Before and After Medifast

I put these here so as to give people the choice of seeing them or not. Eye bleach may be necessary after viewing. The program I used was Medifast. It was hard to stick to, but there is no arguing with the results . . . it works! One can't exercise while on the program, however, so I'm really excited to exercise now, not for the purpose of losing weight anymore but to be healthy and happy!

If any of you are interested in doing the same program, send me a message on Facebook or email me. Like I said, it works!

Thomas Sowell's, "The Fallacy of Fairness"

If you'd like to read this on a site with a white background and black font, click here.

If there is ever a contest to pick which word has done the most damage to people's thinking, and to actions to carry out that thinking, my nomination would be the word "fair." It is a word thrown around by far more people than have ever bothered to even try to define it.

This mushy vagueness may be a big handicap in logic but it is a big advantage in politics. All sorts of people, with very different notions about what is or is not fair, can be mobilized behind this nice-sounding word, in utter disregard of the fact that they mean very different things when they use that word.

Some years ago, for example, there was a big outcry that various mental tests used for college admissions or for employment were biased and "unfair" to many individuals or groups. Fortunately there was one voice of sanity – David Riesman, I believe – who said: "The tests are not unfair. LIFE is unfair and the tests measure the results."

If by "fair" you mean everyone having the same odds for achieving success, then life has never been anywhere close to being fair, anywhere or at any time. If you stop and think about it (however old-fashioned that may seem), it is hard even to conceive of how life could possibly be fair in that sense.

Even within the same family, among children born to the same parents and raised under the same roof, the firstborns on average have higher IQs than their brothers and sisters, and usually achieve more in life.

Unfairness is often blamed on somebody, even if only on "society." But whose fault is it if you were not the firstborn? Since some groups have more children than others, a higher percentage of the next generation will be firstborns in groups that have smaller families, so such groups have an advantage over other groups.

Despite all the sound and fury generated in controversies over whether different groups have different genetic potential, even if they all have identical genetic potential the outcomes can still differ if they have different birth rates.

Twins have average IQs several points lower than children born singly. Whether that is due to having to share resources in the womb or having to share parents' attention after birth, the fact is what it is – and, it certainly is not fair.

Many people fail to see the fundamental difference between saying that a particular thing – whether a mental test or an institution – is conveying a difference that already exists or is creating a difference that would not exist otherwise.

Creating a difference that would not exist otherwise is discrimination, and something can be done about that. But, in recent times, virtually any disparity in outcomes is almost automatically blamed on discrimination, despite the incredible range of other reasons for disparities between individuals and groups.

Nature's discrimination completely dwarfs man's discrimination. Geography alone makes equal chances virtually impossible. The geographic advantages of Western Europe over Eastern Europe – in climate and navigable waterways, among other things – have led to centuries of differences in income levels that were greater than income differences between blacks and whites in America today.

Just the fact that the lay of the land is different in different parts of Europe meant that it was easier for the Roman legions to invade Western Europe. This meant that Western Europeans had the advantages of the most advanced civilization in Europe at that time. Moreover, because Roman letters were used in Western Europe, the languages of that region had written versions centuries before the Slavic languages of Eastern Europe did.

The difference between literacy and illiteracy is a huge difference, and it remained huge for centuries. Was it the Slavs' fault that the Romans did not want to climb over so many mountains to get to them?

To those living in Western Europe in the days of the Roman Empire, the idea of being conquered, and many slaughtered, by the Romans probably had no great appeal. But their descendants would benefit from their bad luck. And that doesn't seem fair either.

A recent flap in a Berkeley high school reveals what a farce "fairness" can be. Because this is ultra-liberal Berkeley, perhaps we should not be surprised that a proposal has been made to eliminate four jobs as science teachers and use the money saved for programs to help low achievers.

In Berkeley, as in many other communities across the country, black and Latino students are not performing as well as Asian and white students. In fact, the racial gap in academic achievement at Berkeley High School is the highest in California – no doubt a special source of embarrassment in politically correct Berkeley.

According to the principal, "Our community at Berkeley High School has failed the African-Americans." Therefore "We need to bring everybody up – that's what this plan is about."

Surely no one, not even in Berkeley, seriously believes that you will "bring everybody up" by eliminating science teachers. This is a proposal to redistribute money from science to social work, by providing every student with advisors on note-taking, time management and other learning skills.

The point is to close educational gaps among groups, or at least go on record as trying. As with most equalization crusades, whether in education or in the economy, it is about equalizing downward, by lowering those at the top. "Fairness" strikes again!

This is not just a crazy idea by one principal in Berkeley. It is a crazy idea taught in schools of education across the country. A professor of education at the University of San Francisco has weighed in on the controversy at Berkeley, supporting the idea of "projects designed to narrow the achievement gap."

In keeping with the rhetoric of the prevailing ideology, our education professor refers to "privileged" parents and "privileged" children who want to "forestall any progress toward equity."

In the language of the politically correct, achievement is equated with privilege. Such verbal sleight of hand evades the question whether individuals' own priorities and efforts affect outcomes, whether in education or in other endeavors. No need to look at empirical evidence when a clever phrase can take that whole question off the table.

This verbal sleight of hand is not confined to education. A study of incomes of various groups in Toronto concluded that Canadians of Japanese ancestry were the most "privileged" group in that city. That is, people of Japanese ancestry there had higher incomes than members of other minorities and higher than that of the white majority in Toronto.

What makes the "privileged" label a particularly bad joke in this case is a history of blatant discrimination against the Japanese in Canada in years past, including a longer internment during World War II than that of Japanese Americans. But, to some on the left, the very concept of achievement must be banished by all means necessary, regardless of the facts.

Achievement by overcoming obstacles is a special threat to the left's vision of the world, and so must be magically transformed into privilege through rhetoric.

Those with that vision do not want to even discuss evidence that students from different groups spend different amounts of time on homework and different amounts of time on social activities. To admit that inputs affect outputs, whether in education, in the economy or in other areas, would be to undermine the vision and agenda of the left, and deprive those who believe in that vision of a moral melodrama, starring themselves as defenders of the oppressed and crusaders against the forces of evil.

Redistribution of material resources has a very poor track record when it comes to actually helping those who are lagging, whether in education, in the economy or elsewhere. What they need are the attitudes, priorities and behavior which produce the outcomes desired.

But changing anyone's attitudes, priorities and behavior is a lot harder than taking a stance as defenders of the oppressed and crusaders against the forces of evil.

To the extent that doing the latter misdiagnoses the problem, it makes solving the problem even harder. That does no good for those who are lagging, however much it exalts those who pose as their defenders. "Fairness" indeed!

Most of us want to be fair, in the sense of treating everyone equally. We want laws to be applied the same to everyone. We want educational, economic or other criteria for rewards to be the same as well. But this concept of fairness is not only different from prevailing ideas of fairness among many of the intelligentsia, it contradicts their idea of fairness.

People like philosopher John Rawls call treating everyone alike merely "formal" fairness. Professor Rawls advocated "a conception of justice that nullifies the accidents of natural endowment and the contingencies of social circumstances." He called for a society which "arranges" end-results, rather than simply treating everyone the same and letting the chips fall where they may.

This more hands-on concept of fairness gives third parties a much bigger role to play. But whether any human being has ever had the omniscience to determine and undo the many differences among people born into different families and cultures – with different priorities, attitudes and behavior – is a very big question. And to concentrate the vast amount of power needed to carry out that sweeping agenda is a dangerous gamble, whose actual consequences have too often been written on the pages of history in blood.

There is no question that the accident of birth is a huge factor in the fate of people. What is a very serious question is how much anyone can do about that without creating other, and often worse, problems. Providing free public education, scholarships to colleges and other opportunities for achievement are fine as far as they go, but there should be no illusion that they can undo all the differences in priorities, attitudes and efforts among different individuals and groups.

Trying to change whole cultures and subcultures in which different individuals are raised would be a staggering task. But the ideology of multiculturalism, which pronounces all cultures to be equally valid, puts that task off limits. This paints people into whatever corner the accident of birth has put them.

Under these severe constraints, all that is left is to blame others when the outcomes are different for different individuals and groups. Apparently those who are lagging are to continue to think and act as they have in the past – and yet somehow have better outcomes in the future. And, if they don't get the same outcomes as others, then according to this way of seeing the world, it is society's fault!

Society may lavish thousands of dollars per year on schooling for a youngster who does not bother to study, and yet when he or she emerges as a semi-literate adult, it is considered to be society's fault if such youngsters cannot get the same kinds of jobs and incomes as other youngsters who studied conscientiously during their years in school.

It is certainly a great misfortune to be born into families or communities whose values make educational or economic success less likely. But to have intellectuals and others come along and misstate the problem does not help to produce better results, even if it produces a better image.

Political correctness may make it hard for anyone to challenge the image of helpless victims of an evil society. But those who are lagging do not need a better public relations image. They need the ability to produce better results for themselves – and a romantic image is an obstacle to directing their efforts toward developing that ability.

Tests and other criteria which convey the realities of their existing capabilities, compared to that of others, can have what is called a "disparate impact," and are condemned not only in editorial offices but also in courts of law.

But criteria exist precisely to have a disparate impact on those who do not have what these criteria exist to measure. Track meets discriminate against those who are slow afoot. Tests in school discriminate against students who did not study.

Disregarding criteria in the interest of "fairness" – in the sense of outcomes independent of inputs – adds to the handicaps of those who already have other handicaps, by lying to them about the reasons for their situation and the things they need to do to make their situation better.

Mixed up with the question of fairness to individuals and groups has been the explosive question of whether individuals and groups have the innate ability to perform at the same levels, if they are all treated alike or even given the same objective opportunities.

Intellectuals have swung from one side of this question at the beginning of the 20th century to the opposite side at the end. Both those who said that achievement differences among races and classes were due to genes, in the early years of the 20th century, and those who said that these differences were due to discrimination, in the later years, ignored the old statisticians' warnings that correlation is not causation.

The idea that some people are innately superior (usually one's own group) goes back for centuries, but various new facts that came out in the 19th and early 20th centuries gave the appearance of "science" to such beliefs during the Progressive era.

Sir Francis Galton's research turned up the fact of remarkable achievements among members of the same family, which he regarded as evidence of genetic superiority. The rise of IQ testing, and especially the massive mental testing of soldiers in the U.S. Army during the First World War, showed great differences in test scores among various racial and ethnic groups.

In the public schools, there were similarly large differences in which ethnic group's children failed to get promoted. In both the Army mental tests and in the schools, Polish Jews did poorly at that time. Carl Brigham – a leading authority on mental tests and the author of the SAT – said that the Army tests tended to "disprove the popular belief that the Jew is highly intelligent."

It should be noted that all of these conclusions were based on hard data, not mere "perceptions" or "stereotypes," as so many inconvenient facts are dismissed today. What was wrong were not the data but the inferences.

Polish Jews were among the many immigrants from Eastern Europe and Southern Europe who were relatively recent arrivals in the United States. Many of these immigrants grew up in homes where English was not spoken, as Carl Brigham acknowledged in later years, when he recanted his earlier statements. In later years, Jews scored above average on mental tests.

It is also a hard fact of history that some races had far more advanced technological, economic and other achievements than others at particular times and places. But those who were ahead in some centuries were often behind in other centuries – the Chinese and the Europeans having changed positions dramatically after Europe eventually caught up with China and then surpassed it within recent centuries. But there was no evidence of any dramatic changes in genetics among either the Chinese or the Europeans.

While striking changes in the relative positions of different races at different periods of history undermine genetic explanations, the fact that there has been no period when their achievements have been the same undermines today's presumption that different economic or other outcomes are due to discrimination.

Whatever the innate capacity of any race, class or other group, what pays off in the real world are developed capabilities, and these have never been the same – or even close to being the same – for individuals or groups.

All the leading brands of beer in the United States were created by people of German ancestry and so is the leading beer in China, not to mention breweries created by Germans in Australia, Argentina and elsewhere. Germans were producing beer in the days of the Roman Empire.

This does not mean that beer brewing skill is genetic but it also does not mean that this skill – or any other skill – is randomly distributed among peoples, so that a failure to have equal "representation" of groups in a given institutions can be presumed to be due to discrimination by that institution.

Fairness as equal treatment does not produce fairness as equal outcomes. The confusion between the two meanings of the same word has created enormous mischief, much of it at the expense of lagging groups, who have been distracted from the things that would enable them to catch up. And whole societies have been kept in a turmoil pursing a will o' the wisp in the name of "fairness."

I am not Emmanuel Goldstein.

In George Orwell's 1984, Emmanuel Goldstein is public enemy number one. He's a terrorist, the biggest threat to the government, and the subject of the famed two-minutes hate. However, the reader discovers toward the end of the book that Goldstein most likely doesn't even exist. So why all the attention and vitriol toward a fictitious entity? This alleged threat to the ruling party was more likely than not an elaborate orchestration bent on keeping the people psychologically dependent on Big Brother. In other words, if the ruling class can marginalize its enemies while keeping them close to the stream of social consciousness as ever present threats, then the easier it is for the ruling class to gain and keep the favor of the masses.

This is what I see happening to me and the entire Tea Party, 9/12 groups in this nation. Because I espouse conservative/libertarian/Constitutional principles, I am diametrically opposed to the direction our government is taking the country. All the legislative compromises throughout the history of this country have inched us closer and closer to increased government control. I mean we certainly aren't moving away from it. We started out right of center, but bill after bill, executive order after order, and Supreme Court ruling and another has landed us squarely on the left. I mean, we can barely see the center anymore.

Therefore, the current powers that be and many of their supporters have created an Emmanuel Goldstein of sorts out of this movement. This straw man they've created hates the poor and wishes the speedy demise of those without health insurance, all in the name of greed. They've bolstered the Goldstein image by taking the theatrical manner in which Glenn Beck conveys his message and negatively linking it to those who agree with his political ideology. Never mind the message! Just LOOK at THAT CHALKBOARD and those cascading TEARS!

Many at the town hall meetings across the country last summer voiced their discontent to their elected officials, but due to the impassioned way in which they did it, all of a sudden everyone associated with this movement is a rabid, racist, fear-monger. This is why we see a push to associate the alleged death threats against our elected officials to conservative talkers and the Tea Party movement. They're trying to marginalize us! That's why Pelosi exultantly walked to the Capital last Sunday afternoon with gavel in hand to pass Obamacare and did so directly through the crowds of opposition. She was trying to incite the opposition to violence so that she and others in power could further demonize them and everyone associated with them.

Now, if your view of this movement on the right is or has been clouded by this straw-man, Emmanuel Goldstein type propaganda, then I urge you to cut through the hype and fallacy and look for the merits of the principled argument. We're not as divided as you may think.

Questions regarding Obamacare

For those of you who received yesterday’s news from the House of Representatives with celebration and rejoicing, I sure would love some accountability and serious responses to the following questions. Please, no pathos or obfuscations.

I hereby candidly but respectfully call you out! Your silence may speak volumes about your position.

1. Based on principle, how can you justify infringing on the inalienable rights of many in order to enhance what you consider to be the rights of others?

2. Defend the premise that free access or government mandated lower costs to health care are inalienable rights.

3. Given our current economic situation combined with our debt obligations to other countries and our total national debt, how do we pay for this? How will we pay for a single payer system, which is the president's desire and the desire of many others in power?

4. How is it not selfish and unconstitutional to require by law that everyone else satisfy your individual wants and needs regarding health care?

5. Just because advancements in medicine extend the average human life span longer than ever before, why should you or anyone else get free access to the benefits of those advancements when they were innovated and developed by the hard work of others?

6. How is it an infringement on someone's rights when those who provide medical care require compensation proportionate to their skill, experience, and expertise?

7. How is it not an infringement on someone's rights when the government requires you to purchase a service or product at the threat of penalties, fines, etc?

If you were bent on the passage of this bill, then I don't think some well thought out answers to these questions are too much to ask.

The State Religion of Irreligion

Living in a Time of Ironies

Glenn Beck CPAC 2010

The following is Glenn Beck's key note address at CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) this last weekend. I invite everybody to watch it. If you're not a fan of Glenn Beck, I still encourage you to watch it but to do so non-objectively.

Withhold your opinion of Beck, and see what you make out of the substantive presentation. I completely affirm his position in this speech.

PART ONE


PART TWO


PART THREE


PART FOUR


PART FIVE


PART SIX

Power Struggle?

Some pundits have recently explained that the overall distaste the majority of Americans feel toward the federal government is because it just seems that both parties are only interested in power. I agree.

However, the movement seen within the Republican Party, the tea party or the 9/12ers, differs from both parties in how it is devoid of power lust. Candidates born of this movement only seek positions in DC to see that the power in America stays where it belongs, with the people. They know that Washington is broken because the majority who serve there have usurped and continue to usurp power from the people in efforts to further their own reelections and to satisfy the wishes of lobbyists and big business. It's pretty simple, really. The incumbent receives huge campaign donations from the lobbyists who want to keep him or her there, and with those huge campaign contributions they crush the competition. It's classic win-win. The politicians keep their seats, and the lobbyists ensure that legislation passes to further the interests of the companies they represent.

Unlike conflict management as seen in "The Office," however, this is not a win-win-win situation. The politicians win, and the lobbyists win, but the people lose, and here's why. First of all, money is not a zero sum game in this country, but power is. The politicians and lobbyists don't create power out of nothing; they can only get it from the people. This power theft is exemplified by the unbridled spending of both parties. They have enslaved us and future generations with unprecedented amounts of debt, and all of you with personal debt know what's like to be a slave to your monthly payments, right? Well the government maxed out our nation's credit cards long ago, and they continue to grant themselves greater limits. But they keep maxing them out with each extension.

This problem will ruin this nation, and as far as I can see, none in either party will have a solution so long as they remain corrupted.

This new grassroots movement, however . . .

Wrong

Sorry, Mr. President, but the majority of voters in Massachusetts didn't vote for Scott Brown for the same reason that the rest of the country voted for you. They're not sending Brown to Washington as a knee-jerk reaction to the Bush era. Scott Brown will fill the seat democrats have long since designed to support the buttocks of one of their own, and he will do so because his electorate is upset with you and your progressive style of huge government. Thankfully, enough people in this country are sufficiently versed in constitutional government and the history of this nation's founding that they see right through your policies that unfortunately have no historical merit and are founded in Utopian, marshmallow wonder. And no, the problem isn't that you got too busy and forgot to truly explain things to the American people. Not even my parents remember a president who released more statements, gave more interviews, and was on television more than you were. Not even close. We get what you're saying, but luckily we have not descended too far as a society that you can treat us like an Orwellian proletariat and further your agenda without a fight.

This country is right of center, always has been and always will be (hopefully). So by all means, continue to perambulate toward your own and your party's ruin with your progressive, leftist, and radical ideology. Or you could try to channel 1995 Clinton and move to the center, but even if you do, it's too late. We already know what you really want.

The Liberal/Progressive Politician

I'm an easy going, cheerful kind of guy, and there are few things in this world for which I have serious contempt. One of those things is the liberal/progressive politician. This rare, pretentious, and haughty "civil servant" operates on the premise and assumption that the American people don't know and can't do what's best for themselves without the intercessory guidance and aid of a strong, centralized government. Nancy Pelosi is one such and perhaps the very personification of the sort. In her most recent op-ed piece she describes the task ahead of the current congress and declares it the mission of congress to build a new economy. Huh?

Call me stupid, but I don't know how our government goes about the work of building an economy unless it has assumed more power and authority than otherwise permitted in the constitution. And I don't know of any government that produced a very successful economy anyway. However, Pelosi and the like are deluded into thinking that somehow they know better, and if we morons would just get out of their way, then we'd all be fine.

Would someone try and sell me on this?

The only thing the American people need from Pelosi, Reid, and Obama is for them to get out of the way and let us take care of ourselves.

At least they're trying to fix things!

A common theme I hear from those who support Obama and his agenda is the paltry, "well at least he's trying to fix things!" This defense seems almost automatic as I and countless others continue to criticize the president and congress. Our logic is sound, and our arguments valid, but at least they're doing something! What this argument does is emphasizes a core distinction between liberals and conservatives. Liberals are somehow deluded into believing that the majority of our nation's elected officials are altruistically motivated and that they really want what's best for us and can get it done. And it's this kind of delusion and ignorance that has elected this circus of a congress with some of the lowest approval ratings ever and a dithering White House whose approval ratings have plummeted with historic speed (Again, bare in mind that I am no Republican Party homer but an espouser of conservative ideals). And granted, some bureaucrats may desire to use the government for good, but consider the following example of government impotence even with good intentions. The percentage of poor people in this country is STILL the same as it was when the government declared war on poverty some forty years ago. Say what?

Conservatives simply understand that governments don't fix things; the people do. What government officials do is get elected and reelected on the promissory illusion of fixing things.

Obviously there are the necessaries like departments of transportation, the police, the military and the like, but outside providing for the "general welfare" of the people, the government just does not fix things. It makes things worse via its own expansion. In this time of economic decline and recession, the only sector that has grown is the public sector. Unfortunately their isn't one solitary government outfit or position that turns a profit, and you know what that means? We the people have to pay those salaries. Again, yes, it is absolutely necessary that tax dollars go to provide for the necessaries, but this nation will collapse on itself as the sector that doesn't produce continues to squeeze money out of the one that does. While I'm on that note, I'm increasingly enraged when I hear politicians say they're going to focus on creating jobs. THEY DON'T CREATE JOBS! The greatest impact they ever had on the job market was to lower taxes so that actual profit turning companies can grow their companies. That is it! (Note my astute use of italics to convey emotion.)

To sum up, conservatives send candidates to office to do less, to legislate as dictated in the constitution. Liberals send them to fix stuff. Fixing things is not a government forte but rather that of a free people. Even with all the corresponding ups and downs, successes and failures, it is a free, responsible, and accountable people that is the most successful.