Weekend A La Carte (December 21)
9 hours ago
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Newt Joins the Left
In Christian Apologetics, there are a few ways to defend the Christian faith. One of the most popular is called Evidential Apologetics. This form works well when you are discussing the Christian faith with someone who is seriously looking to see if Christianity is true. God has given much evidence for the Christian to use. However, when discussing with someone, who is hostile to the faith, I have found Presuppositional Apologetics of great use. It causes one to rethink their unstated objections and philosophical assumptions. If a Christian doesn't recognize this, he will often argue till he turns blue and talk past the person he is attempting to evangelize.
In the above video with Newt Gringrich, we see that in Politics, the same holds true. Throughout this entire video, Newt grants the false assumptions to the Political Left, and then attempts to explain how we could get the price of oil down.
Here is one major problem. Newt explains that there are several places in the U.S. that the government has declared illegal to drill. He explains that these places must be freed to allow for exploration and drilling. There is a major flaw in his argument. He grants to the Political Left that Global Warming is happening. He grants to the Political Left their understanding of pollution. So Newt may argue his evidential style till he is blue in the face, he will fail to lead a political movement.
Just as the Christian, who argues with a person who is hostile to Christianity, must change his apologetic approach, so Conservatives must challenge the Left. Not only must they produce the evidence for the Left's irrationality, they must demonstrate on a presuppositional level that their world-view is incoherent.
Newt has clearly abandoned the fight against the Left. He has now joined them on their turf, while wondering why they won't agree with his conclusions. In the first part of the video Newt wants to side with anti-Capitalists and attack Speculators [the new Left's bad guy], while doing the very thing he is accusing them of!!!! He sides with the Left's view of Alternative Sources and makes ridiculous claims in the video.
Until science makes real advances in technology, we must defeat the Left's presuppositions. We must defeat their feel-good policies that end up making things worse. Until we do, oil isn't coming down.
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4 comments:
Howard,
You're being too hard on Newt. I also disagree with his using the language of environmentalists. But I think his reasoning, according to www.newt.org, is that even though we don't concede their science, they have won the public definition of terms. So in order to participate in the debate with credibility to generaly public, we must co-opt their language. I disagree with this tactic. It is purely a political calculation on his part, not a statement on a truth claim.
I personally have no problem with punishing speculators. I doubt that they are a significant part of the problem, though. On the strength of President Bush's lifting of the executive order on the drilling ban, light crude has dropped $11/ barrel in the last couple of days. The solution is more supply, not only of crude and of refining capacity, but of other fuels such as nuclear and of more efficiencies in automobiles, etc
I agree that I am being hard on Newt. It is his tactic that I most despise. It is purely political. Bush has done this for 8 years, and it has nearly destroyed Conservatism within the Republican ranks among other reasons.
Co-opting the language only causes confusion. Is he for free markets or not? We are ultimately arguing for Capitalism or its destruction. Hiding sound language defending and explaining what is needed is the reason we got here in the first place.
"I personally have no problem with punishing speculators."
I don't understand why. You mentioned the price of oil dropped. If speculators knew Bush could do what he did, would not they have speculated that too?
Let's face it. No one knew Bush would do it. In my opinion, Newt and Republicans in general are just as much to blame for bad policy as the Democrats. They had a full majority and did nothing to educate and advance Conservatism.
Now I'm supposed to agree punishing speculators is part of the solution when they are speculating based upon known environmentalist policy condoned by Republicans for 6 years?
Where does this stop? Do we punish those who sell stocks because they speculated the market might go south?
Newt says in the video that he wants to punish those who bet against the "United States". He equivocates this with betting on the rise of the price of oil. This is sickening to make such a claim. This is pure Liberalism.
Instead of educating and leading a movement, Newt will ultimately fail. If he does succeed, it will have nothing to do with him. It will have to do with the price of gas at the pump. When Americans complain for Congress to get out of the way or get voted out, even Democrats will listen.
The reason I don't have a problem punishing the speculators is becuase they are distorting the market. We don't have a pure free market. These futures that are being traded are financial instruments that are creatures of government regulation. They are artificial since they are not the commodity, but a bet about the future price of the commodity. The future price is being bid up and up on irrational fears about what the price might be.
Now, I don't think speculation is the only reason the price is going up. Obviously, demand IS outstripping supply. And just because the Dems demogogue the speculation issue doesn't mean that there isn't some validity to the claim. Even a blind hog finds and acorn once in a while! :)
I am no expert on the futures market. I do know my own Utility company does something similar. Because it does so, it attempts to keep prices stable. Futures trading has significantly helped our company over the long run. This article
http://money.cnn.com/2008/06/27/
news/economy/birger_oil_speculation.fortune/
says what little I have learned.
"Bashing futures traders may well be good politics, but it's stupid public policy. By providing a mechanism for locking in prices, the futures market makes it easier for oil companies to make costly investments in new production - which is the key to lowering prices at the pump.
Futures trading also discourages hoarding in an otherwise tight market. Without speculators willing to take the other side of so many futures contracts, oil refiners and other end-users might be inclined to ramp up their spot-market purchases and store more oil as a hedge against further price increases."
As far as I can see, Speculators are the bad guys for politicians simply because most people do not know how this works. The article points out that even the politicians have no idea what they are talking about.
So far, I remain unconvinced that Newt is on the right path. Being a Conservative is hard work. It takes education and perseverance through tough times. Being a Liberal is easy. Just be emotional. That is what Newt is appealing to. That is IMO a huge mistake.
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