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More specifically, I have no esteem for belief in and of itself. I detest the recent habit of considering the act of belief as having a value in itself, independent of its content. And I mistrust those who attempt to discover connections between “believers,” even to lump them together, without asking themselves what they believe in. One can believe in flying saucers, after all! There were sincere Nazis and convinced Leninites. And the Carthaginian fathers who had their sons burned alive as a sacrifice to the god Moloch (the scene is narrated by Flaubert, but the facts are true) must have “believed in it” strongly. For me, a belief is as good as its object, neither more nor less.

Hayek: An Infinite Number of Good Things

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Last you heard, I was reading Novak’s Spirit of Democratic Capitalism, Bahnsen’s Homosexuality, and Woods, A Politically Incorrect Guide to American History. Presently I’m deep into the following:

1. Thomas Sowell, Marxism. I’m about halfway through this. Sowell here bypasses 20th century Communism and expounds and summarizes the actual thought of Marx and Engels – rather interesting, as it turns out to be quite different from later “Marxism,” although certainly flawed in its own right. (Sowell does not critique throughout; he leaves that to the end.) Interestingly, the result seems to be that the Western democracies really are becoming genuinely Marxist in many respects.
2. Thomas Sowell, Basic Economics. Yes, I’m reading two books by Sowell simultaneously. I’m roughly 65% of the way through this one, I think. It’s a very substantial hardcover textbook, but it’s not nearly as tough sledding as you might think. The examples are usually real historical ones, and the thorough use of statistics nonetheless doesn’t bog the book down. An absolute must if you want to understand how interference in the market ends up destroying wealth, not just for the few at the top, but for all.
3. Patrick Buchanan, Churchill, Hitler, and the Unnecessary War. I’m about three quarters through this fascinating (albeit sometimes repetitive) read. Without excusing Hitler whatsoever, Buchanan convincing shows how the Western nations, and Great Britain in particular stumbled into two wars devastating in effect – through bad judgment. If you regard Winston Churchill as a great upright statesman who saved the West, this book may well change your mind….

I’ve been sick for a week running, so not accomplishing much at the moment.

I am managing to get a little bit of reading in, though, so that’s nice. Here are the books I’m focusing on at present:

1. Michael Novak, The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism. I’m about 2/3 of the way through this one. Novak is a bit of a softcore capitalist, in the sense that he doesn’t seem to bat an eye regarding trade unions and quite a bit of other stuff. At any rate, some of his most valuable contributions have to do with his discussions regarding the nature of “self-interest.” Socialists translate “self-interest” in capitalism as “greed,” but Novak notes that for most people (at least in a society with social and moral bearings), “self-interest” is generally far more communitarian: concern for welfare of one’s family, for starters, and on into broader concerns for other various community circles such as church. Worthwhile.
2. Greg Bahnsen, Homosexuality: A Biblical View. I’m about halfway through this one. Like (1), this is a book I’ve owned for quite a while, but have never read before. I haven’t shared Bahnsen’s theonomic presuppositions for pretty much a decade, and some factors in his presentation are slightly off-putting, but there’s no question that he was able to reason clearly, and his handling of the biblical texts is solid. As expected from someone trained in apologetics, the argumentation is top notch. Someday I plan on working through Robert Gagnon’s definitive/comprehensive stuff, but this is a good brief intro to the subject.
3. Thomas Woods, The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History. This just arrived a couple days ago. Just started it last night and got about 1/3 of the way through – very engaging, well-written, and not difficult to read. Woods is a Catholic historian with a strong economics bent (or is it the other way around?); I’ve got a few other books on the way also written by him. This one is a fascinating plow-through of a number of events in American history that are widely misunderstood due to basic ignorance or misleadingly selective reportage of the past. A good debunker for those who don’t understand the nature of the American constitutional system, for those who think of Lincoln as a heroic president, and a whole lot more.

In the past week or so, I’ve also finally got to a couple of “classic” movies I’ve often seen raved about: Amadeus and The Phantom of the Opera.

I found the storytelling viewpoint of Amadeus to be intriguing, told as it is by one of Mozart’s rivals, but honestly the movie on the whole didn’t really feel all that “filling” for me. I really didn’t learn much about Mozart… I guess that wasn’t the point.

The Phantom… well, it is what it is. I enjoyed it well enough; the singing was superb, and the heroine isn’t hard to look at. It’s an odd story that can best be appreciated for things other than plot. I suppose that’s the nature of a musical.

All in all, I thought both movies were worth watching and I’ll likely view them again at some point, but neither come anywhere close to my favourites lists.