Peace and Commerce with All

"Where goods do not cross borders, armies will." -Frederick Bastiat

"Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none..." -Thomas Jefferson

"Instability in trade is one of the prime causes of creating conditions that lead to war." -Ron Paul

How to Stop (or Start) Wars

It seems to me (and a lot of other smart people, see above quotes) that the way to remove war from our midst is to engage in the tradition of open and honest trade with all countries, especially countries that are potential powder kegs of war. The opposite is also true: if you want war, then disrupt trade, prevent the flow of goods across borders and soon armies will go off to the march.

Pope John Paul II championed that form of human relationship called "inter-dependence", where cooperation with one another gave definition to human actions. Interdependence is a mark of our human freedom and frailty: we need each other. Alasdair MacIntyre treated at length this notion of interdependence in his work "Dependent Rational Animals: Why Human Beings Need the Virtues". Interdependence means that we achieve maturity, flourishing and independence only through dependence on others.

Poetically, we can say "No man is an island." This truth of human independence and our inherent need for cooperation is written across every dimension of human existence.

Economically, the division of labor embodies our human interdependence, for no one is sufficient unto themselves to achieve prosperity. Philosophically, we can repeat Aristotle's axiom that "Man is a Social Animal" and it is our nature to be inherently ordered to good relationships with other social animals. Theologically, I believe it is caught up in the Scriptural understanding of the Trinity as God-as-Community-of-Persons and man, male and female, are made in the image of this divine communio personarum. In short, we need each other in order to achieve for ourselves any measure of personal independence and human flourishing.

The same is true when persons gather into communities or governments. As the world grows smaller, we see how each country is increasingly interrelated, interdependent, with one another. The more a nation is isolated from others, the more vulnerable they are to aggression from outside or towards acting aggressively to other nations. Thus, the key to warfare is isolation, to isolate your enemy in as many ways as you possibly can, especially in the court of public opinion.

Apply this to Iran. Right now we are increasing Iranian isolation by placing massive embargos upon their petroleum, not allowing them to ship crude oil to refineries and refusing to deal with anyone who shipped refined oil products to Iran. This effectively isolates the whole populace of Iran with an act of sheer aggression that is a precursor to war.

Rep. Ron Paul had the harshest of comments regarding these sanctions, saying "Sanctions are not diplomacy. They are a precursor to war and an embarrassment to a country that pays lip service to free trade. It is ironic that people who decry isolationism support actions like this."

What do you think is going to be the outcome of embargos and sanctions against a nation, cutting them off from open and honest trade with other nations? There can only be one outcome: the lesser power, now cut off, will begin lashing out violently, chaffing against the fetters that we put them in. The greater power will use these acts of violence as excuses for escalation of war, claiming "unjustified aggression" and demanding other nations support them in their "self-defense." Further entangling alliances are fostered as other nations are dragged deeper into conflict.

Our embargo declares that the US will not do business with any nation that does refined petroleum business with Iran. As the lone superpower in the world today, such an embargo brings the whole world to bare against a single nation, as virtually all of the world is entangled and helpless against this unipolar New World Order.

Just a few years ago during the Clinton presidency when there were sanctions against Iran, the then-former Defense Secretary under George H. W. Bush, who was the then-current CEO of Halliburton, Mr. Dick Cheney, complained against the US government sanctions, saying that they just wanted to engage in commerce with Iran. After Cheney becomes the Vice President with W. he sang an entirely different tune, championing war with the Islamic Republic and an increase to the sanctions.

Since that infamous speech of Bush's calling North Korea, Iran and Iraq the "Axis of Evil" the push to isolate those countries as far as possible was begun. In fact, Iraq was under a decade of sanctions int he 90's with embargoes from the US and the UN and North Korea is, arguably, the most isolated nation on the face of the earth. Coupling Iran with these other two nations was the rhetorical key to war with Iran. Calling them "Holocaust Deniers" and saying they want nukes to drive Israel into the sea, that's the nail in their coffin.

Iran has #2 largest supply of both oil and natural gas. It has great natural wealth, but with the inability to refine their own products, this great wealth is reduced to nothing. Instead of allowing such goods to flow freely across the borders of Iran with the rest of the world, these strategic sanctions will lead to the flood of war sweeping across the Persian nation.

Currently, Iran has no nuclear weapons and has no capacity to produce nuclear weapons (a shocker if you only get your news from FoxNews or CNN), but any reasonable person could see how acquiring nuclear weapons would be desirous of any nation in the position Iran is in, for the US treats nuclear powers in an utterly different way (more non-interventionist) than non-nuclear powers. Consider how the US lobs bombs into Yemen, an extreme Islamic country, but does nothing to our near-and-dear nuclear friend Pakistan, an extreme Islamic country and buddy to Al-Qaeda.

For sheer deterrence, rationally, Iran should be seeking nuclear weapons, if only to tone down the war-shouting rhetoric of American government leaders, talking heads, and the Pentagon. Obviously, no one wants Iran to have nuclear weapons, but if the world's only superpower insists on destroying your entire existence and that is the only way to stave off the onslaught, at least it is completely rational to want such weapons. Especially with freakish warhawks in the Israeli government who desire and actively seek Iran's demise who themselves are armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons.

The path to peace with Iran is the same with all nations: commerce. Money for oil is far better than blood for oil, I think we can all agree to that. Commerce establishes the interdependence of the nations. If one has a non-interventionist foreign policy, than commerce with all nations can occur without those entangling alliances causing massive uncooperation and isolationism.

Commerce makes me get along with you for my benefit, which benefits you. Mutual dependence allows each party to achieve greater flourishing. As individuals, true interdependence creates human flourishing and excellence. As nations, it creates prosperity as the division of labor is maximized over the globe, for the good of all nations.

Free trade and honest commerce is the path to world peace. But if you want war, you attack your enemy's ability to trade openly. Trade must be fostered with all nations and we must allow any nation, no matter how despicable the regime, to trade with others. Isolation conceives war.

Mother Theresa rightly said, "If you want peace, work for justice." This is especially true in our global village. If you want peace, work for honest and free trade. Then armies won't have to march across borders.

gomer

AMDG

Articles Linked Today

Here are some links to good articles.

1. The White Rose: A Lesson in Dissent.

This is the story of some kids, 21-27 years old, who defied Nazi Germany in the name of morality and humanity. They made the world more human and more fraternal, though they were killed by the Nazi "National Security Courts" of their time, the People's Court.

Favorite Quote:

Sophie Scholl shocked everyone in the courtroom when she remarked to [Judge] Freisler: "Somebody, after all, had to make a start. What we wrote and said is also believed by many others. They just don't dare to express themselves as we did." Later in the proceedings, she said to him: "You know the war is lost. Why don't you have the courage to face it?"

2. Israel's Amen Corner

Shows the involvement of Israel and the Israeli lobby, especially AIPAC, in US politics and foreign policy arrangements.

Favorite Quote:

Likewise, the conceptual theory of foreign policy, that traces the origin of a given government’s actions in the international arena to abstract ideas and official ideologies, is utter nonsense. This confuses the rationalization with the motivation. Ideals, noble and ignoble, are the masks behind which governments conceal their real goals, which can be boiled down to a single purpose: the maintenance and expansion of the ruling elite’s power on the home front.

3. Iran Sanctions are a Precursor to War. by Ron Paul

I think the title is 'nuff said.

Favorite Quote:

As bad as other regimes may be, it is up to their own people to deal with them so they can achieve true self-determination. When foreigners instigate regime change, the new government they institute is always perceived as serving the interest of the overthrowing country, not the people. Thus we take the blame for bad governance twice. Instead, we should stay out of their affairs altogether.

4. Joe Scarborough on War, keynote at CATO.org

Favorite Quote:

In 2010, there’s not much difference between the Republicans’ view on foreign policy and the Democrats’ view of foreign policy,” said Scarborough. “President Obama… this anti-war president, has doubled the number of troops to Afghanistan to nearly 100,000… and he’s continued the transformation of the Afghanistan effort from a counterterrorism mission to a nation-building mission.”

5. The Wars of Tribe and Faith, by Pat Buchanan

The anti-war old Rightist Pat Buchanan writes about the ethnonationalism of the Middle East. I find it fascinating how our ignorance of tribal and ethnic ties in the Middle East have now come back to haunt us as we impose democracy around the world (bombing people into freedom).

Favorite Quote:

In 2005, George W. Bush, then promoting global democracy as the answer to all of mankind’s ills and an essential precondition for any permanent security for the United States, demanded free elections in Egypt, Lebanon, and Palestine. The winners: the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Hamas [in Palestine]. A perplexed Bush refused to accept the results or recognize and talk to the winners.

6. Follow That Story! by Justin Raimondo

Justin Raimondo brings up two major stories with the Iraq invasion that were never followed up by the Justice Department or the mainstream media. He brings them up and refreshes us on the insidious details.

Favorite Quote:

Expecting Congress to investigate these brazen violations of law and US national security is almost as pointless as waiting for the US media to pursue the story – i.e., forget it, and down the Memory Hole it goes. Here at Antiwar.com, however, these stories are still alive, because that’s why we’re here – to debunk the lies and keep reminding you of who told them.

War Frenzy

Let us get a few things straight:

1. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 and never did. Saddam, though a tyrant in his own country, was not creating WMD's, was not shipping them to Syria, and was not brokering a deal with Al-Qaeda to give WMD's to them for us against the United States.

2. Iraq and their "aluminum tubes" were not making nuclear weapons, according to all of our intelligence agencies, as well as British and German intelligence agencies, and also the IAEA.

3. We went to war with Iraq on complete lies; and the most outrageous thing about it all is that we are using almost the exact same lies in order to go to war with Iran.

4. Tyranny is inherent to Imperial regimes. There is no freedom at home when there is aggressive expansion abroad. Wars abroad is usually cover or excuse for increasing both welfare and the police state at home, which we are watching unfold before our eyes today with Obamacare and the increased militarization of our police forces.

Iran does have a nuclear program, but that program is not even close to being able to make weapons, nor is it meant to. Weaponized uranium has to be highly enriched, 95% or more. Current configurations of their reactors at Natanz are not capable of enriching more than around 6%, which is perfectly fine for domestic nuclear power. For making nuclear medicine, which Iran seeks to do for their research programs, they must enrich to 20%. Just to get it to this level, they are having massive setbacks and complications that they cannot achieve it yet.

The United States is going through a massive recession and is facing a deadly and prolonged depression. Our manufacturing sector is hemorrhaging jobs, while household debt has climbed and personal savings plummeted. We as individuals or households, and as a nation, have no savings, huge debts, and don't have jobs to create real wealth. We are in a war with two countries, while preparing to go to war for no real reason with Iran. The Bushites told us the war would basically be free because of all the oil we would be getting, which are now going to China and others, mainly. We have increased security at home of our own citizens and are now talking about assassination of US citizens who are suspected of cooperation with terrorists! All the while increasing Medicare, Medicaid, and trying to pass Obamacare. So we cannot afford any of this, so our elected officials go ahead and approve all of it.

War frenzy is dangerous.

Those who refuse to participate in the 24 hour news cycle version of the Orwellian Two Minutes Hate against Arabs/Muslims are marginalized and isolated. Those who really want to put America first are ridiculed as isolationists on both the Left and the Right. One left-wing writer mocked Ron Paul's view of an America-first approach to foreign policy by saying he wants to reduce our military to the Coast Guard. He just wants to bring our troops home from places like Japan, Korea, Germany, Italy, etc. World War II and the Cold War are over. Bring them home and shut these bases down.

A big danger with war frenzy is the confusion between patriotism and state-worship. The government is composed of fallible, corruptible human persons and our US system is meant to be limited by each branch opposing each other, with the States opposing the federal government. With our two party system, however, it is not branches that oppose, or States that oppose, but just the theater of opposition between Democrats and Republicans. You are declared a terrorist sympathizer, as Liz Cheney and Kristol are calling the lawyers for suspected Al-Qaeda members locked up indefinitely in Gitmo. You are "on their side" or else you "want us to lose" if you oppose the outrageous and aggressive measures (not to mention illegal) the government has taken in pursuing war with supposed terror states.

Ad Hominem Human Persons

Persons are reduced propaganda, as being "for the enemy" and are opposed outright, not allowing rational debate to take place. Most anti-war people are asking for a debate, knowing the pro-war side (whether for war in Iran or pro-Iraq/Afghanistan) is the weakest. But such debates do not take place between pro- and anti-war groups; only between pro-war and really pro-war is discussion allowed to happen, so the results are always the same: more war.

The hippies of the 60's are the humanitarian warhawks of today. The warhawks of the 60's are Senators and Representatives today who approve of war budgets, defend torture and extraordinary rendition, and are owned by the billion dollar military-industrial complex. These are the people who, together, send our young men and women into battle 6,000 miles away for no real national security need.

When patriotism is replaced with state-worship, then those who oppose the state's actions are not just wrong, but are heretics, deviants, or sympathizers. This needs to stop.

Discourse, honest and open, needs to be returned to the American political system. Debate and argument needs to be the center of policy making again. Lack of criticism will destroy this country. Lack of argument will bleed her dry. All empires overextend themselves. The same will be true for America. There is no exceptionalism for that.

House Speeches against War

Everyone needs to get their hands on a copy of Ron Paul's "Foreign Policy of Freedom", which is a collection of his speeches while in office throughout his ten terms, all of which are on the subject of America's pro-war, anti-peace Imperialism against the original understanding of the Republic of the USA. They are both brilliant and passionate, and I have only read the first 100 pages!

There are a handful of things that Congressman Paul has illuminated my mind regarding the US imperialist position that I think important to bring up here.

First, it was through the Cold War proxy battles that the US finally ceased being a Republic (a decline, some argue, begun at the win by the North of the Civil War) and was officially an Empire. Once the power to go to war is vested in the authority of one man (president, prime minister, etc.), then you no longer have a Republic by definition.

Such a switch occurred through Truman's war in Korea, "The Forgotten War", in which 53, 000 American boys died for American presidential adventurism in the East. Following this we have the illegal (read: unconstitutional) wars of Vietnam, Panama, Lebanon, Grenada, Persian Gulf, Iraq, Afghanistan, and all the rest of those proxy wars fought by CIA trained and owned operatives in the Central and South America and in Asia.

Second, the introduction of Congressional "non-binding resolutions" is often the first step into unnecessary and illegal wars. Congress, while condemning some horrible tragedy, throws in a line or paragraph stating that the president should do "everything he can" to stem the tragedy from increasing, or some such thing. Remarkable, when you see Ron Paul speaking out against the non-binding resolution to condemn the Palestinian masacre by the Israelis, tossing in some comments about the president's roll to do anything he deems necessary till the conflict between Lebanon and Israel is over. This led to scores of Marines dying as the president committed our troops in irresponsible ways and got them killed. Placing our boys and girls in harms way between two warring factions is not a way to keep peace, but it is a sure-fire way to get a lot of good people killed.

What worries me most about this is that we just past such a non-binding resolution expressing our sorrow for the earthquake in Haiti, while throwing in the part at the end about committing US troops to the area indefinitely. Oh, and they found a lot of oil in Haiti recently...

Finally, and probably most misunderstood about Ron Paul's domestic and economic policies (fiscal and monetary) is just how much our spending at home and abroad leads to militarism and adventurism all over the world. You cannot talk about foreign policy without bringing up economic policy, even domestic spending, because of how much they are linked. This is the old "Welfare-warfare" problem.

This recently came up while I was listening to an episode on Anti-War Radio with Scott Horton. He was interviewing Robert Dreyfuss, of the Dreyfuss report, especially regarding his article entitled "Petraeus Gets It Wrong", when Robert called Ron Paul a "nut", doing so in regards to his desire "abolish the tax system". (Horton loves Ron Paul)

Consistently, Ron Paul brings up the fact that there is really only one thing that can sustain, at least for a while, warfare statism is an inflationary monetary policy fostered by the Federal Reserve. You cannot have the warfare state without subordinating the economy to serve federal interests, which involves socialist-style central planning and heavy taxation.

Do you really want to end the imperialism of the US, then you need precisely to attack the War Party's manipulation of the monetary policy of the country. You need to end the Fed. It is not an option. Jefferson did it. Jackson did it. Obama would never do it. He has demonstrated that he is not strong enough or cares enough to, because social welfare programs are just as dependent on the same tax structure and Fed irresponsibility and monetary manipulation as the warfare state.

The sad thing is Robert Dreyfuss continues in the interview as a borderline apologist for Obama, saying that he trying to turn our foreign policy around, but he is just doing it slower than he would want. He cannot or will not see that Obama is a part of the same Establishment Party that brought us all of the imperial wars of the past 60 years. Nothing changed. We still have the Patriot Act I & II under Obama. We still have a total lack of transparency. We still have Iraq going strong and now Afghanistan going stronger.

Ron Paul, sorry we did not vote for you.

gomer

AMDG

Follow Up on Social Contracts

In reflecting on my most recent post I have realized the need for clarification and further elucidation.

In rejecting the Hobbesian conception of man in a state of nature as the origin of the social contract, what I was not saying is that life was one big, happy family or that life was not nasty, brutish and short for the people. Pre-modern, especially pre-industrial, life was so burdensome on individuals that the great majority of humanity suffered under toilsome conditions, were reduced to begging, or simply perished. It was Capitalism, Ludwig von Mises observes, that enabled the great masses of men to rise above abject poverty through selling their labor to owners of productive capital. However, none of those men in poverty entered into a social contract in order to create civil society.

What I am arguing is that the abstraction, "man in the state of nature" is not an adequate understanding of the modern state, or of legitimizing governmental authority at all. Ultimately, governing authority originates in the natural condition of the human family with its own naturally ordained hierarchy.

Perpetual Tyranny
The turn to contractarian conceptions of the state is precisely the turn towards habitual tyranny, for the state is defined in its origins as that entity which exists as arbiter and enforcer over and against individual persons. In this contractarian worldview, the state can only be that which embodies the monopoly on violence.

If the state is granted, at its very origin, a monopoly on violent coercion, than how can we expect to restrain it? With a piece of paper called a constitution? Thomas E. Woods correctly asks if the government is the one who writes, enforces and interprets this constitution, what is ever going to stop it from assuming more and new powers? "Will the constitution grow fangs?!" (from his podcast lecture, Who Killed the Constitution?)

Moral Confusion and the State
What furthers the drive of the modern nation-state toward tyranny is the shipwreck of morality, the breakdown of moral understanding between competing ideologies. Alasdair MacIntyre sees in the Enlightenment Project a rejection of the teleological framework of morality (explicitly Aristotelianism) and the adoption of diverse systems of practical rationality, with their own justifications and first principles. Then these opposing systems of morality inevitably conflict in the public sphere, but holding to precise first principles that radically differ from one another, the conversation becomes argument becomes a yelling match, becomes an issue for the courts to ultimately decide moral issues.

That is why MacIntyre brilliantly observes that the lawyers are today's clergy, today's magisterium. In a society that has multiple conceptions of the Good, of rules, goods, evils, virtues and vices, there can be no rational argumentation where 2 parties can come to agreement. The disputes never resolve, save that by state intervention. The state becomes the arbiter of moral disputation through legislation.

Even holding that our contract-originated state is just meant to preserve life, liberty, and property I think that if we yield to such a justification, we have already lost the war for liberty in the long run. We loose from the beginning individual sovereignty over our lives, our liberty and our property. Why? Because once we conceive of the state as being the only thing that can guarantee those things, then we grant it the ability to take all of it away from us.

Personalism
If your first step is in the wrong direction, then you will never reach your destination. We cannot base a program of liberty on a thesis, even a moderated one (that is, Locke and not Hobbes), on a social contract that, a) is based on a fictional accounting of anthropology, b) conceives the state as super-arbiter over individuals, and c) is the only one with enforcement power.

I find it interesting to note that Catholic theological anthropology is both communitarian and individualist. This is, in a large way, the Church's evolving understanding of personalism- the identity, destiny, and dignity of the human person. In Vatican II, it was this personalism that characterizes much of Gaudium et Spes. I think that the Church's personalism is more than just a mitigated individualism or mitigated collectivism. Clearly, the person is not to be regarded as merely instrumental to the ends of the state. The state cannot violate the dignity of the human person, which is an expression of natural rights. The person is greater than the state, not just a part in a whole. However, the person ought to serve the common good, and acts of justice and charity are not option works for Christian living.

There is a lot more to be said, but I should wrap it up here.

Family as the Negation of Social Contract Theory

Introduction.

This post is simply on the social contract, made famous by philosophers like Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Renee Rousseau, and how the use of pre-historical man's "state of nature" narratives are false and inadequate for founding of a political order that is satisfactory to man. It is my belief that the family is the basis of all human society and that social contract theories of the State's authority are tried and found wanting.

Many influential Enlightenment thinkers on political science begin their social theories by constructing statements about pre-historical man, or man in a "state of nature". Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau all begin their justification of the State and its authority by creating an abstract account of man-without-government (what I sometimes term "pre-historical man") in order to bolster their social-contract theory of legitimizing governing authority.

Most (in)famous of these being the Leviathan of Hobbes, who viewed pre-historical man as both radically free and radically equal with his fellow man, resulting in a hostile, dog-eat-dog society. This is man in a "state of nature" that is, according to Hobbes, "a war of all against all." In order for man not to have a life that is "poor, nasty, brutish and short" the individual yields some of that freedom and equality to the Leviathan, the absolute State that, through awe of its power, coerces men to be civil towards one another.

The monopoly on violence is given over to the State so that its leaders may compel others to obey its laws and commands in order to ensure social cooperation and create civil society. For Hobbes, this is embodied in the absolute monarch. Locke envisioned a liberal monarchy, and Rousseau constructed republicanism and desired direct democracy as the perfect expression of the "general will" of society.

Man, in order to escape hostility and absolute aggression of all against all, surrenders the absolute sovereignty over himself and, in contract with other men, gives to society some of his own individual freedoms in exchange for security. This account, altogether fictional, of pre-historical, pre-social man is based upon a series of presuppositions that cannot be sustained.

False Radicalism.

For Hobbes to have his narrative of contractarian society to be sufficient, it relies on a false radicalism that can only be possible in abstract thought experiments and not through historical, biological or spiritual experiences. No man is brought into the world as a fully formed adult individual, cut off and isolated from other human persons, tossed into a completely hostile, alien and brutal world, able to rely only upon one's self and no other, being violent to others in order to maintain one's own freedom and equality with other men. For Hobbes, each man is radically equal with every other man in this "state of nature" who must engage in aggressive actions in order to protect his own person and property. All men are on equal playing fields, tossed into the gladiator arena whose only outcome is violence and death.

This abstracted and violent individual in a "war of all against all" is pure fiction and is invented in order to create the need for a social contract, for men to say to other men, "I yield to your authority over me (inequality) and of some of my freedoms to you, if you will create a society where we are not killing or being killed constantly."

Familial Society.

This is pure fiction because it ignores the physiological structure of human nature and human society. The first society is - and can only be - the family, of which there has never been a pre-historical time where a man was not subject to this condition of nature. To be conceived, born and raised in a family means that society itself, no matter how primitive, already exists. Families form cohesive units of mutual protection, security, bonds, expectations, rules, goods to be pursued and evils to be avoided.

The earliest political realities were not brought about by social contract, but through family, through nature. This is the only real "state of nature" that happened in human history and thus ought to be the only conceptual basis of human society that ought to be employed. The radical individual simply does not exist because, as nature intends, each person can only come to be through the action of other persons. It was the family structure, no matter how pre-historical one looks back, that forms the basis of political and social interaction.

Hobbes needs three radicalisms for his social contract to have a proper foundation: individualism, freedom and equality. His radicalization of anthropology, though, is not historically accurate. Even other animals are dependent on parents at some point. Human animals are more dependent on family units than any other animal. Not only is the human baby born more defenseless than most other mammals, but higher functions, like speech and reasoning, are formed only through social interactions made in those formative years of life.

Furthermore, within the human family there is no radical equality. The children are always beneath the adults, and this is so by nature. The family has authority (or headship) that is rooted in nature, not convention or contract. The human person, then, has never experienced radical equality with all other human persons. In fact, the earlier back in human history one goes, there seems to be inequality even among the children, as the firstborn male is considered the heir to the family and ranks higher in authority than his younger or female siblings.

An Individualist Social Contract.

A better, but still lacking, conception of social contract would be the individualism of Proudhon, who asserts that the contract is not between man and government, but between men; for such a contract does not yield an individual's sovereignty to others, but rather all men agree to refrain from aggression towards one another, maintaining one's own sovereignty over oneself and never attempting to be sovereign over others.

For many libertarians, this is akin to their principle of non-aggression, where no one- not even the State- ought to have the power to coerce or compel others. The same problem remains, for man is still conceived as radically free and equal, and the primitive world as one of aggression and hostility. The only difference being the individual stays his own sovereign. Now, this difference is huge in its implications for political thought (tending towards libertarian anarchism), but the foundations are the same and the same problems remain, I believe.

Conclusion.

We cannot base our political institutions upon philosophical systems that are fictional accounts of man in his "state of nature", with that state seen as normative for man and society. A hostile individualism fosters, for Hobbes, as well as for Locke, a social contract whereby man surrenders his own authority over himself- his autonomy and/or sovereignty- to others, and gives to an absolute monarch complete authority. This state of nature is anything but natural.

An historical and natural explanation of legitimate government authority lies in the physiological and social sphere of the human family. It is in the family that the human person receives love, education, duties, responsibilities, an identity to live and a role to perform. It is from this familial society that governmental authority originates. Families, households, clans and tribes are ruled by paternal authority, their legitimacy being derived initially from nature. If one is to found a political system based upon man in a state of nature, it had better be the right one!

Peace,

AMDG

image and likeness

The human animal is unique in all creation. As an animal, it is the only one that acts in regards to means and ends. Humans are able to choose, that is, to decide on its own power which ends it will progress towards and which means are right and proper to progress to those stated ends. A man or woman can freely form their lives within the context of their humanity, their lived human experience. The human being is thus a rational animal, and if he/she is rational, then also free. Therefore, for all Christians, human beings are the only creatures that God created for Himself.

God created man in His image, after His likeness. The likeness was lost in the Fall, but the image- though shattered- remained with man. Sure, our intellects were darkened, our wills weakened, and our sensitive appetites no longer have a clue what's good or bad, only what feels good or bad. We are in an internal state of disorder, disarray, disharmony. I agree with Chesterton's thoughts that the Fall and Original Sin is about as empirical as Catholic dogma gets. The evidence is all around us for the decay of reason, freedom and love. Hence the Incarnation, the need for a Savior who is Himself the "image of the invisible God", to restore to us the likeness that we all had lost in Adam.

Now we need to get a little metaphysical. According to Thomist doctrine, God could not create Being Itself, for that is the very essence of God: pure existence, "He Who Is." God's creative work would at the outset have to involve limiting existence into defined categories, for to define something is to give it limits, boundaries, and ends. God Himself is un-defined: in-fin-ite. He is without limits, but to create something else, there necessarily is inherent limitation, for one needs to be created by Another in order to exist. God - Being Itself- has no such need.

As we continue along our metaphysical path from God to creation, we realize that in creating, God was giving a share of His Being, His existence, to creatures. They would now have that high dignity of all existing things, whether spirit or inanimate objects, of participation in existence. God is existence, we have existence. To be is the first grace.

As God created, He limited, defined, His creation. He alone is Being Itself, so His creatures would always be less than the infinite. Instead of creating pure Being, God created angelic being, human being, plant being. The limitation allows for definition, for understanding. The essence of the creature was its defining characteristics. And it would be from whatever this limited expression of existence that all action would proceed. The Medievals had a phrase for just this concept: actio sequitur esse, action follows being.

In the form that God willed for humanity, our being would take shape in two seemingly opposed arenas, that of the spiritual realm and that of the purely natural. It would be in humanity that God would take animal and make it rational, free, spiritual. And this is the particular point that I would like to stress: no matter how you slice and dice human action or thought, you must always take into account both this spiritual and this corporeal dimensions within each human being.

When we turn to this image of God we see how the spiritual dimension of humanity is further reflective of the divine. Man is not meant to be alone, for God is a Trinity of Persons, perfect unity and community. This Divine Communion of Persons, as Pope John Paul II expressed so eloquently in his Theology of the Body homilies, is imprinted upon our being, causing us to desire the same level of unity and community in our own lives and in our world.

God is Lover, Beloved and the Love that unites them.

The human being, then, is a personal creature. Personhood falls upon such creatures that are capable of having an interior dimension, a spiritual life, that is essentially relational. Angels, men, women, and even God Himself are all caught in interpersonal relationships. Far from being a "mere individual", the human being is a person that seeks to be one with other persons, to have a real communion with others like him/her self.

If God is a Trinity, a Communion of Divine Persons, and we are made in the image and likeness of Him, then it is of no wonder why "it is not good that man should be alone." The crafting of our DNA, the form of our material bodies, the desires rooted in our souls and acted upon by our wills- all of this is taken up in the imago Dei.

So it is not just that human persons want to be free. We want to be united.