Shot In The Dark: Society

September 02, 2005

Society

My post yesterday about the guys in New Orleans who got together, armed themselves, and secured their neighborhood against looters raised the hackles of one of my semi-regular commenters, "Cleversponge".

Like many on the left, he is repulsed by the sight of citizens with guns and flags, doing what the government can't.

"And James, yes...I am pissed. I'm pissed that we have a 3rd world situation in the greatest nation on the planet."

I responded that the commenter had it completely backwards.

"First-world"ism - elected representative governments, the rule of law, a civil system of working out disagreements, a police force and judicial system that generally (yeah, exceptions exist, bla bla bla) works to enforce and adjudicate the rule of law, rather than the rule of men - isn't a normal condition of being. Throughout history, that is very much the exception. In most of the world, through most of history, chaos is kept in check by monarchs and dictators and force; in the most of the Third and the late Second worlds, it is a function of the strongest gang beating and killing their rivals; in America and an increasing portion of the world, it's through the will of society - a free association of equals - to band together and create a government based on the rule of law. And in the rest of the world, where those laws and rules can't be enforced through traditional means, it's done through the will of the *people* to stand up and say "this is where the wilderness ends". When their rulers allow them to.

And, as I noted in my comment, the left hates it when people do that. Noticing this was one of many things that led me away from the left in my early twenties; the idea that "if the police can't protect you, you shouldn't resist criminals", or "if the government falls to some extreme ideology, you should follow along like a good subject" nauseated me. They still do.

The left are trotting out the usual pejoraties to refer to the guys who, under the American flag, secured their homes and families and neighborhoods (even after allowing for the fact that the photo is posed - it's the idea of self-defense that seems to enrage them so). It's all I expect from them anymore - this notion that if government can't provide law and order, then we must accept lawlessness and disorder without question until government gets around to the job; if government can't protect your life, liberty and property, well, you probably don't need any of them all that badly, now, do you?

Bull.

Remember the LA Riots? When government and official "law and order" turned and fled from South Central LA, turning the city over to anarchy, lawlessness and - lest we forget - a boundless torrent of racial hate - the only islands of sanity in the riot zone were the homeowners and apartment-block-dwellers and Korean merchants who took out their rifles, and gave a show of force to the rioters and looters; the ones who said "Your madness stops here". The article tells the story of a Korean-American family defending one store after another had been looted and burned:

With their main warehouse looted and torched, the rest of the family moved to their second store near the corner of Second and Western streets to defend it. When police came by and spotted the armed Korean Americans on the roof of the structure, Billy Kim says the police initially tried to get them to come down.

“Fortunately the officer that was in charge of the task force that tried to get us off the roof was much more understanding [than the ones who had come to the warehouse],” he said. “We knew we had lost one store, and we were determined we would not lose a second store. When they told us to come down, we told them we had no intention of complying with their orders. We had lost too much already. The police left.”

Further in the article, Commander Paul Kim of the LAPD - the highest-ranking Asian on the force as the article was written, three years ago - confirms the (lefty) media's bias on the issue:

Like many other Korean American residents, Commander Kim feels the mainstream media unfairly characterized Korean American business people and residents as “gun-toting hotheads.”

“The mainstream media totally failed,” Kim stated. “They practiced prejudice. They practiced their professional trade poorly. They were being controlled by some preconceived ideas that they might have had about certain people. How many rioters did these Korean American shop owners shoot? There were none. It isn’t fair, but I don’t want to dwell on it. We have to start building on something positive for the future rather than arguing about something that happened in the past.”

I'm going to say it here, and say it clearly: the people in New Orleans who are defending law and order by legal and orderly means in their neighborhoods (and, posed photos for Limbaugh's website aside, it's happening in New Orleans today), like the Koreans who faced down the inflamed hordes who were baying for their loot and their blood in 1992, and like the freed slaves and former Union Army veterans in Galveston, Texas who stared down the Ku Klux Klan in 1867 over the barrels of their surplus Springfields, are some of the best Americans I know, and are - and should be regarded as - heroes.

Posted by Mitch at September 2, 2005 11:00 AM | TrackBack

Comments

When the rule of law fails it must be shamed by punishment. That's what it means to defend by force of arms. No law, no justice. Natural justice then must take over and always does, unfortunately, if however too late. The Koreans, without the protection of the law, were willing to punish the looters. Law? What law?

Jungle Law.

Posted by: Eracus at September 2, 2005 12:01 PM

Very good points, Mitch.

There is another angle to this New Orleans situation that needs discussion. Its the "The Blame Game". Blowhards like the UN-cleversponge have no actual idea on how this happened, but they want to make a monumental leap-of-faith and place blame.

Here's the deal:

As Mitch knows, I am an elected official. Emergency Preparedness Training is done by every city. EVERY city. You spend a number of hours, normally once per year, playing out scenerios. In a sterile enviroments. With electricity and communications.

No one could plan for what happened in New Orleans. NO ONE. I am a conservative Republican and I would LOVE to lay this at the feet of the all-Democrat New Orleans City Council/Mayor. I would LOVE to place the blame on the Democrat governor of Louisiana. Or some levy-maintenance organization.

Let's review what bad happened: The hurricane wiped out all electricity. It wiped out 99% of the bridges and roadways to get in OR out of the city. Then...the levies broke. Power service was unavailable to pump and backup supplies were overcome and destroyed by the water. New Orleans turned into an island.

Reports have come in about residents being passed by busses on the freeways and not stopping. The busses are full....what are they supposed to do?

Perhaps there is some criticism over not sending some relief to the freeway people. But anyone thinking that the looting in New Orleans was NOT going to happen are just kidding themselves. Not when you empty the jails before the hurricane.

As far as the elected officials go....here's what they do: Look at the damage and vote to spend money. That's it. The professionals are PAID to know what to do and organize the forces. You get updates, but you are really more observers than participants. The ONLY thing the elected officials should be doing is observing and asking questions to make sure things are progressing.

After hearing the mayor of New Orleans, I fear he has lost control to serve his people. Wild, hostile, borderline insane rants on radio stations are NOT what is needed. Calm leadership is.

But playing the Blame Game is nothing short of a disgusting political ploy to sling mud. It is beneath contempt at this time. And those who participate in this activity are worse than the looters and rapists who are taking advantage of the situation too.

Posted by: Dave at September 2, 2005 12:08 PM

Just one question.

For days and days, we watched on television a Category 5 hurricane develop, pummel south Florida, and then head straight for New Orleans. The comparisons were "bigger than Camille, worse than Andrew," and yet state and municipal officials, with their command, control and communications intact, delayed until Sunday issuing the order for mandatory evacuation ONE DAY before landfall and without committing the resources to enforce it.

If "the ONLY thing the elected officials should be doing is observing and asking questions to make sure things are progressing," what explains their delay in response to prompt, myriad and ubiquitous reports by the most accurate, most sophisticated advanced warning system on the planet?

Posted by: Eracus at September 2, 2005 03:03 PM

The key point is: "legal and orderly." Yup. A bunch of even putatively well-meaning vigilantes running around settling things would be bad. (Remember how the "Vigilance Committees" started -- and what became of them.) People defending their own homes, avoiding the use of force unless necessary, is a good thing.

And if they want to wave a flag or too, that's fine. Fine if they don't.

Just a thought experiment, for a moment -- who is going to be better off, a week, a month, a year from now? Those who had both the foresight and the resources to protect their families and homes, or those who didn't, and (and let's be fair: in most cases it was because they had no real choice) depended on the government to do that?

And look at the whole society -- is New Orleans and the country going to be better, or worse, if at least some small spots in the area were protected against riot, arson, and looting?

Posted by: Joel Rosenberg at September 2, 2005 05:04 PM

Damn! I didn't get a chance to read this before I made my reply to the previous post. Oh well, here it is:

http://monkeysponge.blogspot.com/2005/09/mitch-berg-everyone.html

Posted by: cleversponge at September 2, 2005 05:43 PM

This _is_ how Committees of Vigilance started. Where the rule of law had not yet come, or The Law had packed up and left, or became the evildoers, the good folk banded together to say "No". That some of the time some of them or their members without the consent of the Committee (that is, those supposedly in charge) went to far can be said of almost any organization, including The Law.

Posted by: htom at September 2, 2005 09:29 PM

Perhaps that's meant to be rhetorical, but it's a good question anyway. I'd like to see Mayor Nagin answer that question since he is first and foremost the person responsible for hurricane related preparation needs in that city. But he hasn't been asked because apparently everything's Bush's fault.

Posted by: Sav at September 3, 2005 12:05 AM

"The mayor called the order unprecedented and said anyone who could leave the city should...

Gov. Kathleen Blanco, standing beside the mayor at a news conference, said President Bush called and personally appealed for a mandatory evacuation for the low-lying city, which is prone to flooding."

8/28/2005, 10:48 a.m. CT
The Associated Press

http://www.nola.com/newsflash/louisiana/index.ssf?base/news-18/1125239940201382.xml&storylist=louisiana

Posted by: Eracus at September 3, 2005 12:34 AM

Posted by: Clark Boggart at May 3, 2006 05:59 PM

Hello! Very interesting and professional site. nokia6630

Posted by: Peter at July 1, 2006 07:39 AM