New Places to Fail

--- by Micheal

Liberal materialism has never yet succeeded, yet this current administration is eager to find a new place for it to fail. State Departments spokesperson, Maria Haft, said that the solution to ISIS brutality is job opportunity. They are only evil, apparently, because they can't get good jobs. Seriously. She meant it.

This is just the newest version of the old liberal materialist philosophy.  This thinking believes that people are really only animals. If their physical needs are sufficiently satisfied, the animal will behave. People-animals do bad things because their needs are not being met. Hungry, sick, bored. Therefore, the thinking goes, if we can just supply their physical needs, they will be docile and well-behaved. They'll be good sheep.

Such thinking was behind the LBJ-era's "Great Society" programs. It lurks beneath almost every liberal program. Poor people commit crimes because they're poor (i.e. cold, hungry, bored). If the state were to house them, feed them and give them plenty of entertainment, they would be well-behaved sheep. There is no inherent evil in people, only unmet needs -- unfulfilled desires.

That's how the mind-set goes, but has it ever worked? Over the forty years of Great Society "investment" -- trillions of dollars spent to supply needs -- not much has improved. The "poor" in this country are far better off than they were fifty or sixty years ago: materially. They are vastly better off than most other people on earth. A "poor" American would be middle class in most third world nations.  Yet, life is no more peaceful than it was fifty years ago. In many ways, it's worse.

Once people internalize liberal materialism -- "I am nothing but an animal seeking to satisfy my desires" -- there is no lasting satisfaction. No matter how much the state gives people for free, they will expect more. In fact, they will riot and loot and kill to get more. Why not? They're just animals.

Now the State Department seeks to apply this failed mind-set to Islamic Extremists: ISIS. They only want to kill us because they don't have jobs. If they had steady "living wage" jobs doing menial things, enough to buy a big TV and some nice clothes, they wouldn't hate so much. They don't have money to get the things they desire, so they hate and kill -- in very animalistic ways.

Give them a guaranteed minimum income. Give them food subsidies. Give them free phones and free healthcare. (Free healthcare is expected to solve almost everything.) Give them free community college and work programs. Make sure they're entertained. Oh, and surprisingly, fix Global Warming, and they will be happy. If we just give the extremists a cushy life, they'll be good sheep.

The reason classic liberal materialism has always failed, is that its foundation is wrong. People are not simply animals with needs. (ala B.F. Skinner, et al.) Human beings have a spirit, a soul, and an innate tendency to choose evil instead of good. (The "fallen man" principle)  As proof of this, even well-fed, well-entertained people have committed terrible crimes. Lack of cushy was not their problem.

Evil does exist. It has since the Garden of Eden. People are not simply material creatures with urges, needs and desires. People are spiritual beings and as such, can (and do) choose to be evil. Pretending that evil people are simply underfed or under-entertained or under-employed is delusional.

A lack of jobs is not the problem with ISIS. A jobs program will do nothing other than look like this administration is doing something. It's a new place to fail.