Medary.com

What is a Right? -- If you want to know what our problem is, this is it--the fundamental misconception on the part of otherwise fairly smart people on what a right really is. The simplest way to understand it is: A right to engage in a behavior occurs when that behavior does not require another person for you to engage in that behavior. If what you want to do requires somebody else to do something, it can't be a right, because you are dependent on somebody else to give that behavior to you. That is why being left alone is a right. You don't need anybody else to be left alone. Life is a right--you don't require another person to simply exist. Food, clothing, shelter are all rights only to the extent that you can obtain them without the intervention of another person.

When you must engage another person to obtain something, or to engage in a behavior, you have moved beyond the concept of a right, to the much more complex area of interpersonal behavior--which includes social interactions, economic transactions, and politics. But social interactions, economic transactions, and political actions are not--can not be rights. Rights precede all of those interpersonal transactions, and set limits upon them.

Rights are inherent to every individual, do not require another person's action in order to exercise, and set limits upon the behaviors that one individual may perform with or for--or impose upon--another individual.

The Panama Canal-Ft. Lauderdale to San Francisco-20-night Voyage, May 6-26, Regent Seven Seas Navigator

Text by Snookums, Pictures by Filbert

Part Seven

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May 12 (Wednesday, Day 8, Puerto Limon, Costa Rica, continued) -

Ant, in the wild

More after the jump . . .

The Panama Canal-Ft. Lauderdale to San Francisco-20-night Voyage, May 6-26, Regent Seven Seas Navigator

Text by Snookums, Pictures by Filbert

Part Six

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May 12 (Wednesday, Day 8, Puerto Limon, Costa Rica, continued) -

Butterfly in the hand . . .

More after the jump . . .

The Panama Canal-Ft. Lauderdale to San Francisco-20-night Voyage, May 6-26, Regent Seven Seas Navigator

Text by Snookums, Pictures by Filbert

Part Five

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May 11 (Tuesday, Day 7, At sea) -

Today was a slow day. Not much interested us on the schedule of activities. Filbert and Snookums were invited to the “Titanium, Platinum and Gold Members” Seven Seas Society gathering at 11:15 since we sailed at least 75 days and are Gold. 80 people were there and the ship has 500 guests on it. That’s a pretty high ratio of very frequent cruisers. We hobnobbed with various officers and Paul, the Cruise Director. Randy Cabral, the master of juggling and comedy, also gave a 5-minute performance for us so that was neat.. Snookums was hoping for some good food, like a light lunch, but had to settle for a dessert waffle bar with various sweet toppings. She actually didn’t have any but instead waited for lunch. Bill was part of the party, too, since he turned Gold on this cruise and was able to finagle an invitation to this event.

Snookums went to “Cardio Circuit” and managed to raise her heart rate a lot for 45 minutes and didn’t pass out. In the meantime, Filbert ate some bad seafood salad and paid the price later. (He didn’t go to dinner since he was sick but felt better immediately after ridding his body of the bad seafood salad.)

Mom, Dad and Snookums went to Randy Cabral’s juggling/comedy show after dinner and once again Mom had to use her inhaler since she laughed so much. Randy does some really stupid tricks and says some really stupid things but he’s hilarious.

May 12 (Wednesday, Day 8, Puerto Limon, Costa Rica; 510 Costa Rican colon to the dollar) -

A dreary start

We had an early shore excursion today. We met at 8 AM for a trip to Veragua Rainforest.

More after the jump . . .

Things have piled up over the past couple of days while we've been out playing. Here's some of the stuff:

Morning Bell: Can We Avoid Becoming Europe? -- You really need to read and understand the following paragraph before you continue to support Obama and the Democrat's century-old progressive New Deal agenda:

The Washington Post reported on its front page that the bailout of Greece was forcing “European governments [to] rewrite a post-World War II social contract that has been generous to workers and retirees but has become increasingly unaffordable for an aging population.” And a New York Times headline blared In Greek Debt Crisis, Some See Parallels to U.S. with David Leonhardt reporting: “The numbers on our federal debt are becoming frighteningly familiar. The debt is projected to equal 140 percent of gross domestic product within two decades. Add in the budget troubles of state governments, and the true shortfall grows even larger. Greece’s debt, by comparison, equals about 115 percent of its G.D.P. today.”

The New Deal never made economic sense. It was a huge, elaborate, complicated Ponzi scheme. The Great Society just added another layer to it. Now, all the Democrats in Washington are really doing is just putting a new coat of paint over the same wrong-headed, failed policies that they've been pushing since before the Woodrow Wilson Presidency. That's why Biden called it a "Big *censored*ing Deal" -- his words, not mine. It is an apt name for this final chapter in the "New Deal." The end is near for collectivist "progressivism." The question is: what will come next? Freedom? Or fascism with a "caring face?"

Pattern of Death -- . . . is what happens when you "empower individuals" and "promote tolerance of diversity" but simultaneously remove the individual's right and ability for self-defense, while at the same time encouraging---no---demanding that certain groups engage in protected outrageous behavior to address some hypothetical past grievance. That is a bad foundation for a civil society. You can be for tolerance, OR you can be for leveling the playing field/evening the score/redressing past wrongs/making things come out fairly for everyone/equality of outcome. You can't do both. Not possible. Human nature won't permit it. The two are utterly incompatible moral goals. Advocating "fairness" is the polar opposite of advocating "tolerance" because what you are tolerating is precisely the unfair distribution of human knowledge, ideas, ability, industry, and property.

"An armed society is a polite society" is a much firmer foundation for a civil and stable society. There is little terrorism in Switzerland, home of one of the most heavily armed populaces on Earth.

Time Is Not On ObamaCare's Side -- It won't get better. It will only get worse. More onerous. More expensive. More oppressive. Enjoy your dwindling freedom while it lasts. The 2010 election is your last chance to avoid the European Disease of "progressivism." If the Democrats are not decisively turned back in November, we will continue our descent from the extraordinary American Experiment with individual freedom and liberty into the cold, gray, drab world of common, stifling social democracy. Or worse.

Half of Russians believe bribery solves "problems" -- Watch for similar headlines in the next year or two from America, if the 2010 elections go badly for lovers of freedom. When power and money flow into the state, corruption is the natural and inevitable result. Corruption is why the third world remains The Third World. Corruption is why Russia will always be Russia. When bribery becomes commonplace, freedom cannot survive.

The Panama Canal-Ft. Lauderdale to San Francisco-20-night Voyage, May 6-26, Regent Seven Seas Navigator

Text by Snookums, Pictures by Filbert

Part Four

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May 10 (Monday, Day 6, Cartagena, Colombia, continued) -

The galleon

We had a second shore excursion booked for today so everyone rested up for it. Around 4:00 we boarded a Spanish galleon for a 2-hour cruise of the Bay of Cartagena.

More after the jump . . .

The Panama Canal-Ft. Lauderdale to San Francisco-20-night Voyage, May 6-26, Regent Seven Seas Navigator

Text by Snookums, Pictures by Filbert

Part Three

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May 9 (Sunday, Day 5, At sea) -

Aerobics room

Snookums attended “Body Sculpt” which consisted of 8 different stations where you lifted free weights or did push-ups or crunches for 3 minutes at a time. Amazingly enough, a 5-pound weight in each hand gets very heavy after you do a million reps of one exercise for 3 minutes! Filbert walked around the deck for 45 minutes and had a great workout fighting the wind for half of every lap.

More after the jump . . .

The Panama Canal-Ft. Lauderdale to San Francisco-20-night Voyage, May 6-26, Regent Seven Seas Navigator

Text by Snookums, Pictures by Filbert

Part Two

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May 8 (Saturday, Day 4, George Town, Cayman Islands) -

Snookums, Bill, Judy

Judy, Snookums, Filbert and Bill went on the snorkel excursion this morning. This was Bill’s first snorkel experience ever and the water could not have been any better. It was very smooth, very clear and very warm.

More after the jump . . .

NYT Tells Greece to Abandon Socialized Medicine?

Obama Works the Refs

The GOP's poor understanding of blogs

The Dark Side of Engagement with Governments

Halliburton: work on oil rig finished before blast

Federalization of Disasters Bankrupting FEMA

Animals Talk, Sing and Act Like Humans? Young Children's Reasoning About Biological World Is Influenced by Cultural Beliefs -- Personally, I think we think more like animals (well, mammals, anyway) than most scientists want to admit . . . of course, that's not what this article is about. Oh well . . .

while young urban children revealed a human-centered pattern of reasoning, the rural European-American and Native American children did not. Children's experience, including the extent of their day-to-day interactions with the natural world and their sensitivity to the belief systems of their communities, influences their reasoning about the natural world.

Cancer report energizes activists, not policy -- "But the report from the President's Cancer Panel on Thursday has underwhelmed most mainstream cancer experts and drawn only a puzzled response from the White House. Even members of Congress who usually are eager to show they are fighting to protect the public have been mostly silent."

Obama: Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength -- ""With iPods and iPads and Xboxes and PlayStations, -- none of which I know how to work -- information becomes a distraction, a diversion, a form of entertainment, rather than a tool of empowerment, rather than the means of emancipation," Obama said."

Worst President Ever? Or just the most ignorant?

Skepticism and Independence: Bad! -- "Why should a mother with an Ivy League MBA suppose that she is less capable of teaching her children arithmetic than a state-school graduate with a BS Ed.? (As a proud alumnus of Jacksonville State University, I don’t intend this as a put-down of state-school graduates.)"

And, oh, by the way, Jax State stole the 1985 Division II National Basketball Championship Game from South Dakota State. So, take that, McCain! Cheater!