Issues In Perspective with Dr. Jim Eckman

But the collapse of the twin towers and the Pentagon attack caused Washington to immediately reorganize itself around the presidency. President Bush like a laser focused on the struggle against terrorism. Almost at once, Bush persuaded Congress to approve a $40 billion recovery package that also strengthened security and intelligence gathering. An anti-terrorism bill that hugely increases the executive's power was also passed quickly.

Furthermore, while Republicans have historically called for power to be returned to the states and to individuals, the opposite is happening in the time of crisis. Opinion polls show a new appreciation for the once-demonized institutions such as the FBI and the CIA. About 1,000 people have been detained without much more than a whisper of dissent.

Is this positive? Alexander Hamilton, in "The Federalist Papers," the political documents that argued for the US Constitution's ratification, pointed out that war naturally increases the executive at the expense of the legislature. He explained why: "The direction of war most peculiarly demands those qualities which distinguish the exercise of power by a single hand." The commander in chief is the single voice in a political system that desperately needs one in a time of crisis.

In this time of crisis, the president has almost unprecedented power to shape the national agenda and direct the flow of information. The leak-happy days of the Clintons are over. Also, the memory of Viet Nam hangs over Washington. Another quagmire would surely lead Congress to make another attempt at reigning in presidential power. America cannot withdraw from the war on terrorism. It has no choice, and the consolidation of power and information right now is essential to that objective.

See The Economist (3 November 2001), p. 39.

For the last several decades, the various intellectual elites have been championing the cause of human overpopulation and its cause of so much human misery. Therefore, their goal was to stabilize the world's population and recent statistics demonstrate this goal has been reached. While the world's population is growing, it will peak the middle of this century and then decline indefinitely.

The result is that nearly half of the countries of the world, 83 in all, are no longer reproducing at a rate that will maintain their present population--what demographers call the "replacement level." Europe and Japan, for example, have such low birth rates that, absent unprecedented levels of immigration, they will lose significant amounts of their populations within this century.

What will be the result? Fewer births means fewer workers and lower productivity. It means an aging population, with fewer young people to take care of them and pay the taxes that support their retirement benefits. Further, it will likely threaten to disrupt political and social structures.

These potentially disastrous effects are the product of a worldview that sees children as a threat and a burden. This is really the view of "anti-natalism," which views pregnancy and childbirth as obstacles to material and social well-being. Progress, this view holds, is impossible with children, and women need to be set free from this burden. This is of course the view that energizes and empowers the abortion movement. Childbearing is what stands between a woman and her full potential. Because of this anti-natal movement, civilization is paying a price and one that we will all need to pay. It also once again demonstrates that worldview issues are critical to understand because the results can be devastating for civilization. Anti-natalism is one of those!

See "Breakpoint" (25 October 2001).