eroakirkosta.fi

Sunday, May 28, 2006

Helsingin Sanomien mielipidepalstalta:

Usko ei muuta mitään

Pastori Jouni Turtiainen haastoi Johannes Enrothin Blaise Pascalin "loogiseen" vetoon uskovan ja ateistin välisessä kiistassa (HS 20.5). Pascalin logiikka perustuu väittämään, että Jumalan olemassaolosta riippumatta häneen uskova ei voi menettää mitään, kun taas ateisti voi kuoltuaan menettää kaiken.
Turtiainen ei varmaankaan ole lukenut Luis Bunuelin omaelämäkertateosta Viimeinen henkäykseni.
Siinä Bunuel toteaa: "On samantekevää uskooko vai eikö usko. Jos minulle todistettaisiin vaikka tällä hetkellä Jumalan häikäisevä olemassaolo, se ei yhtään muuttaisi käyttäytymistäni."
Mistä sellainen moraali on kotoisin, joka perustuu rangaistuksen pelkoon tai palkkion toivoon?
-Jukka Tavi, filosofi


(in short, Christians say that by believing in God they have nothing to lose while atheists have everything to lose. The writer questions the Christian moral since it is based on a fear of punishment or on a hope of reward)

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Thursday, May 25, 2006

Estonia to set an example

Estonia has set an ambitious goal: to become one of the richest countries in the EU. And to accomplish that they intend to stay on the path of economic liberalism. Estonia is decreasing taxation annually and intends to lower its flat tax rate (now at 23%) to 12% by 2015. It's truly a great thing that the fresh markets from the former Soviet Bloc/Union are embracing the wicked ideas of "neoliberalism" of which the left warned these nations so many years ago. Luckily the left-wing idiotarians were ignored except in Belarus where the people are still enjoying the fruits of economic socialism.

"Who could have believed some 15 years ago that the most powerful free-market winds would now be blowing from the East instead of the other way around?" -Hans Labohm

More on Estonia's taxation:
-The Economist
-TCS Daily
-CATO
-MTV3
-BBC
-Free Europe

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Thursday, May 18, 2006

This Is Iran

Save Nazanin (Via little green footballs):
"This website was created to spread information about the 18-year old Iranian girl Nazanin Mahabad Fatehi, who has been sentenced to death by hanging. Nazanin`s "crime" was killing a man who ambushed and tried to rape her."

""In Iran... the minimum age for the death penalty is 15 years for males, and 9, yes nine years for females. Although there is no record of girls that young being executed, the fact that the law opens for this speaks clearly about what kind regime Iran is."

Left-wing hypocricy exposed:
"Remember all the attention the execution of Stanley Tookie Williams received all over the world. Does not Nazanin deserve 100 times that attention?"

Iran is not a legitimate state. The US, Israel, or any western democracy doesn't need a permission from any state or the UN to invade or bomb the Mullah regime. A criminal regime has no right to pursue weapons of mass destruction. In fact a Mullah regime that has not been elected by the people has no right to do any political decisions. Some western leaders were given a permission to build nukes to protect their citizens. Iran and other criminal regimes are seeking weapons of mass destruction to stay in power - not to protect their citizens. Laws like those of Iran's (Sharia) are the first to go when a country becomes democratic.

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Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Shush...

Paul Belien at The Brussels Journal has lately been given some hard time by lefties and multiculturalists. While I don't agree with Belien's utterly laughable religious rhetoric he still gets the point: "Europeans have foolishly replaced God by the State as the one on whom they rely to take care of all their needs from cradle to grave."

The case with Belien and The Brussels Journal is concerning. There was a racist shooting spree in Antwerp about a week ago where a skinhead killed two people and wounded one. Two of the victims were colored. Belien and The Brussels Journal were targeted: "Belgian journalists, lawyers and politicians (including Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt), say that I am responsible for creating the atmosphere of hatred that led to the massacre. Some people even demand that I be prosecuted."
How will things turn out this time? The Muhammad Cartoon controversy already hinted that Europe is willing to trade freedom of speech for multiculturalism and so-called tolerance. Anti-immigration individuals = bad, radical imams = tolerable.

Belien is hardly the only one who thinks that Europe is in deep trouble. Ayaan Hirsi Ali is leaving the continent to move to the United States to work for a Washington-based conservative think tank, The American Enterprise Institute. Talking about brain drain...

Sources:
-The Brussels Journal, 2, 3
-Hot Air (via Pikkupoika)

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Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Denmark to show the way?

When things started to go down at the beginning of the 90s Denmark treated the symptons by relaxing its strict employment protection laws. The new model worked and not just in Denmark. As I wrote some months ago economies with lax employment protection legislation have enjoyed a steady economical growth and witnessed a decrease in unemployment rates (lax employment protection is not, of course, the only significant factor contributing to a country's overall economic performance).
Latest developments within the EU suggest that neither German nor French economies are to see lax employment protection laws for a while. Their young workers will end up paying the price. The left is arguing that lax employment protection laws are wrong. To them, it seems, whether these laws work or not is irrelevant. This suggests that my idea, that all left-wing fanatics are just as bad moralists as right-wing Christians are, is correct.
The easiness of firing & hiring in Finland is somewhere between Denmark and Germany. Our situation is not as bad as that of Germany's but there's clearly room to take a step or two forward. It can be done and it should be done. Economies around the world show this but the public (and the wicked labor unions) is reluctant. However, the best employment protection is knowing that there are plenty of jobs available in case you become unemployed.

Some of our left-wing politicians do realize the benefits of the Danish model:

"Työministeri Tarja Filatov kannattaa Tanskan työllisyydenhoitomallin soveltamista Suomessa, kertoo Taloussanomat." -YLE

Since I hate browsing through OECD archives I decided to just scan this table from "Cowboy Capitalism". It's a bit old, from 1999, so keep in mind that it's not that accurate:

Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

More:
-Vapaasana

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Friday, May 05, 2006

The beginning of the end?

Moreover, income growth could fall further because over the next 25 years population ageing is among the most rapid in the OECD; the number of employed workers for each welfare benefit recipient, including those on unemployment benefit and all forms of pensions, could drop from 1.7 currently to about 1.0 by 2030, if current age-specific employment and benefit recipiency rates are maintained. -OECD


Keskipitkän aikavälin katsauksessaan OECD ennakoi Suomen kasvun hidastuvan voimakkaasti. OECD:n ekonomistit arvioivat, että muutos ikärakenteessa alkaa hidastaa kasvua huomattavasti vuodesta 2015 lähtien. -YLE


Sources:
-OECD Economic Survey of Finland 2006

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Monday, May 01, 2006

Vasemmistolainen roskajoukko mellakoi

MTV3, YLE.

Helsingissä ryhmä nuoria on yrittänyt VR:n makasiinien valtaamista. Kärhämä muuttui väkivaltaiseksi, kun osa nuorista kivitti paikalle tulleita poliiseja.

Poliisin mukaan nuorten motiivina oli globalisaation ja kaupallisuuden vastustaminen. Kyse on osittain samasta nuorisojoukosta, joka heitteli sunnuntaina mielenosoituksessa pulloja ja hajotti liikkeiden ikkunoita.
(YLE)

Kun palokunta yritti sammuttaa VR:n makasiineillä syttynyttä paloa, nuoret kävivät letkujen kimppuun.

Useita poliiseja on loukkaantunut lievästi nuorisojoukon rähinöinnissä VR:n makasiineilla Helsingissä.
(MTV3)


Ovatkohan nämä mellakat niitä Lohikosken lupaamia protesteja solidaarisen maailman puolesta?

Jos kaupallisuus, globalisaatio ja näiden aiheuttama yleisen elintason nousu ei kiinnosta, niin kehotan tätä roskajoukkoa vuokraamaan jonkun metsäpläntin ja siirtymään sinne. Voivat sinne sitten rakentaa jonkin Smurffi-yhteiskunnan.

Asiasta lisää @ Johannes Nieminen.

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