The Art of the Abusive

You always know when someone has lost the argument when all they can do is resort to abusive ad hominem. That’s exactly what we find in Doug Wilson’s recent blog, An Anarchic Personality. Simply put, abusive ad hominem is to attack the man rather than the argument and Wilson uses this fallacious argument very effectively in his attack against a liberal critic of his, Idaho University professor of philosophy, Nick Gier.

Gier, who evidently is not at all pleased with Wilson’s growing “religious empire” in tiny Moscow, is called an “unbeliever” and a “liberal” repeatedly by Wilson and throughout his piece. Wilson also accuses Gier of being “one of the chief voices in our local disturbances here in Moscow.” Of course, being an unbeliever and a liberal, even being a “chief voice” in a local disturbance, doesn’t mean that Gier’s arguments against Wilson are false, but that is exactly the conclusion Wilson hopes his readers will draw. So, to play along, and since I have no idea what “local disturbance” Wilson has in mind or even who Professor Gier is, for my purposes here I will take Wilson at his word that Gier is an unbeliever and a liberal.

What sets Wilson off is what he calls the “two-way schmooze traffic between the TR camp and radical progressive camp.” Wilson is clearly irritated that both TR’s and unbelieving “radical progressives,” as he calls them, can both recognize that Wilson is not Reformed at all. Yet, rather than deal with his critics head-on and answer their arguments, Wilson says his intent is “not to defend myself from the charges one more time.” One more time? I’ve been reading Wilson for a long time and I have yet to see him defend himself against the charges of his critics even once. Generally his defense, if you can call it that, has been along the lines that his critics are too stupid to understand him, he didn’t say what his critics quote him as saying (even when they cite him saying the very things they said he said), they’re lying, it was just a typo, all of the above.

Cowards and Hypocrites

From Doug Wilson’s blog today:

Yesterday the congregation of Auburn Avenue Presbyterian Church voted (without dissent) to leave the PCA. They also voted to have Steve Wilkins continue as their pastor, and to approach the CREC for membership. They have been adopted as a mission church of Grace Covenant Church in Nacogdoches, Texas, pastored by Randy Booth. Steve was a member in good standing of the Louisiana Presbytery and consequently may transfer his membership according to the PCA BCO (38-3a), with the presbytery simply recording the action. The Louisiana Presbytery has been formally notified of all this. We welcome Auburn Avenue into our fellowship of churches with an odd mixture of grief and joy.

Second Paul Chief of Staff Names Rockwell

The following is from the Reason Magazine “Hit and Run” blog site.

Now we have a former and the current Paul Chief of Staff identifying Lew Rockwell as the one responsible for the racist Ron Paul newsletters. Evidently Paul himself was set to name names until the campaign pulled the plug.

Funny how that worked.

David Weigel | January 17, 2008, 7:33pm

I just had a conversation with Tom Lizardo, Ron Paul’s longtime congressional chief of staff, who wanted to say this on the record:

Last week, a statement was prepared by Ron Paul’s press secretary Jesse Benton, and approved by Ron Paul, acknowledging Lew Rockwell as having a role in the newsletters. The statement was squashed by campaign chairman Kent Snyder.

I’ve called the Paul campaign to see what, exactly, the statement said.

UPDATE, 7:53: Jesse Benton responds:

I respect Tom Lizardo, but he does not work for the campaign and has no authority to comment on campaign business.

Yesterday Julian Sanchez and I published our own findings on Rockwell.

The Face of the Federal Vision

FV guru and prophet in his own mind, James Jordan, has gone postal. For documentation of his complete mental unraveling go here and here. What will be interesting to see is the inevitable fallout and how men like FV apologist and shill Doug Wilson will try and deflect such clear and evident lunacy from such a prominent FV spokesman and luminary. Commenting on one blog site where Jordan similarly lost his nut, an elder in a CREC candidate church wrote:

“Wowsers . . . I gotta tell y’all- we do not appreciate Mr. Jordan’s approach AT ALL. Uncool- just unnecessary and downright divisive.”

Now, don’t get me wrong, the divisive thing is a good thing. I appreciate Mr. Jordan’s efforts. I really do. I mean, what possible unity can there be with Christ and the FV? Besides, even while spitting bile he makes some great points that P&R men everywhere need to learn. For example, over at Greenbaggins(es) Jordan barks:

Some men remain in the PCA because God has told them they have a duty to help the 7000 who have not yet bowed the knee to antichrist. They hatred of the Kingship of Jesus, which characterizes so much of the PCA, is with fighting. The Reformed faith is that faith includes fiducia, and this is still worth fighting for, regardless of how many antinominian blogs hate it.

Admittedly, even when he is not wearing his disguise, including the one where we’re supposed to believe he is a Christian man and teacher, Jordan still looks foolish, but he does provide another great example why Christian men everywhere – particularly RE’s and TE’s who think their seminary training was the last word – need to read and study Gordon Clark’s, What is Saving Faith. According to the Trinity Foundation website :

This is the combined edition of two of Dr. Clark’s seminal books: Faith and Saving Faith and The Johannine Logos. Both books deal with the crucial issue of justification by faith alone in a new fashion: by deriving a definition of faith (belief) from the Greek New Testament rather than from Latin theologians. It is both ironic and telling that most Protestants, when asked to define the word “faith,” sound like they are exegeting the Vulgate. No one before Dr. Clark has examined, collated, and systematized the wealth of Scriptural material relevant to the definition of faith. The result is a refreshing and exhilarating defense of the doctrine of justification through belief alone.

Open Letter To Lew Rockwell – From John Robbins

Dear Lew,

You have now had three opportunities –1996, 2001, and 2008 — to prove that you are a friend of Ron Paul and freedom, and you have failed to do so each time.

This week, for the third time, the puerile, racist, and completely un-Pauline comments that all informed people say you have caused to appear in Ron’s newsletters over the course of several years have become an issue in his campaign. This time the stakes are even higher than before. He is seeking nationwide office, the Republican nomination for President, and his campaign is attracting millions of supporters, not tens of thousands.

Three times you have failed to come forward and admit responsibility for and complicity in the scandals. You have allowed Ron to twist slowly in the wind. Because of your silence, Ron has been forced to issue repeated statements of denial, to answer repeated questions in multiple interviews, and to be embarrassed on national television. Your callous disregard for both Ron and his millions of supporters is unconscionable.

If you were Dr. Paul’s friend, or a friend of freedom, as you pretend to be, by now you would have stepped forward, assumed responsibility for those asinine and harmful comments, resigned from any connection to Ron or his campaign, and relieved Ron of the burden of having to repeatedly deny the charges of racism. But you have not done so, and so the scandal continues to detract from Ron’s message.

You know as well as I do that Ron does not have a racist bone in his body, yet those racist remarks went out under his name, not yours. Pretty clever. But now it’s time to man up, Lew. Admit your role, and exonerate Ron. You should have done it years ago.

John Robbins, Ph.D.
Chief of Staff
Dr. Ron Paul, 1981-1985

Ron Paul a Racist? – Pt 2

I came across an interesting comment on the Reason Magazine “Hit and Run” blog site and got permission from the author, Andrew Taylor, to reprint it here:

Let’s face it, folks: Ron Paul is lying about not knowing who wrote those newsletters. He might technically be telling the truth — “I don’t know if it was Lew Rockwell, or Gary North, or some intern” — but he certainly knows who was responsible for the newsletters, and that person or persons know who wrote for them. This is not the Associated Press with hundreds of reporters worldwide; this was a small-circulation newsletter that probably involved, at most, 10 people or less.

Eric Dondero claims that the newsletters were edited by Rockwell, and I believe he indicated that “80%” of the articles were written by Rockwell. The fact that Rockwell is allowing Paul to twist in the wind demonstrates that he is an absolute, complete, total and utter piece of garbage who cares about one thing, and one thing only: Lew Rockwell. Why a Christian gentleman like Ron Paul would lie for a such a scumbag is a mystery to me.

As I mentioned in the comments in Part 1, it seems to me that Dondero has a very big ax to grind against Paul and was even calling for his resignation, not from the presidential race, but from his congressional seat immediately after the first Republican debate, which I think says a lot. However, that doesn’t mean he is wrong about the Paul/Rockwell connection to these old newsletters.

As far as the Rockwell, I wouldn’t know him from Adam. The only things I’ve read on his website are basically Paul articles and I bought a Rothbard book and read the DiLorenzo Lincoln book. Yet, I still get the impression that he’s nothing but a scurrilous coward, since it seems clear to everyone that it was him. Just scrolling through the comments at the Reason blog and some of the other Libertarian websites and blogsites, it is the unanimous opinion of many of those who have, at one time or another, been closely associated with Paul, that Rockwell is the man behind the newsletters.

Hey, even I figured that out even before venturing into the blogosphere and I hardly follow Libertarian party politics.

Of course, the problem for Paul is that it’s not Rockwell’s name on any of these old newsletters. The only name on any of them is Ron Paul’s. He’s the one holding the bag.

That is why even if Paul won’t name names, Rockwell, if he had any decency, should admit he was the editor and that he wrote many of the pieces under question. Then he can go on a rant justifying himself, but at least he would put the whole thing to rest by deflecting criticism from Paul . . . and Paul could look like he’s just being loyal to his friends and not as feeble, dishonest and as stupid as he looks now. Beyond that, a Rockwell admission would give Paul at least some plausible deniability.

I confess have no real hope that Paul could ever win (I think 72 is just too old anyway for the stress of that office), but the ideas he stands for and especially the young people these ideas are attracting (and I suppose the nut jobs too) are too important to get discredited by some trumped up racist smear campaign. Ron Paul is no racist. I am also confident this whole thing was orchestrated by the RNC and they are the ones who made sure these old newsletters got into the hands of those at The New Republic.

Paul is right about one thing and that this was an orchestrated political hit.

I mean, what else to the Republicans have to really curb his momentum? What are they going to do attack his voting record? They needed to find a way to completely sideline him and shut him up. Just having Giuliani cackle like the nauseating New Yorker he is every time Paul opens his mouth at the debates is not enough, but up until now that’s all they had.

What makes me mad is that this whole thing could easily be put to rest if only some people, either Paul or Rockwell, had some guts.

Ron Paul a Racist?

In a hit piece that appeared in The New Republic by James Kirchick, Angry White Man, Kirchick tries his best to paint Ron Paul as a racist by dredging up old Ron Paul Report newsletters, most of which were never written by Dr. Paul. Of course, the pieces were written under his name, so Paul does bear some responsibility. In response to the hit piece, Dr. Paul issued the following statement:

The quotations in The New Republic article are not mine and do not represent what I believe or have ever believed. I have never uttered such words and denounce such small-minded thoughts. In fact, I have always agreed with Martin Luther King, Jr. that we should only be concerned with the content of a person’s character, not the color of their skin. As I stated on the floor of the U.S. House on April 20, 1999: ‘I rise in great respect for the courage and high ideals of Rosa Parks who stood steadfastly for the rights of individuals against unjust laws and oppressive governmental policies.’

This story is old news and has been rehashed for over a decade. It’s once again being resurrected for obvious political reasons on the day of the New Hampshire primary. When I was out of Congress and practicing medicine full-time, a newsletter was published under my name that I did not edit. Several writers contributed to the product. For over a decade, have publically taken moral responsibility for not paying closer attention to what went out under my name.

Confirming Paul’s claims, but taking things one step further, is Dr. John Robbins in a letter to the editors of TNR :

I have known Ron Paul for more than 30 years. He is not guilty of racism, and the suggestion that he is a racist is preposterous. I worked for him in 1976 and again from 1979 to 1985, the last our years as his chief of staff. The juvenile racial slurs in his newsletters were written by others; I have my suspicions as to who they were. I hope Ron dissociates himself from them by name. I think Ron has made some poor judgments lately and has accepted advice from men who do not respect the Constitution and the Rule of Law. If the TNR article torpedoes his campaign, the torpedo was provided by men who have pretended to be friends of Dr. Paul for years. If anything, they have preyed on his trusting nature and naivete.

Let’s hope Paul takes Robbins’ advice and that he name names and cleans house – or at least hires someone who will clean house for him.

With that said, most of the so-called evidence that Paul is a racist dredged up by Kirchick’s hit piece is the typical Liberal knee jerk leaps of logic most of us have come to expect from professional race baiters. For example, Kirchick writes concerning the LA riots:

According to the newsletter, the looting was a natural byproduct of government indulging the black community with “‘civil rights,’ quotas, mandated hiring preferences, set-asides for government contracts, gerrymandered voting districts, black bureaucracies, black mayors, black curricula in schools, black tv shows, black tv anchors, hate crime laws, and public humiliation for anyone who dares question the black agenda.”

Let’s see if I’ve got it? Liberalism and the collectivist philosophy it represents through the aegises of race based welfare programs have completely destroyed the black community while feigning to help them. The error in the quote is the reference to the black agenda. It’s the Liberal white collectivist agenda that is to blame. So, in response to this Liberal enslavement and the emasculation of black men to the point that the federal government has become the provider of choice for a growing number of black women and their children, a small group of black men threw some bricks and availed themselves of another hand out? Well, as friend pointed out if Ron Paul is a racist he’s a racist just like George Bush Sr. It took him 3 seconds to find this on Google (LA Times 5/5/1992):

RIOTS IN LOS ANGELES: The President; White House Links Riots to Welfare

Monetary Policy 101

If you have some time you might enjoy this little lesson in monetary policy. It runs about 40 minutes and gives insight into how those in government — Republicans and Democrats –have been raping us. No question most people have a sense that something is wrong, but few know why. Here is the why.

Everyone expects to be robbed by the socialists calling themselves “Democrats,” but this is something you’re not even going to hear from the crop of crooks running for office from either Party. And, don’t expect Republican party shills like Sean Hannity to tell you either. OK, maybe from Republican Ron Paul, but this will give you some idea why the statists and fascists in the Republican party and Fox News keep trying to marginalize Paul and paint him as a kook. Men like Paul are a real threat to those in power since he has been exposing their dirty little secret, and, even more terrifying, people are listening.

Sit back, load your gun, take your blood pressure meds, and enjoy.

Federal Vision Charm School

I thought I’d share a few thoughts concerning Mark T.’s exposé, Bag o’ Snakes, over at the Federal Schism blog. Needless to say Mark has come under some fire from Federal Vision fanatics for publishing an exchange from a private Yahoo email list for subscribers to James Jordan’s rag, “Biblical Horizons.” The FV attack Chihuahua’s are all in a self-righteous froth over this breach of privacy and the glimpse it’s provided into their little private party.

Now, first, let’s get that “private” nonsense out of the way. Jordan’s list is open to all those who subscribe to Jordan’s rag. You pay your money, you can join the list. Rough estimates are there are approximately 200 people on the list. Hardly a small group of friends. But did they really think that in a group that large no one would have the courage to defect? Doug Wilson trying to do some damage control complained on his blog :

Everyone on the list agrees to the rules in order to participate. In short, there is no way for someone to forward information from that list to others outside the list without breaking his word in a strikingly dishonorable way.

Well, I don’t know where folks are required to make this vow of silence, but I checked the Yahoo group listing, which is also published on Mark T.’s blog, and there is nothing whatsoever in the list rules that state list members must agree to never “forward information” to “outsiders.”

Here are the list rules if you haven’t already seen them posted at Federal Schism:

Description
I. BH PURPOSE STATEMENT

1. Biblical Horizons’s list is a restricted email forum that exists to foster informal discussions on matters of biblical and theological issues from a Reformed theological perspective. Many of us on the list are good friends and we will often speculate freely without fear of overbearing chastisement from each other. BH exists for intramural discussions among those who share certain biblical and theological convictions. BH welcomes discussions of these and any well-considered Biblical themes, but if you disagree with our common assumptions, then as our guest we hope you will respond to our hospitality with your respect for our ideas. (You may be asked to find another forum if you cannot refrain from argumentative disputation.)

2. You must be a subscriber to Biblical Horizon’s newsletter to join this list! We will cleanse the list of those whose subscription is not current. To subscribe send your name and address to Biblical Horizons, P.O. Box 1096 Niceville, Florida 32588 or call 850-897-5299. You may also email James B. Jordan (jbjordan4@cox.net) with your request. We will extend a free six-month trial subscription to anyone who asks to be on the mailing list. After that, you should make an appropriate donation to continue to receive the mailings. Only those who have made financial donations are eligible to join the email list.

Wilson must be using that funny FV logic again to be able to infer a vow of silence and secrecy from the above list restrictions. I admit it does appear that Jordon only wants his friends and sycophants on the list. Plus, there is no question he feels quite at home talking to like minded teachers, pastors and conspirators like Steve Wilkins, John Barach, Jeff Meyers, Jeffrey Steel, Mark Horne, Tim Gallant, Rich Lusk, Doug Wilson and others. Too bad for him but it looks like some unwanted Christian joined his list as well. Oh, well. Not only does he need to hold a good old fashion Chinese struggle session to ferret out non FV list members, but I think he should pre-screen anyone foolish enough to subscribe to his newsletter. Maybe he could come up with a multiple choice quiz for subscribers along with a loyalty oath for new members to sign.

Post of the Year . . . And It’s Only January!

Mark T. over at Federal Schism has done it again! Please take some time and carefully comb through what the Federal Vision conspirators have to say when they think no one is watching. Men (and that’s being kind) like Steve Wilkins, John Barach, Jeff Meyers, Jeffrey H. Steel, Mark Horne, Tim Gallant, Rich Lusk, Doug Wilson, and James Jordan.

This is very revealing and incriminating stuff. I suggest copying the post itself (not just the link) and send it to everyone you know who might even be remotely interested in the machinations of these FV dogs.

I confess that I’ve always shied away from conspiracy theories, but this is no theory. Of course, after reading Paul Elliot’s powerful Christianity and NeoLiberalism and witnessing all the political maneuvering by the FV men prior to the GA vote on the PCA FV committee report, I shouldn’t be surprised. This stuff is par for the course.

Mark titled the piece Bag o’ Snakes and he couldn’t be more right. Read it while you still can.

. . . do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them . . . .