whYNOT

You know what I'm reminded of? "The operation was successful but the patient died". There's what happens when (total) context is dropped, and foreseeable consequences of actions ignored, and reality/real lives shoe-horned into pre-selected and usually inappropriate principles. I do not consider this is "acting on principles"

Subsequent to Rand, authoritarianism/intrinsicism has caused divisiveness among Objectivists. No, I don't take Brooks (or Peikoff) as 'the final word' (specifically, on applications - implementations of O'ism to reality).

Who is "allowing"? I'll first point out that Iran was not consistently, economically, financially, morally and intellectually, diplomatically and militarily isolated by the West -- as was e.g. their treatment of Russia, rightly - during - the Cold War (not after). I trust world leaders have now learned to not try to placate, bargain with and bribe ideologically-evil regimes "to be good". Nukes are out. Ground forces will not fare well invading that mountain terrain against a formidable army. . I've reminded before, that whereas Rand wrote any free nation had the right to invade a country and overturn its dictatorial regime - and also added, in effect, a "right" was not to be taken to be a (self-sacrificial) duty. The last gets forgotten. So leave it to Israel. Better (I think) the gvt. bides their time for now, and later hits a few Iranian military and nuclear installations. Israel has to live there and Israel must decide. The emphasis on ~defense~ by the US presently is the right one, I believe. (While they and their partners will have to face up to and eliminate the seaward provocations in the Gulf, this international initiation of force). For Israel: This is a long-term commitment, not about floating principles and the instant gratification of beating the foe.

The Saudis too https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/saudi-arabia-acknowledges-helping-defend-israel-against-iran-797201 "The best defense is offense", turned on its head. The exemplary manner in which the USN, USAF, the rest of the hasty coalition - and Israel's own defense systems responded, showed that robust defense plays a bigger role in modern war. The attack should have made plain Tehran's motives and methods to the world, how it operates through proxies sowing terror abroad, while playing the big innocent in diplomatic circles - and importantly, it will be less feared now by its neighbors. This stresses how swiftly the Abraham Accords must be revived. A consortium of "moderate" nations will feel more urgently empowered to escape Iran's grasp. The changes will adapt Palestinian minds to the new unity (feared by Iran) and proceed from there to serious negotiations with Israel. . ("Palestine", not the necessary *cause* and condition of M.E. peace, as Islamists and Israel-detractors have always deceitfully insisted - but an *effect* of peaceful national relations -- with Iran permanently cut out . . .

nope

https://www.msn.com/en-za/news/world/the-us-state-department-is-amplifying-the-smear-campaign-against-israel/ar-BB1llXph?rc=1&ocid=socialshare&cvid=bd57065849154d769b6788baae5b00ca&ei=53

"Myth No. 4: Trade and open markets create "a race to the bottom." That's how Jon Stewart decries globalization on his show, saying, "Globalization allowed corporations to scour the planet for the cheapest labor and loosest regulations!" ---- That problem child, "globalization", would be fine and dandy when governments are barred from entry, economy and state kept strictly apart . Individuals (and companies) deal and trade with others, wherever and whenever they see opportunities and at their own risk. As it is, the large corporates operate "hand-in-glove" with their Gvt which in turn makes deals with foreign gvts. That is then, corporate-globalization, backed, and given entree by, the power of states. Corporatocracy plus statism. (which gives spurious credibilty to socialists who claim capitalism = imperialism ("/neocolonialism") As good a place for this essay by Jeffrey Tucker https://brownstone.org/articles/how-did-american-capitalism-mutate-into-american-corporatism/

I don't agree, but then I'm sure you'd not be in line with a bargain struck with the Houthis. Which will be regarded, if only at the discussion stage, as a weakening of resolve by the equivocating West, the reward for Houthis committing terror attacks by sea and Hamas in Israel, and USA making concessions to Iran. It supports my criticism of the changing Admins, in turn, obstructing or aiding Israel in finding resolution to the Palestinian/ME problems - their own way - with the moral-diplomatic (and not overtly military) assistance of the US, e.g. Trump's salutary Abraham accords (that if fast-tracked by this Administration could have thwarted Iran's and its proxies' aggressive, regional ambitions). https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/us-could-remove-houthis-from-terror-list-in-exchange-for-red-sea-quiet-report-795268

I do not even hear a desire for intervention from Israelis themselves. Rather, the country and global Jewry, also under enormous strain, should be championed morally, that's urgently needed and lacking. You know my attitude on committing American soldiers anywhere? This far, it's Israel's local fight alone, they have to deal with the consequences. The arms (they purchase by agreement out of the 3.3 billion dollars in annual aid they get from the US) must not be withheld during war. The possibility is delighting/empowering the terrorists and their genocidal supporters.

I used to use them interchangeably but was never fully satisfied. "Man is a being of volitional consciousness" - states precisely the condensed, metaphysical core of man's nature. i.e. one doesn't reason automatically, we have to raise our consciousness by choice, so conceptualizing, character forming. The "broader" sphere of free will involves ALL choices made, sourced from that original O'ist tenet. I suggest the first is absolute and necessary, free will is dependent. Snips from Branden which bears this out (I think) "Freedom [of will] does not mean causelessness; this point must be stressed. A volitional choice is not causeless. It is caused by the person who makes the choice, and the choice entails an enormity of issues: [He lists many, starting familiarly with "Focusing versus non-focusing" and ending with "Concern with congruence versus disregard of contradictions" -and- "Reason versus irrationalism; respect for logic, consistency, coherence and evidence, versus disregard"]. [Recalls "A man has free choice to the extent he is rational" by Aquinas]. and the telling point here: "Our freedom is neither absolute nor unlimited, however. There are many factors that can make the appropriate exercise of our consciousness easier or harder. Some of these factors may be genetic, biological. Others are developmental. The environment can support and encourage the healthy assertion of consciousness or it can oppose and undermine it"... Etc. (The "will" is "free", but reality ain't, to my simple mind -- one cannot *always* attain *everything* wished for by the power of will. Yet - nothing can be accomplished without it) (Excerpts from Honoring the Self).

I'd venture in keeping with both NB and AR, that Rand's "the volitional consciousness" - which would draw blank stares from most free will-ers and determinists - is the core component and principle of free will, as recognized generally. From which Branden widens his scope for his psychological purposes.

"Free will--in the widest meaning of the term--is the doctrine that human beings are capable of performing actions that are not determined by forces outside their control, that we are capable of making choices that are not necessitated by antecedent factors". N Branden HtS (His footnote, that his explanation is "...closest to the concept of volition proposed by Ayn Rand but differs from hers in that Rand identifies the choice to focus exclusively with the choice to think, to engage in a process of explicit reasoning, whereas ... my own view of the choice to focus is considerably broader").

Why I've advocated a measure of distance between the longstanding allies to keep their friendship alive throughout unpredictable changes of administration. Biden, Schumer et al must accept that Israel is not "the 51st state" to do their bidding. The IDF must complete this last push into Rafah. (And for Israel to decide how to handle the aftermath, not the pressured and impossible (for now) 2-state solution that will guarantee unending conflict with the Palestinians who, common knowledge, will seize it as the path to the 'one-state' solution they wish for. . Not another "prolonged war" with Israel as "proxy". Let Israel finish the task, unimpeded- to ensure the US doesn't need to enter down the line. Analyst on Epoch TV: "It is the position of the Biden Administration that wants to prevent Israel from winning, that is most likely to entangle America in this region". https://www.theepochtimes.com/epochtv/how-bidens-policies-are-prolonging-the-gaza-war-eugene-kontorovich-5613002?utm_source=NS_ATLNewsletter&src_src=NS_ATLNewsletter&utm_campaign=atl-2024-03-30&src_cmp=atl-2024-03-30&utm_medium=email&est=AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAde0lbBkLyNPE7b0Knm1WH7l7wk9AJCYDvu4puebPx%2B%2Bc52sNbBYRuw%3D%3D?utm_source=ref_share&utm_campaign=copy

Wise old head Ray McGovern. https://youtu.be/BGSBxotojHk?si=MsVqRfazb2lSrq0B

The forum for ARC-UK's young intellectuals has been the one robust, regular, just, resistance against the swarming social media calling - some at least implicitly, more, overtly - for Israel's eradication. Or ordering Israel to conform to public opinion, UN resolutions. etc. at its own present and future sacrifices. (ugh, election year...). Good for them. And in this ~moral~ war, the appeasing international community calls for "ceasefire" - while never condemning Hamas still holding hostages - and for a "two-state solution"; a truce and compromising negotiations which weren't raised in 2 years of that other immoral one. https://www.youtube.com/live/aNpe4jqzo6Y?si=DG-c7Fpy5i3NTOlf

Simple as that?

I was fascinated by those sophomoronic experiments which were prevalent on Youtube about 10 years ago, supposedly discounting the freedom of will. Something involving the wired-up test subject reacting to lights on a screen and pressing a button, thus 'showing' that the relevant part of his brain responded a split second before he made his physical selection--i.e. his brain 'informed' him which button to press. i.e. no free will: His act was "determined". What? As if the brain will not in every instance show activity prior to and during activities. As if the brain is pre-programmed deterministically to "cause" one's actions in any and all encounters outside the lab environment. I recall the young host of the show was thrilled by these superficial findings. He concluded (consistently) that no free will means nothing you do can be held against you legally or morally by others, equally that you do not need to take yourself to task for some failing. A great relief for the amoral. More, the personal choices of undertaking effortful thinking and character building can be dispensed with. Then the individual mind will be under attack. The result, individualism will succumb to collectivism-tribalism-racism (major determining antecedent - "ancestral" - factors used often to claim power through past 'victimhood') and self-esteem and pride must suffer since one also cannot be responsible for one's accomplishments. If no-free-will has arrived in the broader mainstream the world is heading for trouble, I thought. Sure enough - what we are seeing today. One can count on human nature to take the easy options. Free will demands far too much awareness and thinking work. While valuable in their own area, the neuroscientists (I refer to the popular Sam Harris, notably, who also, I gather, consistently eliminated "the mind" together with free will) have something to be responsible for bringing about this age of pronounced determinism/skepticism. (But who would expect proponents of determinism to take "responsibility" for anything they do? They had no other choice. Or was it due to your free will, Sam?).

The very slight, moral as well as political, cultural, distinctions between Ukraine and Russia is the main reason I've been a peacenik about "the war that ought not have happened". Abuses on both sides (with Ukraine: the NON-democratic change of regime, the cultural-political repression of Russian-Ukrainians and subsequent civil war, the stifling and imprisonment of dissenters, banning of the Russian Orthodox Church, breaking negotiated deals and so on) have me umimpressed. For all that, for reasons one can only infer, the West applauded their poster child Z, lent the conflict its sanction and upheld Ukraine to be the Savior of Europe--at Ukraine's predictably terrible cost--and vilified Russia alone. Who would you prefer to "go to bat for" (at massive expense and unthinkable potential risks) ? Answer: neither.

A few more are sitting up and taking notice of a glaring anomaly, the 'numbers' given are those accepted without question from - a Jihadi terror group and its supporters, from whom the disingenuous claim of 'genocide' originates, the 'numbers' fuelling the lie - picked up and promoted with glee by sundry Judeophobes. Too late this Newsweek piece, the slander was popularly embedded in the first days after Oct7, in advance of the first Gazan casualties. But I notice a level of panic setting in, Hamasophile writers and Tubers and mass activists are not getting their way as expected in saving the remnants of their adulated hero-killers with "humanitarian ceasefire" demands - this time the IDF shows it will not cave to global sentiment and is committed to going all the way. (The huger threat is the Hezbollah Army's coordinated attack in the North, holding back, waiting to see what happens there, and why Israel must wrap up the Gaza war quickly). This is "existential" self-preservation for Israel (for any who are concerned). https://www.msn.com/en-za/news/world/a-more-accurate-accounting-of-the-war-in-gaza-opinion/ar-BB1ka9IG?rc=1&ocid=socialshare&cvid=fa1e2985647b4284842206f5d0432e0e&ei=11

One would think so. I'm not one of those calling for such a declaration, especially one justified to 'help Israel' (which will fight its own regional battles, hopefully without interference) but for "calibrated" retaliation against any "clear and present danger", such as the intolerable attacks on international shipping by the Houthis which the US led consortium has firmly responded to and has to permanently stop. I believe Iran is "testing the waters", so to speak, seeing how far they can push the West through its proxy terror groups while avoiding confrontation. They must be met resolutely on an ad hoc basis while not (yet) maximally. https://www.jpost.com/israel-hamas-war/2024-03-16/live-updates-792187

A return to clarity, by a proper expert on urban warfare. Increasing dismissal of the "numbers" put out by the Gazan Ministry of Death. Nothing new, Hamas' strategy was all-dependent on large civilian casualties, real or fictional, to "win" the political war.

Monart, here's a link to Brownstone Institute and their many articles https://brownstone.org/ the gold standard for all things pandemic, good science, optimal health and freedom-orientated, fronted by the heroic Jeffrey Tucker ("Liberty or Lockdown?"). They have been my bright reference point

"Prevarication" = non-stop lying and distraction It's your minds they own. https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-ukraine-war-runs-on-lies/

You could do with some education on the false alternative/dichotomy. The fanatical (Western) propaganda is which made for: either "pro-Putin" OR "Slava Ukraini!" Like children's games, with us or against us. Third way, for/against neither - and an early negotiations route to a peaceable resolution. They and their triumphalist indoctrinating of a "weak Russia" have (predictably) got Ukrainians killed in masses with Russia still solidly unbudged from its positions inside Ukraine, so, so much for pretending to be "for" Ukrainians. It was a murderously callous war policy foisted on the people. It makes one wonder just how little were leaders and populations caring "for Ukraine", and how much more hating/fearing of Russians. Obviously, exposed now is the rank failure of (colluding, censoring) western propaganda up against reality. "Putinist propaganda", I've said, was much more bluntly realistic. Still in denial, the Western govt's won't admit their deceptions and failure. They will keep doubling down.