Life in Ancient Troglopolis was hard. I remember it well. Like it was a hundred million years ago. You’d wake up in the morning, brush the leaves off you, regain consciousness, open your eyes, and find that your best friend has been eaten by a pack of coyotes. Right on the day of the most important match of the year. You get used to everything, except watching an important match alone. With whom could you discuss it now? With the coyotes? Who would bring beer and potato chips to the cave? As I say, life was tough. We idiots today are no longer like the idiots of yesteryear. I long for the Paleolithic midlife crisis. The troglodytes limited themselves to scurrying through the jungle in search of food, dead or alive. With huge, sharp spears they chased their prey. They hunted them, chopped them up, and then roasted them over the fire for a long time, because Japanese restaurants had not yet been invented, where the sole winks at you and wags its tail when served on your plate. But hunting and eating were not everything in those ancient times. Hominids also drank strange concoctions. Maybe that’s why they spent some time painting. It was unnecessary, yes, but they did it. Although it is true that in this aspect their advances were surpassed in a very short time, as soon as it became fashionable to give pots of finger paint to children in kindergartens. The latest studies confirm that primitive men spent a lot of time sleeping. Only those who have not spent a few days in the jungle with one of these isolated tribes for centuries can be surprised by this tendency towards horizontality. Prehistoric man had only two positions: horizontal and vertical. And the vertical is very risky when you live surrounded by two hundred idiots whose main hobby is throwing sharp spears fast and in every direction. The number of accidental deaths in Neolithic times far exceeded the number of accidental deaths in Neolithic times. Chilling fact. I know what I am talking about. The troglodytes had a short but intense life. They understood that the first gray hairs of their thirties are a good excuse to submit to old age. They assumed it without too much stress. Among other reasons, death was the norm in the Paleolithic. A living Neanderthal is always an exception. In fact, no anthropologist has yet managed to find living Neanderthals. This proves that their normal state is death. You would never have said it but cavemen were very narcissistic. Only that can explain why they wore colorful bird feathers on their heads. They hung the brightest rhinoceros teeth around their necks. And the troglodyte girls painted their faces with all kinds of filth, and tied the slenderest mammoth femurs to their heads. The boys howled like monkeys and the girls danced to the sound of loud drums that would make a one-armed drummer sound good. Not much has changed in that respect over the centuries. Enormously vain, prehistoric people never considered the possibility of doing sports. And, like us, they reached their forties with the strange feeling that the party was coming to an end. None of this led them to join a gym, to avoid fat in their food, or to weigh themselves to avoid being overweight. On the contrary, they hunted and ate more mammoths than ever, with the vast amounts of cholesterol that they must have had. You just had to see what they ate. I have a small mammoth at home and I can assure you that it feeds exclusively on butter and strawberry ice cream. And he has been dead since the quaternary era. Along with my generation, I am going through the late midlife crisis. Much less bearable than in the prehistoric era, because due to medical advances the life expectancy of man has been prolonged in an almost unconstitutional way. Perhaps this is why I am so surprised by the attitude of my friends. Most of them are rather troglodytic. And yet, a fever for health and wellness that has me worried pervades my surroundings. Everyone around me is joining gyms. Someone should remind them that they’re going to die anyway. They dress up in tracksuits! They go to the gym and get on a thing they call a treadmill, and it works just like those wheels they put hamsters on to show they are incapable of intelligent activity. Ignore the myths. The midlife crisis is nonsense, the first gray hairs, the big one is the forty-somethings. A couple of nights ago I met an old friend for dinner. Just turned 40. Brilliant professional career. He had just come from doing three hours on the exercise bike and was in a sorry state. Sore, stiff, and with dark bags under his eyes that were much bigger than mine; it’s hard to beat the dark bags under a journalist’s eyes. He said his skin glowed with health. But I would have said he was pale, perhaps dead. The conversation was brief. The properties of boiled apple peel came up several times. He called the waiter at the restaurant. He ordered still water and a salad. And then I swooned. Not so much because of the salad. But because he said it was to share. I think the West is crumbling. We idiots today are no longer like the idiots of yesteryear. I long for the Paleolithic midlife crisis. I urgently need a spear and a herd of mammoths full of cholesterol. READ MORE from Itxu Diaz: Trump Sets Foot on the Lord of the Flies Island and Brings Reality to the Wild Children Monday Begins a New Era for the West The post The Late Midlife Crisis appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

The machinations of the global elites attending the World Economic Forum’s annual conference in Davos this week epitomize what economist Friedrich Hayek called The Fatal Conceit. The conceit arises from overconfidence in one’s ability to plan the economy and other people’s lives. Free markets also preserve greater freedom and facilitate broader human flourishing than government planning does. This could be the mission statement of the Davos crowd. Afterall, they came up with plans for a “Great Reset” after the pandemic. And they market their conference as solving the world’s problems. The real problem, though, is that they can’t. Klaus Schwab, the architect of Davos elitism, was trained as an economist but he apparently failed to understand Hayek’s critical insights about the market economy. The main economic problem we face is not finding the “optimal” way of arranging resources, but rather of how to utilize the decentralized knowledge of time and place towards satisfying human desires and enabling people to accomplish their various goals. Much of the knowledge relevant for economic calculation cannot be aggregated or represented statistically. It is local knowledge. Central planning cannot work because a single authority cannot access all this important dispersed knowledge, which Hayek calls “fragmentary and contradictory.” We can only utilize this information by leaving “the man on the spot” free to make his own decisions. And those decisions, to be effective, must be able to adjust to myriad changes in the economy — changes that are conveniently (and perhaps miraculously) transmitted via prices. But for prices to convey knowledge of relative scarcity, they must be allowed to fluctuate. And people must have an incentive to respond. Profit and loss, then, are important signals and incentives along with prices. Free markets have a robust price system that creates incredible wealth in free societies with limited government, rule of law, and private property. Highly restricted societies don’t. Yet the plans of Davos elites involve placing ever more restrictions on how people can generate energy, what kinds of vehicles they can buy, what kinds of materials they can use to build, and even what they can eat. These elites claim to know what the world’s biggest problems are: limited resources, income and wealth inequality, destruction of the environment, climate change, etc. In the name of these broad, and often ambiguous, problems, they impose “solutions” on the rest of the world. Hayek would have roundly criticized them for stifling human ingenuity by imposing their own agenda and plans on everyone else. The calamitous impact on freedom and economic prosperity of Davos elitism is plain to see. European countries are home to many of the Davos elite and they have been much more influenced by these elites over the past few decades than the rest of the world has. And their economies have suffered as a result. Germany, France, and the United Kingdom have grown much more slowly than the U. S., whether you look at the past 15 years or the past 30. What about freedom? The European Union has moved closer to China in its policy on speech, as has the UK, and the internet. It’s no coincidence that there are no trillion-dollar companies based in Europe, or that their tech sector has been hamstrung by regulations. And farmers across Europe have been protesting rising energy prices and restrictions on fertilizer. Davos elitism has led to stagnating European living standards. Even more dangerous, Europe’s global influence has declined precipitously too. The Russia-Ukraine war has revealed Europe’s weakening position. So has China’s rapid dominance in the electric vehicle market and its growing geopolitical influence around the world. Rather than ceding global dominance to China, the political regime in the U. S. has accepted the challenge of geopolitical competition. It’s not surprising, then, that President Trump had some harsh words for the Davos elites’ agenda. Yet even Trump and his administration are not immune to the Fatal Conceit that so worried Hayek. Trump and his team think they can fine-tune tariff rates across thousands of goods and dozens of countries to favor U. S. industry. But the more “tailored” their tariff policy, the greater the odds of favoritism and manipulation; and the more trade officials substitute their own plans for those of millions of people in the market. This planning mindset differs little, philosophically, from Davos elites who think they know what renewable energy production or recycling rates should be. Tariffs distort market calculation, just as green energy subsidies and mandates do. Hayek advocated free markets not only for their efficiency, but for their ability to address complex and difficult problems with human ingenuity. Free markets also preserve greater freedom and facilitate broader human flourishing than government planning does. If Schwab and the Davos elites spent their time developing plans for deregulation and strengthening the rule of law, they would be worth supporting. They don’t, though, because they doubt the effectiveness of markets. What’s more, advancing deregulation and the rule of law will not increase their influence or get their “solutions” implemented. In fact, it would undercut their status as “elites” altogether. But as Hayek might say, “That’s the whole point.” READ MORE from Paul Mueller: The Children of Elites Are in Trouble The Real Climate Change Disaster The post A Better Alternative To the Davos Elites appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

For the first time since I joined the Marine Corps in 1969, I am ashamed of the organization. Until now, no Marine Corps commandant has been accused of lying to the American public. On January 15th of this year, General Eric Smith told a whopper. When asked by a group of reporters what the Corps’ position was, Smith answered unequivocally; “As far as DEI, the Marine Corps has not had DEI programs, never have.”  If General Smith does not willingly resign, he should be fired and replaced by one of the retired three star  generals who were forced to retire. That statement is a bare faced lie. Starting in 2021, the sitting commandant, General David Berger, slavishly complied with the guidance of the new Biden administration to embrace DEI as service doctrine. Berger went all in. In his human resources guidance called “Manpower 2030,” Berger created a vibrant program to implement DEI across the Corps. A Special Assistant for DEI was hired and an office established. General Smith was the assistant commandant at that time. When Smith became commandant, he did nothing to change Berger’s policies until President Trump made it clear that DEI was persona non grata in the federal government. Suddenly, all mention of DEI was scrubbed from the Marine Corps’ website. Presumably, the commandant’s DEI advisor is — or soon will be — unemployed along with his staff.  What amazes me is that Smith thought he could get away with his assertation that the program never existed. No one has ever accused Smith of being the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree, but the enormity of the lie is so blatant and the truth so transparent that his incompetence is staggering;  did he truly believe that deleting something from a website wipes it out completely? Smith Must Leave Marine Corps The general was obviously trying to save his skin in the inept attempt to erase history, but it will probably ensure his firing. The recently canned Commandant of the Coast Guard was fired for ineptitude, but at least she didn’t lie about her policies. Smith will likely be terminated both for incompetence and for knowingly making a false public statement. What the general should have said when queried by the press regarding DEI  is this: “In 2021 we complied with the Commander-in-Chief’s directive to implement DEI. The new president has reversed that guidance, and the Marine Corps will salute smartly and follow orders.” I am one of many retired Marines (as well as  many on active duty working covertly) to attempt to reverse former Commandant Berger’s Force Design and Manpower 2030 initiatives. The former is bad strategy the latter the latter is bad policy.  Our objections to Force Design were professional , but our distress with the way Smith handled the DEI situation is personal; he disgraced not only himself, but the Marine Corps as well. Once a reputation for integrity is lost, it is hard to get it back. If General Smith does not willingly resign, he should be fired and replaced by one of the retired three star  generals who were forced to retire for quietly opposing the Berger/Smith policies. Hopefully, in the next few weeks, Smith will learn the truism of an old saying. “To err is human and to forgive is divine, neither of which is Marine corps policy.” READ MORE from Gary Anderson: Sanctuary Cities Are in Insurrection New York and Cali Could Crumble Like Kabul and Damascus Gary Anderson is a retired Marine Corps Colonel. He served as a Special Advisor to the Deputy Secretary of Defense. The post Marine Corps Commandant Tells a Whopper appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

This is the eulogy delivered at a Sunrise Baptist Church memorial service on January 25, two weeks after Debbie Lott’s passing. Barrels of ink have been spilled contemplating what it means to have a good death. According to almost every measure, my mother Debbie Lott had a good death two weeks ago today. Many friends visited in her last days. Some traveled great distances to do so. She had one final Christmas dinner, surrounded by family. Her children and grandchildren rushed to her bedside. There is a saying: “Art is the fight against decay”…. I believe it to be true, and never truer than in this final flurry of expression. Mom made her exit holding the hand of her husband of over 50 years. She was at peace with all and professed to be ready to go if those dread cancers couldn’t be fought off. So, yes, she had a good death, but I’d rather focus here on her good life. I am going to quote at length from a remembrance written by her husband and my father, Pastor Bob Lott, one week after her passing. I will try very hard, and probably fail, to hold off the waterworks while doing so. She was 14 when they first met, Dad thinks, though maybe 15 as these things go. The Temple Baptist Church high school group from Portland, Oregon, was having “a waterskiing outing” at Lacamas Lake in nearby Clark County, Washington. Now, you have to understand one “rule” of this event to make sense of what came next. Everyone had to go into the lake. If they didn’t, a certain amount of hazing was allowed and even expected. Baptists take matters involving water very seriously. “I arrived a little late and noticed her. My reaction was, ‘Who is the new girl?’” Dad said. “She was beautiful. I didn’t make a very good impression that day. I ended up pushing her in the water and getting her clothes all wet. It wasn’t a great start.” Fortunately, things got better from there! “Over the next few years our relationship blossomed,” Dad said. “We became very good friends and had so much fun together. Debbie always made me laugh. She was kind, smart, artistic, and full of life.” He described another sort of blossoming, a spiritual one, that happened as well. “When Debbie was 16, she became a follower of Jesus and I also became a Christ follower at the age of 19. Both of our lives began to change. We started dating and were married in 1973,” Dad explained. One reason for that marriage was that he was set to move away to train for the ministry. She moved away with him. They traveled to St. Paul, Minnesota, “where I attended Bethel Seminary to become a pastor,” Dad said. Ministry continued to direct their travels after graduation. They served at churches in Tracy, California, Portland, Oregon, and Tacoma and Custer, Washington, where I speak to you today: The church at the bend in the road. They grew a small family along the way, with new children in California, Oregon, and Washington. “The Lord blessed us with three sons, four living grandchildren, and one woman who is like our daughter,” Dad said. You will hear from that “all-but-adopted daughter,” as the obituary printed in your booklets calls her, in a minute. And you will see why I asked if she wanted to deliver this eulogy instead. Cristina is a much better speaker than I will ever be. But back to Dad: “Debbie was the best wife, mother, and grandmother who was truly a gift to me and to everyone that knew her,” he judged. “She walked with Jesus and made a tremendous impact on hundreds of people,” many of whom are here today. Thank you for showing up to help honor Mom’s memory. If you can forgive a witticism on this heavy occasion, Yogi Berra said you should always go to other people’s funerals or they won’t go to yours. But I am delaying here, frankly because I don’t really want this next part to be true. “On January 11, Debbie passed away after a long bout with cancer,” Dad said. “She is now in heaven with the one that she followed her whole life, the Lord Jesus Christ. I miss her so much and loved her deeply. I will never forget the wonderful wife that the Lord gave to me.” Her second born son Andrew “Drew” Lott had these words to say about Mom: “My sweet momma passed away after battling cancer for a couple of years. She was a steadfast wife to my dad for 51 years, a loving mom, a joyful grandma, and a loyal friend. Most important, she was a faithful follower of Jesus who lived out her days with purpose. The more that I reflect on her life and impact, the more honored that I feel to be her son.” And her youngest, Christopher, had this to say: “Sleep well, Mom. Your love is everywhere.” I don’t have much to add to those statements other than general agreement, but I would like to take a moment to talk about her God-given talents. She had an eye for detail. You could see in her decorating sense and also in her art, if those are separate things. Have a look at this Christmas tree. Debbie Lott’s last painting. This was Mom’s final painting, made about a week, maybe a week and a half, before her passing at Alderwood Park Health & Rehabilitation in Bellingham. It’s not her best work but to me it’s a minor masterpiece. She was going blind. Her cancer ravaged body was shaking like crazy. She STILL did better than I would have. I shared this painting in a comic book group shortly after her death. Many commenters saw the art in it. One of them enthused, “I really like this a lot. Maybe not being able to paint with a steady hand forced this into an expressionistic design? It’s very beautiful. there’s a flurry of motion around the tree.” Another said, “I think it is beautiful. I feel it.” I feel it, too. If a fire were to consume my house tomorrow, I would be sure to get a few things away from the blaze: my children Sparrow and Augustine, my wife Angela, and this painting. I would save it at great cost because of what it says to me. There is a saying: “Art is the fight against decay.” The source of it has proved elusive, but I believe it to be true, and never truer than in this final flurry of expression. Mom’s body was failing. Her systems were shutting down left and right. That was obvious to everyone, including her. That didn’t stop her from creating something truly beautiful as one of her final gestures that I plan to keep and protect and to treasure. READ MORE from Jeremy Lott: When I Baptized Your Mother Of Elon Musk, Alex Jones, the Bible, and a Little Funeral The post The Good and Beautiful Debbie Lott, My Mom appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

The entire artificial, Leftist-propelled controversy over an arm gesture that Elon Musk made at the Inaugural Parade is one of the reasons why Democrats and their media sycophants lost in the last election. The American public just got tired of the persistent, one-sided, and double-standard Democratic gaslighting attempt to portray Trump and his supporters as Nazi-like fascists. Everyone knows who the real threat to democracy is, and it’s not Trump. At least half of voters recognized that this was a thinly veiled effort at getting voters to stop thinking about Trump’s political program. Indeed, the aim was to distract voters from the true reality that it was the Democrats, not Trump, who were the biggest threat to democracy. Apparently, the Left has learned nothing about its Hitler rhetoric. As Musk himself rightly commented in an X post: “Frankly, they need better dirty tricks. The ‘everyone is Hitler’ attack is sooo tired.” Musk at the Inaugural Parade twice threw his arm out from his heart (albeit palm down) in a gesture designed to convey that he was throwing out his heart to them in thanks for voting for Trump. The context makes this exceedingly obvious. He even followed up the gesture immediately with the words, “My heart goes out to you.” A Nazi salute does not start from the heart with one’s arm swinging horizontally. It is typically a straight down-up motion; and it is held, not waved around. But the Democrats and their media propagandists went berserk, claiming that Musk was doing a Nazi salute. PBS (please cut their funding), CNN, and other media outlets supported this conclusion. AOC went ballistic making the same claim. And then Libs of Tik Tok uncovered a video of AOC repeatedly stretching out her arm straight, which, applying the standards used against Musk, would also have to be interpreted as a Nazi salute. Indeed, her arm movement, which was more down-up than Elon’s, came in the context of militant rhetoric, unlike the context for Elon’s arm gesture that focused on love. Others have produced pictures of a straight-arm-forward gesture by Obama, Harris, Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Warren, Walz, and Taylor Swift. Yet the Dems and their media allies said nothing about these gestures because they were all made by Leftists. Babylon Bee did a nice spoof entitled, “Superman Under Fire After Hundreds of Images Surface of Him Giving Nazi Salute,” with a picture of Superman soaring upward with his stiff left arm straight out. Democrat Senator Chris Murphy absurdly asked UN ambassador nominee Elise Stefanik what she thought of Elon Musk “doing two ‘Heil, Hitler!’ salutes last night at the President’s televised rally.” Stefanik rightly refused to trade in the Democrat fake news. Murphy then claimed that white supremacists were construing Musk’s gesture as supporting their views. But these are at best tiny fringe elements that don’t hold office, unlike the antisemitic “Squad” of the Democratic Party. It’s the Left that dominates the media and academia that are saying: Don’t believe Musk’s disavowal. They are the ones perpetuating the deception for their own personal gain. They are the ones that want the tiny white supremacist fringe to embrace this deception. That’s their goal. Finally, the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil rights organization, weighed in, saying that Musk “made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute.” When you have no arguments, no evidence, pound the table and smear your opponents with vacuous claims. Their act is wearing thin. People know now that they are being gaslit. Let them keep it up until they are relegated to the dustbin of history. Everyone knows who the real threat to democracy is, and it’s not Trump. It’s the Party that promotes censorship of free speech and religion, the Party of the Cancel Culture, the people who won’t let conservatives speak at university campuses, the Party that seeks to cheat in elections through an illegal immigration scam, followed by eliminating all voter ID laws and a full amnesty bill. And they can do this by exploiting the Left’s disproportionate influence over the flow of information, including the media, the entertainment industry, the academy, K-12 schools, the search engines, and (till Elon) social media.  Only when these sources of unearned power are made responsive to the public can we say that our democracy is safe. READ MORE: Trump’s Executive Order Ends ‘Trans’ Tyranny and Protects Females Tuesday’s Final Tally: Only Trump and Cruz Are Left Robert A. J. Gagnon is Visiting Scholar at Wesley Biblical Seminary in Ridgeland, Miss., and has taught previously at Middlebury College, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, and Houston Christian University. He has degrees from Dartmouth College (B.A.), Harvard Divinity School  (M.T.S.), and Princeton Theological Seminary (Ph.D.). He has published a number of works, including The Bible and Homosexual Practice (Abingdon).   The post Stop the Gaslighting on Elon Musk’s Arm Gesture appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

The Los Angeles inferno continues, as new fires continue to break out even after entire neighborhoods have been ravaged and thousands of people have been displaced. Every day the case builds for reintroducing “a culture of responsibility” to California. Shmuel Klatzkin wrote of the once great city of Los Angeles, “No one took responsibility for the collapse of the culture of merit that had built the city. Instead, they celebrated that demise as a cultural triumph.” If there is a serious objection to private firefighting efforts, it is that focusing on saving particular homes might somehow interfere with saving entire neighborhoods. Today’s lack of serious, responsible leadership would have been unthinkable not only under Governor Ronald Reagan but also under the Democrat he beat, Governor Pat Brown, as well as the Democrat who succeeded him, Governor Jerry Brown. The infirmity at the political top contrasts dramatically with the determination, resolve, and courage of those actually deployed to save the city from flames. That is typical of those in emergency services — several members of my church are firefighters, as was one of my dearest friends for decades, whose family remains family to me even after his passing. Similar determination, resolve, and courage have been demonstrated by ad hoc and private actors who sought to fill the gaps left by California’s decrepit political leadership. Yet the latter has ignored, or worse, demonized those who helped save their own and other people’s homes. This attitude demonstrates a rot that runs far beyond the top. Many Californians seem angry when their neighbors prepare for their common disaster and thus avoid the all-too-predictable catastrophe. In many cases, nothing could have saved buildings consumed by the flames. The fires were too great, the winds were too high, the geography was too hostile, and the homes were too close. Nevertheless, one of the most striking images in some LA neighborhoods after the widespread fire was the spectacle of one or a handful of homes sitting undamaged among entire streets filled with ruins, in some cases that reflected the preparations of individual homeowners. There are strategies for making homes less vulnerable to fires. People can even install private fire hydrants or create systems relying on water from their pools or spas. Moreover, at least a few owners turned into ad hoc firefighters. For instance, The Daily Telegraph told the extraordinary story of an LA brain surgeon who sought to fireproof his home when he moved in 16 years ago. Alas, that wasn’t enough when the firestorm hit. So he prepared for battle and, with his son and neighbor, successfully defended their entire cul-de-sac. They were on station and at war for four days and five nights. Detailed the Telegraph: Chester Griffiths finished performing brain surgery, climbed into his car, and drove across Los Angeles to save his beachfront Malibu home from the wildfires raging around the city. It was a scenario the 62-year-old had been preparing for years: he had done the training, sourced the fire hoses, and briefed his son and next-door neighbor about the course of action. Now was the time to put it into practice. What followed was a daring mission that saw the three men confront the worst inferno in the city’s history to successfully protect six homes in their picturesque cul-de-sac, while houses around them crumbled into a mess of ash and rubble. They had some help. At times public firefighters were on hand to give them an assist. But they were mostly on their own, and the danger was real and continuous. The worst moment came around the middle of the week “when the fire barreled towards them from the west, engulfing two of their neighbors’ wooden homes and sending them up in flames within 20 minutes. First went the house two doors along from Dr. Griffiths on Topanga Beach Drive, as the inferno made eucalyptus trees explode. Then the next one went up ‘like a Roman candle’.” But they stood firm. That wasn’t easy: “The trio responded by jumping on nearby roofs, spraying the flames, and using dirt and sand to put out any fires on the ground. They got blown over several times, buckling under the power of the 80 mph gusts.” The video of their battle looks apocalyptic. However, they prevailed. Individual responsibility still exists in California, along with heroism. Also worthy has been the role of private firefighters. One need not be a hardcore anarchist to appreciate the role of private operations supplementing public departments. And the former was active in Los Angeles — only to receive substantial criticism for also acting to save homes. Indeed, as evidenced by Griffiths’ experience, in saving your home you might end up saving other ones. Wealth increases opportunity. As a result, life is unfair, as the late Jimmy Carter once declared. And that is evidently the case in Los Angeles. Some people spent lavishly to protect their property. Which apparently angered some observers (though perhaps not their neighbors). While the Left complains about greed, envy is by far the worst emotion. Greed can be satisfied by doing and producing more. In contrast, envy is more often satisfied by taking from. Hence an apparent preference that buildings burn publicly rather than be rescued privately. Again, The Daily Telegraph has the story: Los Angeles’s rich and famous are facing growing criticism for using private firefighters and personal fire hydrants to protect their homes against the deadly wildfires. Elites in the city, which has been burning for six days, have spent tens of thousands preparing for such an event, spraying their homes in fire-retardant gels, building water storage facilities and keeping for-hire fire professionals on speed dial. Companies who dispatch private firefighter crews told The Telegraph that the full packages to defend homes against wildfires cost at least $25,000 (£20,500) upwards — with an undisclosed top-tier fee for home visits during an emergency. A two-person crew with a small vehicle can cost $3,000 a day, while a larger crew of 20 firefighters in four fire trucks can go up to $10,000 a day. This is a lot of money. Nevertheless, it’s a good investment if it ends up saving your property from destruction. The Telegraph described how a firm sent water trucks to save a shopping complex owned by the former commissioner of the city Department of Water and Power after (public) fire hydrants were emptied: “Footage later showed how his expensive shops were left perfectly intact, almost the only structures in the area untouched by the flames.” He also relied on private firefighters to protect his home. The reaction: “Critics called his actions ‘totally dystopian,’ while others called for an investigation to see if he used any public resources to protect his businesses.” These people apparently would be happier if his real estate had burned down like everything else nearby. After all, they said, “it allows only the rich to buy their way out of a disaster, heightening class divides.” Indeed, seven years ago Kim Kardashian and Kanye West were similarly criticized for hiring firefighters to protect their mansion from wildfires, that is, “for using their wealth to buy what should be a public service.” Although the usual suspects focus on the role of private firefighters, how about the ad hoc warriors, such as the Griffiths squad? Isn’t it unfair that apparently only his cul-de-sac had three people ready and willing to fight the flames on their own. Shouldn’t they have accepted their fate rather than promoting class divisions? The argument is shockingly stupid but applies no less to people who hire private firefighters instead. Indeed, private firefighters only secondarily fight fires. To start, they typically help fireproof homes. They prefer to prevent fires, if possible. Only if necessary do they want to enter into fiery combat. Explained The Telegraph: “Their work starts long before the fire is lit. [All Risk Shield founder Joe] Torres, who is also an active California firefighter, said: ‘We assess properties, identify risk, what could be done, fit gutter guards, sprinkler systems, long-term fire retardants…. We’re like a one-stop shop for folks.” As danger approaches, they also help prepare existing systems and add extra weapons, such as sprinklers. Indeed, the biggest employers of private firefighters are insurance companies, which use enterprises like All Risk Shield to fireproof properties, thereby reducing the likelihood of having to cover a loss. Homeowners’ insurance policies commonly give discounts for homes located near hydrants or featuring fireproofing. Moreover, governments often hire private contractors, including during emergencies. If there is a serious objection to private firefighting efforts, it is that focusing on saving particular homes might somehow interfere with saving entire neighborhoods. However, in Los Angeles, no one has offered an example where that was the case. And it seems very unlikely to be the case in all but the most unusual circumstances. For instance, David Torgerson founded Wildfire Defense Systems, which works for insurance companies in high-risk areas. He called his activities “win-win” and said that in LA his company has people and equipment “on every street, at every fire.” Surely his private activism has resulted in a public good. He argued: “What we need to do is create neighborhoods that can survive wildfires passing through.” And when that fails, it is better to have private firefighters, whether professional or ad hoc, like Griffiths, than to allow the city to burn down. Let us give thanks to heroic firefighters irrespective of who they are and who they work for. READ MORE from Doug Bandow: South Korea’s President Commits Self-Immolation Neither Health Care Killer Nor Health Care System Is a Hero Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute.  He is a former special assistant to President Ronald Reagan and the author of several books, including Foreign Follies: America’s New Global Empire. The post Demonizing Heroic Private Firefighters appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

from ZeeeMedia: TRUTH LIVES on at https://sgtreport.tv/

from Sputnik News: Ukrainian soldiers are being turned into unwitting organ donors. How does this happen, where do their organs go, and what is the cost? Let’s investigate: Since the conflict escalated, Ukraine has become a haven for organ harvesters with the backing of Western partners, operating out of field surgery units near the front […]

Scientists have revealed new insights into the distant X-ray universe, with the Einstein Probe satellite offering fresh perspectives on the distant explosions in the cosmos.