. So, for simplicity, I use the term black, meaning no disrespect or offense.]

He ran as post-racial. Many people succumbed to that. It’s a positive thing to show what so many of us already felt—race doesn’t matter; character and capability matter. Unfortunately, he was voted in because of his race, regardless of lack of character and capability. And, six years in I think it’s safe to say that his is the most racist administration we have had since Woodrow Wilson (who separated blacks serving in the military and encouraged eugenics that have led to a higher percentage of blacks being aborted than any other race—possibly more being aborted than being born).

Almost immediately after his election, he appointed a racist Attorney General, Eric Holder, who refused to prosecute Black Panthers for voter intimidation, because they were black. And it was his policy that anything racist that blacks do is fair, and only non-blacks will be prosecuted for racist (or perceived racist) offenses. See J. Christian Adams’s book Injustice.

The president has tried to construe disagreement with him and his policies as racism—just as Mayor Parker has tried to construe disagreement with her as being homophobic. He uses his tribalism as a power tool against numerous other segments of the people: Constitution respecters, religious people, people who assert their second amendment rights, people who respect the military….

Now that we have had a first black president, what do we know? The agenda of the tribe trumps the character of the candidate. With blacks, this may set things back even further than you might think. We have the additional data that more than 9 out of 10 blacks voted for this man—because of his race. In other words, we have clear evidence that an overwhelming majority of the black “tribe” identify with the tribal connection more than with the American connection. This is where stereotypes come from—a probable truth. Most of the blacks we meet failed to vote in favor of American freedom and constitution, because they had a chance to vote for someone of their color. Most blacks, we can conclude safely from the overwhelming data, are racist. Tribal.

This means racism is a bigger issue than before the Obama elections. I’m expanding this discussion to “tribalism,” because race isn’t the only group with an agenda. Tribalism isn’t a good thing.

Think back to high school. Your school had a cross-town rival. Were all the people in your school better than all the people in the rival school? No. Was your school better than theirs because you had a better football team? Or even because you had more graduates go on to college? There might be some useful measures, but chances are you rooted for your school team out of loyalty. You went there; you belonged. And that’s all that matters.

But in grown-up world, loyalty by happenstance isn’t a good enough reason for supporting a person or policy.

There’s more to cover here, to fully understand our divisions, and possibly to find some way out. So we’ll continue this in part II.