DESERTED BEACHES -- AND PAPAL ENCYCLICALS

I may be wrong but I have the strong impression that the ideal image of a tropical beach that most people have in mind is an image of a deserted beach. "Getting away from it all" largely means freedom from having to deal with other people all the time. Yet, as far as I can see, that does not happen with most tourist destinations. The crowds follow you. Yet in Australia's far North you can find plenty of long, wide, white, tree-lined, sandy beaches with hardly a soul on them for most of the time. That was certainly true yesterday when I looked in at Cowley beach, Kurrimine and Mission beach. And the smaller beaches in between them are normally absolutely deserted. The dream CAN become reality. Australia certainly makes a laugh out of the Greenie idea that earth is "overcrowded".

My vacation reading has been pretty weird. I have just read (well, most of it) the Papal encyclical Centesimus Annus by John Paul II (1991). Have you ever heard of any other atheist who reads Papal encyclicals on his vacations? There was for me one surprising bit in Centesimus Annus. The Pope supports Sabbath observance: "In this regard, one may ask whether existing laws and the practice of industrialized societies effectively ensure in our own day the exercise of this basic right to Sunday rest". I wonder why we never hear of that?

Like the famous encyclical it commemorates (Rerum novarum), however, Centesimus Annus is a thoroughly conservative balancing act. It says Communism is no good but neither is unbridled capitalism. It says there is a right to private property but not an unrestriced right. It says the State should interfere to look after the poor but it should not interfere too much. As I point out elsewhere, conservatives have always undertaken that difficult balancing. Simplistic all-or-nothing theories and systems are only for the ideologues of the Left. Because Centesimus Annus is a balancing act, however, both Left and Right can find bits in it that they like. It does nothing to check the increasingly Leftist nature of the church hierarchy. The hierarchy can use it to defend any degree of Statism except outright Marxism as being for the good of anyone who is at a disadvantage in any way. So I would call Centesimus Annus an unsuccessful balancing act. It is too vague to be useful. At least Rerum novarum took on Marxism at a time when it was a growing threat. I cannot see that Centesimus Annus does anything similarly useful.

Clinton and Etty Bay

Well bugger me! I rarely use crude language but this is an occasion for it: Bill Clinton is here in Far North Queensland at the same time as I am. I guess his taste in vacation spots is better than his taste in wives. He has been here before so he knew where he was going when he decided to come here for a vacation. I gather he is here for a few days at least. I saw an all-black Learjet on the tarmac as I flew into Cairns International Airport but now I know whom it delivered here. I hope that is all I see of Mr Amorality.




ETTY BAY



Thanks to my trusty IBM Thinkpad, I am writing this whilst leaning up against a rock and sitting on the beach at tropical Etty Bay. Overhead is a tangle of jungle trees giving me shade. Ahead of me is an expanse of fine white sand with tree-covered hills in the background that come right down to the beach. Although it is midwinter here, the temperature is balmy and I am wearing only a shirt and shorts. There's only about eight other people in sight. It is the beach to which I used to come for outings when I was a child. I know of no other beach where the jungle comes right down to the sand -- though I guess there must be others. It is of course well off the tourist map and long may it remain so. There is a small caravan park here but not much else. It is rimmed in by hills so there is really no scope for any building here. Just a tiny patch of paradise. And everybody here speaks English! To me it the most beautiful place in all the world. The whole point of my coming North on this vacation was that I just had to sit on the beach at Etty Bay once again.

TROPICAL VACATION

I have taken a week away from my usual haunts to spend in my ancestral place. All four of my grandparewnts were born and bred in tropical North Queensland and I was too. I am at the moment blogging from Cairns -- the tourist hub of the Far North. I have been to a few tropical tourist destinations in my time -- Fiji, Hawaii, Singapore and Thailand -- and I think North Queensland is as good as or better than any of them. And I do definitely wonder why people go to third-world tropical destinations when they could enjoy every tropical experience in the safety and convenience of a modern Western country like Australia. Because I was born amid magnificent tropical scenery I am very hard to impress when it comes to scenery. I used to think that there was no scenic drive in the world better than the Cairns to Port Douglas road but these days I will concede that a drive through the Western Highlands of Scotland in the summer rivals it.

The Asians have discovered Cairns big time and the Japanese are everywhere. So that parts of Cairns remind me a lot of Asia -- with all the crowded vibrancy that that entails. So if you want to see Asia, come to Cairns! But outside the tourist bazaars, there is no crowding. So forget about tropical islands. Cairns has everything they do. Anyway, for me it is a trip home.

PURITANISM, SOCIAL CLASS ETC.

Commenting on two recent posts by Keith Burgess-Jackson: Keith noted that I use only a dialup connection and commented that it must be my Puritan heritage, considering that I could easily afford any connection I want. There is considerable truth in that. My Presbyterian upbringing did indeed teach me frugality, or, as the Scots say: "A careful way wi' money". The sites that I visit are rarely graphics-intensive so dialup is not, however, the frustration it might seem. My frugality is still moderate by Scottish standards, though. When I was in Scotland, I occasionally made jokes about "using things up", "getting your money's worth" etc but nobody ever saw that I was joking. They all thought I was being perfectly sensible!

In another post Keith spoke with some asperity about "dolts" who don't think much about the world around them and know little of politics. Another philosopher -- Socrates -- once said something similar: "The unexamined life is not worth living". Keith got a blast from one of his readers for speaking so ill of ordinary folk -- a blast that Keith posted up without comment -- by way of a mea culpa, I assume.

I can actually see Keith's point of view as well as that of his reader. I am aware of a large gulf between academic types such as myself and the man in the street and I normally have little to do with those with whom I cannot share at least some intellectual or aesthetic interests.

I do not however think ill of ordinary people in any way. I admire them for getting by and leading generally decent lives without the intellectual resources that I have. They quite simply need almost all their attention for their day-to-day lives and so cannot afford the luxury of constant reflection that I can. And I am strongly inclined to believe that, in general, a simpler, more basic life leads to greater wisdom and balance than the far flights of fancy one often encounters among intellectuals.

I have certainly found that so in my personal life. I find that intelligent working-class girls are far easier to get on with as wives and girlfriends than bourgeois women are. The bourgeois ladies are always getting bothered about little things that don't really matter whereas the working-class women just look at the basics and are delighted to get those right. There is no doubt which group is happier.

THE WEDDING

Many Americans may be unaware that the Crown Prince of Denmark has just married an Australian girl. The event got big coverage in much of Europe (and, of course, in Australia) and was even well-covered in China, but I believe that American coverage was minimal. I guess Americans are not too keen on Royalty. Was there a revolution or something? Australia is a monarchy, however, and I have always been a strong monarchist so I found it interesting and pleasing that the wedding got a lot of coverage around the world. Who says that monarchy is an anachronistic irrelevance? If it is, how come so many people watched a wedding in an ancient European monarchy? It was a beautiful show too, of course. Lots of Australian women in particular were absolutely glued to their TVs while it was all happening. So much nicer than watching anything to do with Iraq.

And, if I have any readers in Scotland, I would be pleased to hear whether I guess right in thinking that the wedding would have got blanket coverage in Scotland too. Why? Well, quite apart from normal Scottish sentimentality, the father of the bride is a Scotsman with a Scottish accent who wore the kilt for the occasion! There would have been not a dry eye in many Scottish homes, I think. I felt a bit teary myself, given my Scottish heritage.

And the wedding is another example of how pervasive the Australian diaspora is in the world. I think most people are aware of the big Australian presence in Hollywood these days and people who take an interest in business will be aware that Australians run both Coca Cola and McDonald's, but having an Australian as the future Queen of Denmark does rather set the seal on what a large and successful diaspora it is. And, unlike most diasporas, Australians are not driven abroad by poverty, warfare, persecution etc. They are just adventurous.

THE THIRTY-NINE ARTICLES

A minor eccentricity of mine is that I find amusement in a lot of things that most others don't find amusing at all. For instance I find Mein Kampf an amusing read -- because you can open it almost at random and be struck not only by what a good Leftist of his day Hitler sounds but also by what a good Leftist he was even in modern terms -- as I have previously pointed out here.

Another text I get a kick out of is about as unlikely as you can get: The "39 Articles of Religion" of the Church of England. To this day all Anglican priests have to swear that they agree with them before they can be ordained. They are the original definition of Anglicanism and go back to 1571. The main reason I enjoy them is that so many of them are very plain-spoken. They conspicuously lack the waffle, obfuscation and infinite compromise that characterizes the Church of England and its daughter churches of today. Note a few of them below. All conservatives should like the last two I quote. The meaning of some words has of course changed a bit over the centuries. "Fond", for instance, meant "deluded" in the 16th century. So being "fond" of someone originally meant being crazy about them! And a "fond hope" was a crazy hope.

The Romish doctrine concerning Purgatory, Pardons, worshipping and adoration as well of Images as of Relics, and also Invocation of Saints, is a fond thing vainly invented, and grounded upon no warranty of Scripture; but rather repugnant to the word of God.

It is a thing plainly repugnant to the word of God and the custom of the primitive Church, to have public prayer in the Church, or to minister the sacraments in a tongue not understanded of the people.

The Cup of the Lord is not to be denied to the lay people; for both parts of the Lord's sacrament, by Christ's ordinance and commandment, ought to be ministered to all Christian men alike.

Bishops, Priests, and Deacons are not commanded by God's laws either to vow the estate of single life or to abstain from marriage. Therefore it is lawful also for them, as for all other Christian men, to marry at their own discretion, as they shall judge the same to serve better to godliness.

The Bishop of Rome hath no jurisdiction in this realm of England. The Laws of the Realm may punish Christian men with death for heinous and grievous offences. It is lawful for Christian men at the commandment of the Magistrate to wear weapons and serve in the wars.

The riches and goods of Christians are not common, as touching the right, title, and possession of the same, as certain Anabaptists do falsely boast; notwithstanding every man ought of such things as he possesseth liberally to give alms to the poor, according to his ability.

It is the English of over 400 years ago but I still think it is hard to beat for plain-speaking: Most refreshing in the present era of political correctness. There was no worry then that they might make someone feel "uncomfortable".

And the simplicity and clarity of the wording does not stem from simple-mindedness on the part of those who wrote the 39 articles. Where they feel a need to get theological -- on the difficult doctrine of predestination (Article 17), for instance -- they are as complex as any modern theologian.

German wine

I drink very little alcohol these days so it was for the first time in years that I had a couple of glasses of German white wine with my dinner last night. It took me ages to find someone in Brisbane who sold German wine. Even so, it cost me only $10 for the bottle (about $6.50 in U.S. dollars). I think it is one of the everyday miracles of capitalism that I can buy a Rheinhessen Qualitaetswein half a world away from where it was made for such a small sum.

It rather perplexes me, though, that German wine has such a patchy following around the world. Maybe its uniformly high quality makes it boring. French wine is mostly rubbish by Australian or German standards but I suppose the challenge of finding a good one makes it interesting. Australian winemakers wouldn't dream of making such a nasty product as French vin ordinaire. Even a $5 ($3.50 U.S.) bottle of Australian red is pretty good.

CHRISTIAN ETHICS

A very small meditation

Although any idea of "God" ceased to be meaningful to me over 40 years ago, I have never abandoned Christian ethics. I don't claim to be any Abou Ben Adhem but I have always found that if I do the "Christian" (kind, helpful, forgiving, generous etc.) thing, I get a reward for it -- usually quickly and it is often a substantial reward. For me, Christian ethics work. They work so well that I do well understand how Christians would see in such things the hand of their God. I myself see such rewards as evidence that Christ was a very wise teacher who had an understanding of human psychology that is still better than what most modern professional psychologists have.

An instance of how Christian ways have worked for me is one most readers of this blog will know by now. When Keith Burgess-Jackson had just started his blog, I read it and noted with pleasure the philosophical clarity of his writing (Anglo-Saxon philosophy aims to clarify; Continental philosophy aims to obfuscate). When I therefore also noted that he was having trouble with his template, I immediately offered to help and was able to do so.

As a result Keith was very appreciative and has always since been quick to link to my postings -- and I of course also link back to his. So we have been able to steer our respective readers to one another -- which some readers at least appreciate. So my initial Christian deed (which took me only a couple of hours) has benefited Keith, me and our respective readers! Beat that for an ethical system that works!

As an aside, it is perfectly consistent with Keith's energetic and extraverted style (a style I enjoy greatly) that he posts up some of the congratulatory emails that he receives. But I would never be able to do that. Perhaps it is my traditional British reserve. I only post emails that address some topic that I think has general interest. I do in fact receive congratulatory emails all the time and every one of them is greatly appreciated so I hope my readers understand my reserve about posting any of them.

A bright lad

My 16-year-old son Joe has just started an advanced placement course in mathematics at the University of Queensland. He is in his final year at a large private Catholic high school but is allowed to do one subject at university level. The University of Queensland is one of Australia's oldest and largest universities and is where I got my first degree. Joe actually has classes in exactly the same big old sandstone building where I first had classes exactly 40 years ago.



I am pretty pleased about it all -- particularly as he is the only one in his school doing advanced placement. And he arranged it all for himself, too. I had no hand in it.

ANOTHER NOTE ABOUT MY PAST POLITICAL ADVENTURES

I have never feared to investigate anything political or religious or to speak the unvarnished truth about what I find as the result of my investigations -- and that means I get a lot of abuse and false accusations -- most of which merely amuse me. I took an interest in politics from an early age and read some of the works of Karl Marx in my junior High School years. I was therefore at that time known as "Commo John". Since then I have joined or associated with almost any political group I could find in the hope of getting to understand them better and find out what I could from them. That neo-Nazis were among the groups concerned has of course at times given Leftists an excuse to call me a Nazi. At the same time as I was attending neo-Nazi gatherings (in the 60s) I was however also attending meetings of my local far-Left student activist group (called SDA after the American SDS) and was also attending meetings of the Australia-Soviet Friendship Society. So anyone who claims to infer my sympathies from my associations is pissing into the wind. In fact, my only real passion is for rationality and I just don't find much of that on the Left. I have no formal political affiliations at all these days.

The Australia-Soviet Friendship Society was particularly amusing. Most of the members were what Australians call "wharfies" ("longshoremen" in the USA, "dockers" in the UK) -- as wharfies were almost all Communist sympathizers at that time -- but there were a few extreme Leftists from the university there too. But their way of running meetings was pure wharfie. There were no majority votes about anything. One of the organizers would put up a proposal but instead of votes being called for the question was: "Any objections?". I cannot remember there ever being any!

Because I made no secret of the variety of my associations, I was always suspected of being a police spy wherever I went -- which indeed I was -- but I always just laughed off such accusations (e.g. by saying "testing, testing" into my lapel) so it is rather amazing how much I was given the benefit of the doubt. It's amazing how "brass" carries the day. I guess the members of extremist groups WANT to believe that their arguments are overwhelming so are willing to tell all to almost any listening ear. The police were certainly interested to hear much of what I could tell them of both the neo-Nazis and the student Left.

Because I went straight from being a fundamentalist Christian to complete atheism in my late teens, one type of belief I have never taken the slightest interest in is the "The Occult". I would just not be able to keep a straight face long enough. But I gather that as part of the general Nazi fascination with Germany's pagan past, Hitler did take some interest in it so maybe my studies of Nazi history are incomplete without taking some account of such beliefs. This book gives an occultist's interpretation of Hitler's actions and says that he won the war that he was REALLY fighting. I think there is a grain of truth in that. Hitler went from being a superb strategist in the early part of his rule to being his own worst enemy later on. Why? I think part of the answer to that is that he DID have a higher priority than defeating the Allies. But I don't think we need to suggest any occult motives. Hitler himself could not have made it plainer. Wiping out the Jews from anywhere under his control was his no. 1 aim and he DID win that war -- tragically.

LEFTIST STEREOTYPING DEMOLISHED AGAIN

The most successful "big lie" of the 20th century is undoubtedly the Leftist myth that Nazism is just a more extreme form of conservatism. Leftists really hate it when you point out that it was the Conservative Winston Churchill who was Hitler's most unrelenting foe and that Hitler and Stalin were allies until Hitler tried to grab Russia. That conservatives did and do oppose Nazism as much as they oppose any other form of socialism or totalitarianism just cannot be fitted into the Leftist worldview. From the Marxist psychologist Adorno onwards (writing in 1950), the Leftist line has always been to ignore the socialist nature of Nazism and to assert fervently that Nazis and conservatives are allies, not enemies.

As an outspoken conservative myself, I too have obviously been the target of such dishonest accusations. Any outspoken conservative (including of course President Bush) will get called a "Nazi" by Leftists sooner or later and I have certainly been called that many times. I am inclined to think that such accusations are in fact a badge of honour: they show that you are an effective opponent of the Left. And a couple of Australian Leftist bloggers have repeated that old accusation about me recently and been rather competently demolished in reply by Sam Ward. And I have also myself replied to similar criticisms years ago.

In fact, however, I have been more of an enemy of Nazism than most people. Leftists just sit in their armchairs and condemn Nazism in order to make themselves feel good without actually doing anything practical about it. I, on the other hand have actively tried to combat and undermine Nazism. Part of that effort has been in the academic journals for over 30 years -- my sociological observations of Australian neo-Nazis -- in which I went out and got to know lots of actual real-life neo-Nazis in order to describe and analyse what they are really like and what motivates them (see here and here). The first step in combatting something is to understand it and I put a lot of time and effort into understanding what makes modern-day Nazis tick in the hope that it might help me understand Nazi Germany better. The usual Leftist explanations of Nazism are rendered worthless by their perverse determination to identify it with conservatism. And all my work on the subject was published in Jewish academic journals, as it happens. So the occasional Leftist claim that my work was sympathetic to Nazism is the height of absurdity.

Until recently, however, I have kept my mouth shut about another very active way I have combatted Nazism -- my role as a police agent reporting on them. My sociological studies of Australian neo-Nazis yielded not only information of psychological and sociological interest but information of interest to the police too. And I gladly supplied that information to the police -- in order to assist the police in preventing any Nazi thuggery. Since over 30 years have now passed since that time, however, I think any need for secrecy is at an end and I have recently gone VERY public about my police role by telling all to Brisbane's Sunday newspaper. The reporter who interviewed me seemed to know a lot about the matters concerned and I was able to give him enough detailed information about my police and Nazi contacts to enable him to authenticate what I said.

So, far from being a Nazi, I have done far more to combat REAL Nazism than any Leftist I know. But that just makes me a good conservative -- contrary to what the Leftists would have you believe. And, in case anybody thinks that studies of Nazism/Fascism are irrelevant to the modern-day world, they should have a closer look at how things are going in Russia.

OF CHRISTIANITY AND HOLINESS

Regular readers of my blogs will be well-aware that I often write on matters to do with the churches. I even had a well received article in Front Page Magazine some time back that looked at why many mainstream churches are now Leftist. And readers will also have noted how derisively I speak of "liberal" Christians. I imagine however that some readers would want to ask what right an atheist (which I am) has to to pontificate on such matters.

The simple answer is that it is my remote fundamentalist past still speaking. I still have great sympathy for my former fundamentalist brothers in arms despite no longer being one of them. And I share their view of what a "real" Christian is. All that aside, however, I do think that there is an important rational distinction to be made between those on the one hand who sincerely believe that Christ is their saviour and do their humble best to follow his teachings and those on the other hand who have no real convictions but simply use the churches for social, political or even financial purposes. And I will continue to refer to the former as "real" Christians and the rest as "pretend" Christians, "impostors" and "hypocrites" -- or, as Christ called the equivalent people in his day: "whited sepulchres" (Matthew 23:27): "Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for ye are like unto whited sepulchres which indeed appear beautiful outward but are within full of dead men's bones and of all uncleanness". I will never be able to better that description.

I should, I guess, make clear that it is pretend belief, not unbelief or unorthodox belief that I am condemning. I have met holy people of all faiths and no faith -- from the Greek Orthodox Church to Jehovah's Witnesses. And in my view the holiest person I know is a geriatric nurse who works in a nursing home. When her lonelier patients finally become so ill that they are sent to hospital she goes of her own accord and in her own time to visit them in hospital. Such good-heartedness leaves me awestruck. She is, as it happens, a complete atheist who says that her strong Methodist background was never anything but a burden. She also is a habitual voter for the A.L.P. -- Australia's major Leftist party -- but like many supporters of that party (including its present Federal leader) she has strong conservative views on many subjects -- in her case including a complete derision for anything to do with governments.

And what I think all of that goes to show is the one thing Leftists hate to admit -- that life is far too complex to be reduced to their simple rules, formulas, slogans and theories.

And Ann Coulter has a very amusing article on the hypocrisy about religion of the current Democrat Presidential hopefuls. Some excerpts: "When they were fund-raising, the Democratic candidates for president all claimed to be Jewish.... To ease Democrats into the Jesus thing, the Democratic Leadership Council is holding briefings for Democratic candidates teaching them how to talk about religion. The participants were warned that millions of Americans worship a supreme being whose name is not Bill Clinton... The only Democrats who go to church regularly are the ones who plan to run for president someday and are preparing in advance to fake a belief in God... "

SOME N.Z. STUPIDITY

Former New Zealand Prime Minister Robert Muldoon is famous for commenting that the constant flow of emigration from New Zealand to Australia "raises the IQ of both countries" -- implying that the Kiwis who emigrate are stupid but Australians are even stupider. That comment is only one example of a generally derogatory view of Australians almost universally held in New Zealand: Much like the attitude of Canadians towards the USA --- and for similar reasons: resentment of a more affluent and capable big brother.

I was therefore rather amused by something that happened recently. A few months ago I bought some shares in one of the icons of New Zealand industry -- Fisher & Paykel, best known for making high-tech washing machiens. Yesterday I received a dividend cheque from them -- to my amazement. These days dividends are normally deposited directly into a shareholder's bank A/c. Shortly after you buy into a company, they send you a form asking for your bank particulars and thereafter the money just appears on your statement. Fisher & Paykel sent me no such form, however, so I had to make a special trip to the bank to deposit their pesky cheque -- which I regard as a prehistoric thing to have to do.

But it does not end there. I resolved to write to them and ask them to deposit my dividends directly in the future. But nowhere on the documentation that came with the cheque was there any address that I could write to! So I looked up their Annual Report, a big glossy production with lots of colour photographs, graphs, auditor reports and all the usual nonsense that you expect of a company annual report. But there was no address anywhere there either! Which is probably illegal, I would think. It was only by digging out the envelope that the report came in that I found a return address on the back of that. But that is not the end of the story either! Included with my cheque was a cheque to someone else with their dividend! Which I of course promptly sent on to the correct recipient. If that is how bright a New Zealand high-flyer is, it does not say much for the average Kiwi.

I guess NZ Pundit will never forgive me for saying that.

TURKEYS AND DELEGATION

From Socrates on, good philosophers have always aimed to stir up critical thinking so I guess that Keith Burgess-Jackson will be pleased that he has stirred me up over this post: "If you aren't prepared to raise and kill a turkey, don't eat one". A version of Peter Singer thinking if I am not mistaken.

If he means that I should always sincerely say under my breath "I am prepared to raise and kill turkeys" before I sit down to a turkey dinner, that would seem a fairly modest if highly eccentric requirement. If actual action rather than mere preparedness to act is required, however, I see bigger problems. As it happens, I have back in my country childhood been involved in raising fowl and beheading them for the table when required so I guess I would be OK for a Thanksgiving Day feast even under a stringent version of Keith's morality -- but I don't really see why. Does it have to be turkeys that you raise or are other fowl close enough to justify a turkey feast? And how much of the raising do you have to do? And if you don't have to do all of it, why can you not delegate the whole of the raising to others? Delegation and specialization are the the great tricks of homo sapiens, so why should we not delegate that particular task?

Update:

Referring to Keith Burgess-Jackson's view that eating turkeys is morally suspect: I suspect that my post on the subject yesterday sent a few irate readers his way as he has now expanded his exposition of the matter. His argument is that when you have things done for you, you are just as responsible for them as if you did them yourself. So if a turkey is cruelly raised on a factory-farm, you are responsible for that suffering if you buy it.

His argument about responsibility is plausible and may be widely agreed to but I think it just an assertion nonetheless. I would argue in fact that it is absurd to say that you CAN know all the details of all the things that happen when something is done for you (maybe the turkey was kindly raised but the truck-driver who delivers them beats his wife so by buying the turkey we are supporting a wife-beater?) and you cannot be responsible for things that you do not know about.

THE "INARTICULATE" GWB: AN AUGURY

There is a great letter here from someone in Britain who watched GWB's interview there on TV. It highlights the contradictory views many of GWB's detractors have of him and the arrogance behind such views.

The point the letter makes about GWB's relative inarticulateness reminds me of a similar phenomenon here in my home State of Queensland. Queensland was run for nearly 20 years by the very conservative Sir Johannes Bjelke-Petersen. I was one of his party members. "Sir Joh", as he was known, was universally condemned by the intelligentsia for his inarticulateness. He spoke like the ill-educated farmer he was. The media regularly said he made no sense at all. But he made plenty of sense to the ordinary Queenslanders who voted for him and in one State election (1974) his government actually got 59% of the popular vote -- a majority so large as to be almost unheard of in a Westminster democracy.

The big political battle in Australia in the mid-70s was in fact between the immensely erudite and silver-tongued Leftist Prime Minister, Gough Whitlam, and the stumble-tongued but very canny Queensland Premier. And when the 1975 Federal election came around Sir Joh did Whitlam like a dinner. The Leftists won only one out of 18 Queensland seats -- which lost them power in Australia as a whole.

So I think that is a pretty good augury for GWB next time he faces the voters. I suspect that his "inarticulateness" is an asset to him with his voters too. And if GWB does as much good for the USA in his second term as Sir Joh did for Queensland he will be doing very well indeed.

ACADEMIC FUN AND GAMES

Yesterday was a rather fun day for me academically. A copy of the journal containing my first academic article (Ray, 2003) to be published in 5 years arrived in the mail. My most recent one before that came out in 1998. That I can still get them published probably means that senile dementia has not got me yet! For copyright reasons I cannot put the new article online but an early version of it is already online here. The early version is probably more readable anyway. What it shows is that older women (but not older men) tend to lie more about how good they are. Apologies to the sisterhood!

Also appearing in the same issue of the journal was yet another article (Van Hiel & Mervielde, 2003) on "Need for closure" (a terrible affliction that we conservatives are said to suffer from) by that Belgian dynamo, Alain Van Hiel. I had just started to get my head around the considerable complexities of the article when I noticed that his results were not statistically significant! In other words, you could have found similar results in a table of random numbers! I am amazed that such stuff is getting published these days. The Leftist discomfort with reality is showing up more and more in academe, I guess. And one of Van Hiel's key measures was the absurd Bieri scale of cognitive complexity. Van Hiel obviously overlooked my "deconstruction" of that particular piece of nonsense. Had he paid more attention to the way he measured things, he might have got more significant results.

Reading on further in my copy of the journal I noticed another article that was rather reverential about some prior work by McHoskey. That stirred a dim recollection that I too had once looked at the selfsame McHoskey article. So I dug deep in the archives and found a paper I had written which never got published. In the unpublished paper I pointed out that McHoskey's work showed that at least one type of conservatism was --- wait for it! --- MORE COMPASSIONATE! No wonder THAT paper never got published! Anyway, I have now uploaded the previously unpublished article here and here.

The really amusing thing about the McHoskey finding is that the conservatism scale he used (the RWA scale) was originally designed to measure a particularly UN-caring kind of conservatism. How frustrating that it gave the opposite result! I have pointed out long ago however that the designer of the RWA scale (Altemeyer) did not have a blind clue about what he was doing.

But the fun is not over yet! The author (Wilson, 2003) who was so impressed by the McHoskey work himself produced some vastly overinterpreted findings using the wacky "Social Dominance Orientation" (SDO) scale. About half the items in the SDO scale express a strong belief in equality between people. And so what was our intrepid author's main finding when you cut through all the flim-flam? That low scorers on the SDO scale (equalitarians) were idealistic! Big surprise! Yet another example of an "artifactual" (built-in, true-by-definition) finding. Will Leftist psychologists ever knuckle down and do some real research instead of constantly trying to load the dice in advance? Don't hold your breath.

References
Ray, J.J. & Lovejoy, F.H. (2003) "Age-related social desirability responding among Australian women". Journal of Social Psychology, 143 (5), 669-671.
Van Hiel, A. & Mervielde, I. (2003) "The need for closure and the spontaneous use of complex and simple cognitive structures". Journal of Social Psychology, 143 (5), 559-568.
Wilson, M.S. (2003) "Social dominance and ethical ideology: The end justifies the means?". J. Social Psychology, 143 (5), 549-558.

"THE POOR"

A point I have made clear on a number of occasions is that I think it makes a difference that I generally speak from a lot of experience rather than from theory about "The poor" (or "underprivileged" in Leftist jargon).

One of the great Leftist themes is their "compassion" for the poor. But from what they say it is clear that the average dreaming Leftist intellectual knows only as much about the poor as he can imagine from the comfort of a well-paid middle class job and general middle-class background. I however was born into a working-class family (my father was a lumberjack) so I have always been perfectly familiar and at ease with the poorer members of my society and been able to speak to them using their own idioms, concepts, values and characteristic beliefs.

I actually have to make some effort to write this blog in international English as my natural tendency is to express myself in the vivid Australian vernacular. If I were writing this blog solely for an Australian working class audience, for instance, I would be able to convey very accurately my impression of Leftists by saying that they are people who are always "bunging on an act", who are not "fair dinkum" and who are always "big-noting" themselves -- but I doubt very much that such terms would be universally understood in the way intended. All three terms are, by the way, expressions of extreme contempt among Australian working class people.

Because my background made it possible, I did for a couple of years not so long ago own and run a large boarding house in one of Brisbane's poorest suburbs (Ipswich). My tenants were almost exclusively long-term unemployed and, yes, I did accept black tenants. The law was of absolutely no use in managing such people. The previous owner of the place was an "outsider" and had experienced financial disaster as a result.

Because I understood the type of people I had as tenants, however, I WAS able to manage them and made good money out of the business. And I would not have been able to eject "campers", single-handedly clear a room full of interlopers or physically throw out druggies if I had not always known the right psychological buttons to push. I always did such tasks with impunity even though I am not physically imposing and even though I was often dealing with hardened criminals.

My psychology was practical as well as theoretical -- largely because it was founded on an intimate understanding of the people I was dealing with. If anybody thinks they know the Australian underclass better than I do, I would like to see them do the sort of thing I did without getting their head punched in.

So what were my tenants like? Foolish. Few if any, for instance, were keen shoppers. Almost all would buy a lot of their food and other requirements from nearby service stations and "convenience" stores even though prices there were up to 50% higher than at the supermarket only a short walk further down the road. If that does not tell you that a lot of poverty is self-inflicted, I do not know what would.

And dishonesty and criminality were rife among them. They were always stealing from one-another. Anybody who had anything of value in his room was very unwise to walk out of his room without locking the door behind him. They WERE often unwise of course so there was an awful lot of "lost" money and property among them. If that does not tell you that poverty is closely associated with moral breakdown, I do not know what would.

And despite the fact that all of them lived entirely from welfare payment to welfare payment, all of them could afford to drink (alcohol) and smoke. On "payday", there was a regular parade of cardboard boxes of "Fruity Lexia" (a cheap but pleasant Australian white wine) into the premises. If that does not tell you that they were not really poor I do not know what would.

Maybe I will say later how I think the welfare system should be reformed in the light of what "the poor" really are like.

ACADEME, IQ and POLITICS

Leftist professors are very prone to saying that their Leftism is the outcome of their higher intelligence and ability at critical thinking. As a former successful academic myself, I reject that and say that their Leftism is an outcome of their greater egotism. They are already in positions of power, influence and prestige to some degree and that just makes them want more power, influence and prestige -- and they see Leftism as a way towards that. They think it makes them seem wise and good beyond their narrow academic expertise.

It strikes me that there is a counter-example to university professors which tests much more directly what the politics of intelligence per se are. Most people have heard of Mensa -- the social group with the sole admission requirement that your IQ has to be in the top 2%. For a few years in the 1970s I ran the Mensa group in New South Wales -- Australia's most populous State. It is years now since I have been to a meeting but John Moore, a current Mensa member in the USA, has just reminded me of an interesting fact: Libertarianism is far and away the most common political orientation among Mensans. I have also shown elsewhere that Mensans are much less likely to smoke than are other people. From my point of view as a non-smoking libertarian, I think it is obvious that both differences are the expected outcome of greater intelligence!

One of the most useful things about Mensans for the present comparison is that they are notoriously NOT highly successful members of society. They tend to be intelligent people who have missed the boat for one reason or another. So they have no reason for inflated egos -- unlike university professors. So if we take the ego away and just leave intelligence, what are the politics produced? Libertarianism, not Leftism.

OH WHAT A LOVELY MOON!

Gareth Parker, one of my fellow conservative Australian bloggers has described me as too "lunar" for him. I wonder would he like to point out one claim I have made that is not backed up with good scientific and historical evidence? But I guess that the facts can be pretty "lunar" at times. They certainly conflict with a lot of popular notions.

The good Gareth should perhaps note that almost all of my "lunar" pronouncements have in fact been previously published in widely-circulated academic journals -- e.g. here and here -- and getting anything past the basilisk eyes of academic journal editors is no mean feat for anyone. They of course have access to the world's best expertise on the subject concerned and the fact that my conclusions are ones that they would not generally find congenial means that my evidence and reasoning has to have been exceptionally watertight.

This is not of course remotely to say that everything published in academic journals is correct -- but it is to say that anything published there would have a very hard time being "lunar".

A GREAT CONSERVATIVE

Robert Gordon Menzies, long-serving Prime Minister of Australia -- both before and after WWII

I am myself a great fan of Menzies and something I always find amusing is the way commentators recognize his greatness but are puzzled that they can never think of anything much he that actually achieved. But that is of course the whole point. Menzies was such a strong figure that he did what very few politicians can do -- he successfully resisted the pressures from almost all special-interest groups to legislate in favour of them at the expense of the community as a whole. Doing nothing was his great achievement. The torrent of legislation to which all governments subject us was a comparative trickle under Menzies. He generally resisted the urge to meddle. And under him Australia was peaceful, calm and secure -- with unemployment negligible and living standards steadily rising. Contracts were enforced, criminals were punished and taxation was a fraction of what it is now. There was welfare for those who really needed it and there were scholarships that enabled children from working-class backgrounds to go to university if they had the ability. I myself was a recipient of one such scholarship. My father was a lumberjack who thought that even secondary education was a waste of time. So Australian conservatives only have to remember the world of Menzies in the 1950s and 1960s to realize that their ideal of a much smaller and fairer government is far from an impossible dream.

Sir Robert Menzies

Today's story concerns Australia's redoubtable conservative Prime Minister Menzies. The time was the early 1950s and the height of the Communist scare. Many conservatives thought the government was not doing enough to combat Communism and some senior Ministers in the Menzies government agreed. Menzies was however a notable lawyer by profession and declared that a recent High Court case limiting Parliament's powers in the matter had to be respected. This was felt to be an inadequate response so a triumvirate of senior Ministers got together and decided that Menzies had to be deposed, a State of Emergency declared, the Communist party banned and a major expansion of the armed forces undertaken. They decided to deliver an ultimatum to this effect to Menzies himself. Menzies was too imposing a figure simply to be bypassed. They decided to make a surprise call on Menzies one Saturday afternoon. Saturday afternoon in Australia of that era was a time when NOTHING happened. The shops were closed and, if there were no major sporting event happening, people just pottered in the garden, took rubbish to the dump or took a big nap to catch up on sleep missed during the week.

The triumvirs arrived at the Prime Ministerial residence and, as well-known figures, were immediately ushered into the presence of the great man. And what was the great man doing at the time? He was in the greenhouse transplanting tomato seedlings so there would be a good crop for the kitchen! It was the sort of hobby activity any Australian might be doing on a Saturday afternoon in that era. Its sheer normalness and ordinariness did however undermine the resolve of the plotters and Menzies, being a wily old bird, probably realized that something was in the wind so continued to engage them in conversation about tomatoes, the seasons and gardening. When he had finished his transplanting, Menzies asked them to take afternoon tea with him -- which they of course accepted.

During tea Menzies asked them to what he owed the privilege of their visit but with all momentum lost by then all one of them could do was to say weakly that they had come to seek his views on the Communist menace. Being famously quick-witted, Menzies told them that he just that day had come to a major decision on the matter. He had decided to hold a referendum on banning the Communist party. As a referendum is an impeccably proper democratic procedure they could hardly argue -- though all those present would have been aware that referenda are normally lost in Australia. And so the rebels went empty away -- foiled by tomato seedlings.

The referendum was of course held -- and it was lost.

The story was relayed to me many years ago as "inside knowledge" by someone who was in a position to have such knowledge so I have no way of verifying it but I think it conveys very well the sheer mundane safety of Anglo-Saxon political life as it used to be -- the very opposite of the high drama that plagues politics in most of the rest of the world.