Added a few links to Friends' sites, one of which is my dahling girlfriend's. I've noticed that not many Blogger sites link to LiveJournal sites? Is this a cultural divide? Outward-focused "news of the world" bloggers vs. Inward-focused "today I am blah..." live-journalists?
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
Deaf "Culture" and Needless Issue Manufacturing
During one of my post-graduate education classes, I watched a film in which the issue of cochlear implants for deaf children was beat to death like a red-headed horse by a pack of ravenous Frenchmen. I wanted to be deaf by the time the movie was over, just so I wouldn't have to listen to it any longer.
Right on the Left Coast has this post on the crux of the work -- that "deaf culture" is valid and needs protecting. I'm personally of the opinion that parents have the final say in whether invasive surgery is to be performed on their children. If deaf parents have a deaf child, and don't wish to put in the implant, no one, I think, has the right to compel them to do so. But, as providing for the needs of deaf children in education is a requirement upon the state, the state will be able to come up with a "compelling interest" to sue for it in court. Look for continuing legal hullabaloos.
By the same token, a set of hearing parents who wish to give the gift of hearing to their deaf child should be able to do so without self-important "deaf activists" trying to "defend their culture." Let me be plain: I care not a whit about "deaf culture," whatever that might be. I'm not impressed with activists who want to refuse people the possibility of regaining one of the five senses merely so they can keep their numbers up. That impulse is no less tyrannical than that behind compelling surgery over the will of the parents.
To conclude: deafness is not so disabling as to require government intervention, and no disability "culture" has any say over the wishes of a mother and father to have their child be able to listen, speak, and enjoy music and theater. In all cases, let the parents decide, however they wish.
Can we all agree to that?
Right on the Left Coast has this post on the crux of the work -- that "deaf culture" is valid and needs protecting. I'm personally of the opinion that parents have the final say in whether invasive surgery is to be performed on their children. If deaf parents have a deaf child, and don't wish to put in the implant, no one, I think, has the right to compel them to do so. But, as providing for the needs of deaf children in education is a requirement upon the state, the state will be able to come up with a "compelling interest" to sue for it in court. Look for continuing legal hullabaloos.
By the same token, a set of hearing parents who wish to give the gift of hearing to their deaf child should be able to do so without self-important "deaf activists" trying to "defend their culture." Let me be plain: I care not a whit about "deaf culture," whatever that might be. I'm not impressed with activists who want to refuse people the possibility of regaining one of the five senses merely so they can keep their numbers up. That impulse is no less tyrannical than that behind compelling surgery over the will of the parents.
To conclude: deafness is not so disabling as to require government intervention, and no disability "culture" has any say over the wishes of a mother and father to have their child be able to listen, speak, and enjoy music and theater. In all cases, let the parents decide, however they wish.
Can we all agree to that?
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
Is the Pope Catholic?
Being so used to the phrase "Pope John Paul II" I admit that it will be a while before I get used to the sound of "Pope Benedict XVI." I had the same problem, as a boy of twelve, getting used to the sound of "Bush Administration" instead of "Reagan Administration". In 1989, Reagan was the only President I remember. As I was not yet two when John Paul II became Pope, he's the only pope I remember, though he was the third of my lifetime.
I will also freely admit to being a trifle surprised that the conclave elected Ratzinger. I was expecting them to go with the Nigerian, or one of the Latin American, cardinals (their names have escaped me). So, too, apparently did many of the press, who fairly frothed at the thought of the Church electing a younger, darker, liberal-er, dare-I-say-it sexier prelate. I can taste the disappointment in their copy: all that excitement, and waddya get? Another old white dude telling us we need to be holy. BOOOOORRRRRIIIIINNNNNGGGGG....
ABC calls Ratzinger a "hard-liner," as though his views on abortion, homosexuality, etc., (you know, all the important things) were somehow different from those of JPII. In fact, if anyone had been paying attention, they'd have known that all of the "popeful" cardinals had been appointed by John Paul, and all of them solid on doctrinal fidelity as that pope viewed it. So, Andrew Sullivan's histrionics aside, no Pope elected today was going to be opening the preisthood to women or repealing Humanae Vitae. The Doctrine is the doctrine, consecrated by time and usage, and it doesn't change just because people wish it. If you have a problem with your Pope viewing the doctrine that way, then I have a place for you to go.
UPDATE: I haven't even read Sullivan's display on Benedict XVI, but the degree to which he has become a figure of ridicule is astounding, given how many of us stopped by his blog first thing in the morning two years ago.
ONE THING MORE: My girlfriend is a pro-choice Lutheran who voted for Kerry (which has got to mean it's the real thing). When we discussed the new Pope's positions vis-a-vis abortion, homosexuality, contraception and whatnot, she said, "Well, I wouldn't expect the POPE to approve of those things..." If she gets it, how come so many Catholics can't?
I will also freely admit to being a trifle surprised that the conclave elected Ratzinger. I was expecting them to go with the Nigerian, or one of the Latin American, cardinals (their names have escaped me). So, too, apparently did many of the press, who fairly frothed at the thought of the Church electing a younger, darker, liberal-er, dare-I-say-it sexier prelate. I can taste the disappointment in their copy: all that excitement, and waddya get? Another old white dude telling us we need to be holy. BOOOOORRRRRIIIIINNNNNGGGGG....
ABC calls Ratzinger a "hard-liner," as though his views on abortion, homosexuality, etc., (you know, all the important things) were somehow different from those of JPII. In fact, if anyone had been paying attention, they'd have known that all of the "popeful" cardinals had been appointed by John Paul, and all of them solid on doctrinal fidelity as that pope viewed it. So, Andrew Sullivan's histrionics aside, no Pope elected today was going to be opening the preisthood to women or repealing Humanae Vitae. The Doctrine is the doctrine, consecrated by time and usage, and it doesn't change just because people wish it. If you have a problem with your Pope viewing the doctrine that way, then I have a place for you to go.
UPDATE: I haven't even read Sullivan's display on Benedict XVI, but the degree to which he has become a figure of ridicule is astounding, given how many of us stopped by his blog first thing in the morning two years ago.
ONE THING MORE: My girlfriend is a pro-choice Lutheran who voted for Kerry (which has got to mean it's the real thing). When we discussed the new Pope's positions vis-a-vis abortion, homosexuality, contraception and whatnot, she said, "Well, I wouldn't expect the POPE to approve of those things..." If she gets it, how come so many Catholics can't?
Monday, April 18, 2005
File Under "Toothless Moral Opposition"
I don't know that I completely accept the premise of this post at Catholic Light, that Gay Anglican bishops will of necessity be pro-abortion Anglican Bishops. As gays tend to be of the political left, that's generally an acceptable rule, but exceptions are not impossible.
What I am truly interested in is the logic that this particular Anglican Bishop, gay or no, uses to arrive at a pro-choice position:
Let us parse this:
The first part of this "Abortion is not just a matter between a woman and her body. This is not like removing a mole," suggests that a fetus posesses a moral worth greater than a mere appendage of the body. One could be forgiven for inferring that the fetus has a value intrinsic to itself. Human entities (and, being a fetus inside a human woman's body, we can only label this a human fetus) which possess intrinsic value are generally referred to as "persons", and, as a matter of law and habit, considered worthy of protection, by other humans, and by the law.
The second part "On the other hand, no one should interfere with a woman's right to choose," seems to say that no one may come between a woman and the choice she makes regarding what goes on inside her body. That which no one may interfere with, human beings have habitually termed "sacred." So, an abortion is a sacred matter concerning a woman and her body. Many will find that term inappropriate, but the speaker here is a Bishop of the Anglican church, and thus, for Anglicans, one empowered to speak as to which matters are sacred and which are not.
So the fetus is a person, deserving of protection, and abortion is a sacred matter involving no one but a woman and her body. Which is exactly the opposite of what the bishop said.
I may be rhetorically reaching, but it is to prove a point: is there anyone out there who actually believes that Bishop Robinson is in any way troubled by abortion? Does anyone believe he's actually spent a half-hour's reflection on the suffering inflicted on pre-neonates, and the physical and emotional damage done to the woman? In fairness, I don't know the man, and he could be sincere on the subject, but I doubt it.
And if he isn't, what does he bother stating anything that even sounds like a moral judgement against abortion? You know why: it's a rhetorical shibboleth, designed to soothe the other side's opposition into a go-along-to-get-along situation. But it goes nowhere towards teaching or persuading anyone to adopt the Anglican view of abortion as something impermissible for "birth control, family planning, sex selection, or any reason of mere convenience." In fact, judging from some of Bishop Robinson's later remarks (follow the link), I doubt very much he'd deem aborting a fetus because you wanted a girl instead of a boy a sin.
This kind of thinking runs parallel, to my mind, with the people who say they thought Saddam was a murderous bastard and they're glade the Iraqis are free, but detest the mechanism that brought that about. It's a child of "9/11 was awful, but..." It is a declaration of moral awareness hamstrung by a refusal to take the action that awareness demands, and therefore amounts to nothing more than an expression of aesthetics, not morality.
Now, any good leftist can point out where people of my camp to the same thing, but with different issues (poverty being the leadoff hitter, the death penalty perhaps batting cleanup). And I don't know that they'd be wrong to do so. And this is where alternative proposals are so important. There are ways of dealing with poverty other than the bureaucratic spawn of the dead command economies. But if abortion and terrorism and Saddam Hussein are such bad things, what do you plan on doing about them?
What I am truly interested in is the logic that this particular Anglican Bishop, gay or no, uses to arrive at a pro-choice position:
"Abortion," he said yesterday, is "not just a matter between a woman and her body. This is not like removing a mole. On the other hand, no one should interfere with a woman's right to choose."
Let us parse this:
The first part of this "Abortion is not just a matter between a woman and her body. This is not like removing a mole," suggests that a fetus posesses a moral worth greater than a mere appendage of the body. One could be forgiven for inferring that the fetus has a value intrinsic to itself. Human entities (and, being a fetus inside a human woman's body, we can only label this a human fetus) which possess intrinsic value are generally referred to as "persons", and, as a matter of law and habit, considered worthy of protection, by other humans, and by the law.
The second part "On the other hand, no one should interfere with a woman's right to choose," seems to say that no one may come between a woman and the choice she makes regarding what goes on inside her body. That which no one may interfere with, human beings have habitually termed "sacred." So, an abortion is a sacred matter concerning a woman and her body. Many will find that term inappropriate, but the speaker here is a Bishop of the Anglican church, and thus, for Anglicans, one empowered to speak as to which matters are sacred and which are not.
So the fetus is a person, deserving of protection, and abortion is a sacred matter involving no one but a woman and her body. Which is exactly the opposite of what the bishop said.
I may be rhetorically reaching, but it is to prove a point: is there anyone out there who actually believes that Bishop Robinson is in any way troubled by abortion? Does anyone believe he's actually spent a half-hour's reflection on the suffering inflicted on pre-neonates, and the physical and emotional damage done to the woman? In fairness, I don't know the man, and he could be sincere on the subject, but I doubt it.
And if he isn't, what does he bother stating anything that even sounds like a moral judgement against abortion? You know why: it's a rhetorical shibboleth, designed to soothe the other side's opposition into a go-along-to-get-along situation. But it goes nowhere towards teaching or persuading anyone to adopt the Anglican view of abortion as something impermissible for "birth control, family planning, sex selection, or any reason of mere convenience." In fact, judging from some of Bishop Robinson's later remarks (follow the link), I doubt very much he'd deem aborting a fetus because you wanted a girl instead of a boy a sin.
This kind of thinking runs parallel, to my mind, with the people who say they thought Saddam was a murderous bastard and they're glade the Iraqis are free, but detest the mechanism that brought that about. It's a child of "9/11 was awful, but..." It is a declaration of moral awareness hamstrung by a refusal to take the action that awareness demands, and therefore amounts to nothing more than an expression of aesthetics, not morality.
Now, any good leftist can point out where people of my camp to the same thing, but with different issues (poverty being the leadoff hitter, the death penalty perhaps batting cleanup). And I don't know that they'd be wrong to do so. And this is where alternative proposals are so important. There are ways of dealing with poverty other than the bureaucratic spawn of the dead command economies. But if abortion and terrorism and Saddam Hussein are such bad things, what do you plan on doing about them?
You asked for More Al Gore, and We're Giving to You. Hard.
Adiemantus has resurfaced, and, as always, he's worth reading.
The Swing and the Pendulum
Let's say, just for the sake of argument, that everything Rich Lowry is reporting in this piece for NRO is accurate, and let us accept the possibility that therapy is not all its cracked up to be. Many will oppose such out-of-hand as right-wing hack work, but let's work from it.
If it is true, than the argument of Signmund Freud--that all civilization is based upon repression--gets an corollary added to it: not only civilization but, to a degree, human happiness, is based upon repression. To pick our scabs and wallow in our pathologies slow our progress. Stoicism is necessary for survival.
But let us not damn in defending. If stoicism were to be universal, we would not have mouths. And let us not forget that it was the repressed Protestant persona that fathered the touchy-feely jargon-spewing therapy culture that thrives today.
If it is true, than the argument of Signmund Freud--that all civilization is based upon repression--gets an corollary added to it: not only civilization but, to a degree, human happiness, is based upon repression. To pick our scabs and wallow in our pathologies slow our progress. Stoicism is necessary for survival.
But let us not damn in defending. If stoicism were to be universal, we would not have mouths. And let us not forget that it was the repressed Protestant persona that fathered the touchy-feely jargon-spewing therapy culture that thrives today.
Friday, April 15, 2005
The 9 Types of Types
I've always been a fan of Matt Groening's cartoons, even though he's a polar opposite of my kind of politics. I remember the cartoon whose captions are linked here (Hat Tip: Vodkapundit), and I remember chuckling at them when I didn't have a girlfriend. But looking over the list now, I notice something:
Is it just me, or are the guys the effeminate ones here? And the women the dominating brutes?
There's Joe Sensitive, the Dreamer, and Flinchy, with only Bigfoot fulfilling the role of standard-issue caveman. Even the Sneak is oddly fey, sneaking around like a weasel rather than shouting "Bathe her, and bring her to my tent!" like a warrior. As for Old Man Grumpus, think "college professor", "senior editor," and "Dave Matthews fan."
Now look at the ladies. Out of Nine types, three are clearly Alpha-Females (Old Yeller, the Bosser, and Huffy), two are by-nature uncontrollable, (Wild Woman Out of Control, Woman From Mars), and two are the wilting kind (Sickly, Vaguely Dissatisfied). Ms. Nice Guy is clearly "One of the Boys" and any chick who gets into sports carries a degree of ambiguity gender-wise.
All anecdotal, of course. And it leads one to wonder about the kind of men (what, no Perpetual Jock? No Capitalist Captain? No Perpetual Geek?) and women (No Nun-in-Training? No Yammerbox? No Geekess?) Groening encounters. But when I consider the memes about the demasculation of modern society that flew around back in the 90's, and when I consider that underlining such an idea was likely the farthest thing from Groening's mind, I find the co-incidence fascinating.
Is it just me, or are the guys the effeminate ones here? And the women the dominating brutes?
There's Joe Sensitive, the Dreamer, and Flinchy, with only Bigfoot fulfilling the role of standard-issue caveman. Even the Sneak is oddly fey, sneaking around like a weasel rather than shouting "Bathe her, and bring her to my tent!" like a warrior. As for Old Man Grumpus, think "college professor", "senior editor," and "Dave Matthews fan."
Now look at the ladies. Out of Nine types, three are clearly Alpha-Females (Old Yeller, the Bosser, and Huffy), two are by-nature uncontrollable, (Wild Woman Out of Control, Woman From Mars), and two are the wilting kind (Sickly, Vaguely Dissatisfied). Ms. Nice Guy is clearly "One of the Boys" and any chick who gets into sports carries a degree of ambiguity gender-wise.
All anecdotal, of course. And it leads one to wonder about the kind of men (what, no Perpetual Jock? No Capitalist Captain? No Perpetual Geek?) and women (No Nun-in-Training? No Yammerbox? No Geekess?) Groening encounters. But when I consider the memes about the demasculation of modern society that flew around back in the 90's, and when I consider that underlining such an idea was likely the farthest thing from Groening's mind, I find the co-incidence fascinating.
The Four Things Civilization Needs
Boxing Alcibiades links to this heartening report of what's been going on in Tanzania since socialist Julius Nyerere stepped down as President in 1985. Rose-colored glasses, to be sure. But When P.J. O'Rourke toured Tanzania in the late 90's for his book Eat the Rich, he found a country that had "made nothing from everything," a deeply poor, albeit peaceful country. That the introduction of market economics is beginning to turn all that around, is both obvious and pleasantly surprising.
Property rights. Rule of Law. Suffrage. Universal Education. The basics, folks. Everything else is gravy, and like gravy, can mess up the arteries if you gorge on it.
Property rights. Rule of Law. Suffrage. Universal Education. The basics, folks. Everything else is gravy, and like gravy, can mess up the arteries if you gorge on it.
Tuesday, April 12, 2005
Thursday, April 07, 2005
The Remnant
John Derbyshire of National Review is not known for being the most optomistic man in the known universe. This is the man who famously declared that the U.S. was not going to go to war against Iraq, largely because he felt we lacked the cojones. There's more than a little of the doom-and-gloom-crochety-old-drunk-in-a-pub-for-whom-nothing-is-ever-right about him. We ought to take that into consideration.
Nonetheless, I think today he has a point. While everyone who isn't nailed down is crowding Rome to view the mortal remains of John Paul II (I'm waiting for the media backlash against the media overexposure to kick in), Derb is airing the dirty laundry, not of the Pope himself, but of the Church, and no, he doesn't mean anything having to do with priests, children, and K-Y Jelly. He means the gradual erosion of spirituality in the post-modern world, the "posthuman tsunami," as he puts it (I'm proposing a five-year moratorium on the use of the word "tsunami" as a metaphor. Any takers?).
For in spite of the fact that we all loved John Paul, we all hate going to Church nowadays. We all hate any doctrine (birth control, abortion, euthanasia, etc.) that gives us anything more thant momentary inconvenience. We have been trained by modern society to demand release from any pain unjustly caused us, and we have been trained by modern academia to find a way to blame the whole for any particular pain. Despite this saint's leadership, none of that has changed.
So we're doomed. Brave New World, here we come.
But I demur. John Paul II stood for freedom of religion, and freedom of religion is no small thing. As long as religion is not muzzled or censored by the state, religion can grow, and where religion can grow, religion will grow. Look at the Evangelicals in the United States, who are so successful in preaching their version of Christianity that they've made inroads in Latin America and even forced the coastal humanists in their own country to shudder at them. The mass of humanity may be willing to turn their brains into genome-mapped pleasure domes, but not everyone is. The religious impulse is harder to kill than anyone not acquainted with it will realize. Time Magazine proclaimed God dead in 1966, certain that religion would fade away. In 2005, the death of the Pope is the biggest news story of the year. Hardly seems like an end, does it?
But even if Derbyshire is right and worldwide church attendance dwindles to the 10% it likely is in infidel France, so what? Either that 10% is right about their being a transcendent God who promised that the gates of hell would never prevail, or they're wrong. If they're wrong, the Brave New World is no threat to anything, because the Brave New World will be right. If they're right...then they Brave New World is no threat to anything.
I am reminded of the path of the Jews in the Old Testament: raised from slaves to all-conquering zealouts to effete, polytheistic sacrificers to grist under the treads of the Assyrian and Babylonian Empires. When the Jews went away to Babylon, most of them, too, wallowed in the luxury of the Morning Star's Kingdom and forgot their God. But a handful, the Remnant, stayed true, and to them God promised return and restoration:
This would make John Paul II not John the Baptist, heralding the new age, but Josiah, the last good King of the Davidic dynasty, who labored mightily to restore the old-time religion, and largely failed, because the people had decided that the Mosaic Law was archaic and required re-interpretation in the light of their modern society. Of Josiah it was written: "Before Him there had been no king who turned to the Lord as he did, with his whole heart, his whole soul, and his whole strength, in accord with the law of Moses; nor could any after compare with him." Yet his kingdom was devoured by Babylon within a few generations, then reborn in such a way as would never allow it to bow to foreign gods again.
So if God will seek to punish the Catholic Church for the sins of its past (sins that John Paul II knew well), fear not. The remnant will see it's way through to the other side, and be there when the Brave New World is no longer new, and no longer brave, and surrenders as meekly as tyrants inevitably do.
Nonetheless, I think today he has a point. While everyone who isn't nailed down is crowding Rome to view the mortal remains of John Paul II (I'm waiting for the media backlash against the media overexposure to kick in), Derb is airing the dirty laundry, not of the Pope himself, but of the Church, and no, he doesn't mean anything having to do with priests, children, and K-Y Jelly. He means the gradual erosion of spirituality in the post-modern world, the "posthuman tsunami," as he puts it (I'm proposing a five-year moratorium on the use of the word "tsunami" as a metaphor. Any takers?).
For in spite of the fact that we all loved John Paul, we all hate going to Church nowadays. We all hate any doctrine (birth control, abortion, euthanasia, etc.) that gives us anything more thant momentary inconvenience. We have been trained by modern society to demand release from any pain unjustly caused us, and we have been trained by modern academia to find a way to blame the whole for any particular pain. Despite this saint's leadership, none of that has changed.
So we're doomed. Brave New World, here we come.
But I demur. John Paul II stood for freedom of religion, and freedom of religion is no small thing. As long as religion is not muzzled or censored by the state, religion can grow, and where religion can grow, religion will grow. Look at the Evangelicals in the United States, who are so successful in preaching their version of Christianity that they've made inroads in Latin America and even forced the coastal humanists in their own country to shudder at them. The mass of humanity may be willing to turn their brains into genome-mapped pleasure domes, but not everyone is. The religious impulse is harder to kill than anyone not acquainted with it will realize. Time Magazine proclaimed God dead in 1966, certain that religion would fade away. In 2005, the death of the Pope is the biggest news story of the year. Hardly seems like an end, does it?
But even if Derbyshire is right and worldwide church attendance dwindles to the 10% it likely is in infidel France, so what? Either that 10% is right about their being a transcendent God who promised that the gates of hell would never prevail, or they're wrong. If they're wrong, the Brave New World is no threat to anything, because the Brave New World will be right. If they're right...then they Brave New World is no threat to anything.
I am reminded of the path of the Jews in the Old Testament: raised from slaves to all-conquering zealouts to effete, polytheistic sacrificers to grist under the treads of the Assyrian and Babylonian Empires. When the Jews went away to Babylon, most of them, too, wallowed in the luxury of the Morning Star's Kingdom and forgot their God. But a handful, the Remnant, stayed true, and to them God promised return and restoration:
Cease your cries of mourning,
wipe the tears from your eyes
The sorrow you have sown shall have its reward,
says the Lord,
they shall return from the enemy's land.
There is hope for your future, says the Lord;
your sons shall return to their own borders.
Jeremiah 31:16-17
This would make John Paul II not John the Baptist, heralding the new age, but Josiah, the last good King of the Davidic dynasty, who labored mightily to restore the old-time religion, and largely failed, because the people had decided that the Mosaic Law was archaic and required re-interpretation in the light of their modern society. Of Josiah it was written: "Before Him there had been no king who turned to the Lord as he did, with his whole heart, his whole soul, and his whole strength, in accord with the law of Moses; nor could any after compare with him." Yet his kingdom was devoured by Babylon within a few generations, then reborn in such a way as would never allow it to bow to foreign gods again.
So if God will seek to punish the Catholic Church for the sins of its past (sins that John Paul II knew well), fear not. The remnant will see it's way through to the other side, and be there when the Brave New World is no longer new, and no longer brave, and surrenders as meekly as tyrants inevitably do.
Wednesday, April 06, 2005
Interesting Times
Is it me, or is this decade a lot more dramatic, and substantially so, than the last one? We got 9/11, the War, the Death of a Pope, the prospect of popular, pro-democracy, peaceful revolutions in corners of the world that are strangers to them, etc. What was going on at the mid-point of the 1990's? The Republican takeover of Congress? The Fall of HillaryCare? Yugoslavia's meltdown? All minor, parochial happenings, unless you happened to be caught up with them. Nothing worldwide, except for Aids.
I know all history is really a simultaneous sowing and reaping of the hearts of humanity, but it seems to me that this is a time of tectonic shifting, of places and possibilities moving in new ways.
The other possibility is that all this is but the aftershock of the collapse of the Soviet Empire, which fell so softly as to lead us to believe that we had escaped all consequences. Come to think of it, the U.S.S.R. did technically end in 1991, so I guess you can put that one in the 90's column. So maybe it was the late 90's, the "Roaring" part if you will, the era of Monica Lewinsky, that will be remembered as silly and without consequence. Hell, maybe after the 2006 elections and the (very) gradual petering out of the Iraq insurgency, the pace of history will entropy and we can settle back down to American Idol and swinging the Stock Market again, and the late 00's will be another little nap until China decides to go after Taiwan or Asian Bird Flu starts dropping people like flies, or (insert unforseen event here).
I don't know. You don't know. All we know is all we are...
I know all history is really a simultaneous sowing and reaping of the hearts of humanity, but it seems to me that this is a time of tectonic shifting, of places and possibilities moving in new ways.
The other possibility is that all this is but the aftershock of the collapse of the Soviet Empire, which fell so softly as to lead us to believe that we had escaped all consequences. Come to think of it, the U.S.S.R. did technically end in 1991, so I guess you can put that one in the 90's column. So maybe it was the late 90's, the "Roaring" part if you will, the era of Monica Lewinsky, that will be remembered as silly and without consequence. Hell, maybe after the 2006 elections and the (very) gradual petering out of the Iraq insurgency, the pace of history will entropy and we can settle back down to American Idol and swinging the Stock Market again, and the late 00's will be another little nap until China decides to go after Taiwan or Asian Bird Flu starts dropping people like flies, or (insert unforseen event here).
I don't know. You don't know. All we know is all we are...
Tuesday, April 05, 2005
Ill News
Peter Jennings has lung cancer. When I was a boy, my family watched ABC news exclusively, and so saw the news and Jennings told it to us every night. To this day, I can recall the timbre of his voice when he described the trading on wall street as "moderate". To many on my side of the aisle, Jennings is just another head of the MSM hydra, but he was always a dignified, gentlemanly, non-document-forging head. While I find the tone of his group mailing bizarre(switching from a gentle self-chiding as one who alternates from "cranky to really cranky" to a droned statistic about how many millions of Americans are "living with cancer"), I can't think of many who would want to speak ill of him.
Hopefully my compatriots in the blogosphere will not not prove me wrong. In the meantime, best wishes to him and his at this time.
Hopefully my compatriots in the blogosphere will not not prove me wrong. In the meantime, best wishes to him and his at this time.
The Great Debate
Volokh brings up the subject of whether a tomato is actually a fruit or a vegetable, and finds himself cutting through a mass of legal and botanical verbiage, and concludes that they are both. A logical conclusion, I suppose, but one which will not hold water. The placing of the seeds and the purpose of the bloom have nothing whatever to do with the average persons classification of fruits and vegetables.
The delineation is actually palate-related: fruits are sweet, vegetables are bitter or salty or starchy. Apples, oranges, banannas, pomegranates, grapes, strawberries, etc., are fruits. Beans, squash, potatoes, asparagus, etc. are vegetables. Tomatoes, which taste like the rotting interior of a gangrenous wound, are therefore vegetables.
I defy anyone to refute this distinction.
The delineation is actually palate-related: fruits are sweet, vegetables are bitter or salty or starchy. Apples, oranges, banannas, pomegranates, grapes, strawberries, etc., are fruits. Beans, squash, potatoes, asparagus, etc. are vegetables. Tomatoes, which taste like the rotting interior of a gangrenous wound, are therefore vegetables.
I defy anyone to refute this distinction.
I knew him when...
Boxing Alcibiades has gone crazy, filling himself up with bloglinks and posting all over creation. The Bastard's built himself up into a Flippery Fish while I'm still a Lowly Insect. I send little radiating beads of hate, cheer him on, and tell you to go check him out.
Monday, April 04, 2005
So, Anything happen over the break?
I pretty much absented myself from the Terry Schiavo hullabaloo, because I felt the matter better presented in other formats. John Leo aptly sums up what went on in case you just turned over the rock.
One thing I did notice about the a particular argument that people who were opposed to keeping Schiavo alive kept using. "The religious right is out of control," or some facsimile thereof, they'd say.
"Out of control."
Look, I can see getting annoyed at involving the federal government in a matter this private. And reasonable people will disagree as to the proper point to allow nature to take its course. But to say that the religious right is "out of control" for wanting to save Schiavo's life, such as it was, says a lot more about you than it says about religious conservatives.
We aren't talking about organizing a crusade or setting Jews on fire. We're talking about attempting to re-insert a feeding tube into a disabled woman. Maybe doing so is superfluous, maybe it's not even what Terry Schiavo would have wanted. But if you can't see and understand what motivated the right-to-life crowd, then you might consider if you argued for Schiavo's death for the reasons you thought you did. And if the only reason you wanted to see her die was because it would annoy Pat Robertson, then you are the bigger asshole.
One thing I did notice about the a particular argument that people who were opposed to keeping Schiavo alive kept using. "The religious right is out of control," or some facsimile thereof, they'd say.
"Out of control."
Look, I can see getting annoyed at involving the federal government in a matter this private. And reasonable people will disagree as to the proper point to allow nature to take its course. But to say that the religious right is "out of control" for wanting to save Schiavo's life, such as it was, says a lot more about you than it says about religious conservatives.
We aren't talking about organizing a crusade or setting Jews on fire. We're talking about attempting to re-insert a feeding tube into a disabled woman. Maybe doing so is superfluous, maybe it's not even what Terry Schiavo would have wanted. But if you can't see and understand what motivated the right-to-life crowd, then you might consider if you argued for Schiavo's death for the reasons you thought you did. And if the only reason you wanted to see her die was because it would annoy Pat Robertson, then you are the bigger asshole.
Wednesday, March 23, 2005
The Essayist #5: The Efficacy of Pain
This was started last week and left half-finished. It's somewhat circular, but I offer it anyway. Eugene Volokh, whose quote started the controversey, has since posted an update of ideas here, which is worth looking at. I hadn't intended it as part of the Terry Schiavo bonfire, but since that's on everyone's mind, I feel obligated to point out that when I hear people saying "Oh, the woman's suffered enough," I keep asking myself "Suffered enough for what?"
Could you accept executing a man like this, with a flogging before a non-gallows hanging?
What if you were told that he was a serial rapist and murderer who preyed on children?
Eugene Volokh, the blogger and law professor, has no problem with it:
Me, I'm not so sure. I've always found something disordered in the lethal injection table, because it's so bloodlessly clinical; execution made safe and clean, down to the last alcohol swab (a longtime foil of stand-up comics). Me for a hanging, public-style, where the crimes against the community are avenged before they eyes of the community. The soft transformation of existence to non-existence is what strikes me as truly creepy.
Yet at the same time, flogging before hanging just strikes me as gratuitous. To knowingly inflict pain, and to derive moral satisfaction therefrom, is a dangerous area to be getting into. If our purpose is to engage in a killing, let us engage in a killing, and be done with it. If our purpose is to inflict pain, then let us inflict pain, and then release. To inflict pain without the possibility of learning from pain is to de-humanize the victim, and to misunderstand the purpose of pain.
Pain having a purpose at all is an idea not much spoken of in modern America. We do not believe in pain. We believe in life, liberty and the pursuit of pain's opposite. This is noted among both sides of our political perspective: our liberals (aka "conservatives") believe pain is caused by excessive government; sweep that out of the way, liberals argue, and humanity will solve its own problems, with freedom and money. Our socialists (aka "liberals") believe that pain is an evil to be eradicated from every corner in which it might inhabit, except for pain caused to enemies of the people, which is deserved. Both groups rail against any discomfort, inconvenience, or hurdle standing in their way.
The liberal view is slightly preferable to the socialist, however naive it may be, because it holds pain as something to be transcended by the individual, not numbed away by the collective. The latter approach, sympathetic as anyone may be to it, runs counter to the Reality Principle: that everything which exists has a cause independent of it, a purpose it fulfills, however unpleasantly.
So what is the purpose of pain? You know what it is biologically: a signal of damage to the brain from the body, data that something has gone wrong. And like any piece of data, what matters is what you do about it. Some pain, like that coming from a cut, indicates that you should be more careful when you try to cut cheese. Should you do so, the pain will be avoided in the future. Other pain, like that you get in your muscles after exercise, tells you exactly what you wanted to hear: that you had a good workout. You'll want to repeat the experience as often as possible, until you have obtained the goal that you want. Thus the principle of gym: "No pain, no gain."
But outside that aerobic context, who want to hear that kind of talk? Who wants to be told that pain is a necessary evil, even a positive force in life? Who could even beging to see the positive aspects of pain except sadomasochists and people so buffered by money from the twists of fate that they'll never have to experience any pain they don't wish to?
I think this is an unacknowledged part of our political discourse. Liberals ("conservatives") can see that pain has a utility, albeit a negative one, and are willing to reserve to themselves the right and capacity to use it. Such folks tend to have a opinion of capital punishment, corporal punishment, the cruelties of the marketplace, and war that agrees to their use, given certain circumstances. Socialists ("liberals") hate war, hate the death penalty, hate spanking, and despise the invisible hand. Using these means to achieve any end, be it international security, local order, discipline among children, or wealth, is unacceptable to the leftist, because, in his mind, the means do not correspond to the ends.
War and spanking and the marketplace, and possibly the death penalty, cause suffering to those that do not deserve to suffer, for various reasons. Civilians killed in the crossfire of battle are certainly innocent, and the poor and unlucky businessmen are not just innocent but arguably wronged. Spanking just makes children resentful and quarrelsome, we are told, and the death penalty restores nothing to anyone.
Ignoring the merits of these arguments, we may see the core idea: to take action that may cause unjust suffering is wrong, to use suffering as a tool of civilization is idiotic at best and monstrous at worst. The notion is certainly consistent, and at first glance, well within the boundaries of Judeo-Christian tradition.
The problem with the argument is that pain and suffering, unquestionable physical realities though they be, are not absolutes. A child who gets soap in his eye is in agony unprecedented, a youth would scoff at such woes, but in the throes of unrequited love is suicidal, to the head-shaking amusement of more experienced men. All new pain is intense to the point of unbearability. Then the mind and body learn that it is not the end, and is thence able to withstand it.
Which brings us back to the wrongness of torturing someone and then killing them. Using pain to change behavior can be permissible, depending on the degree of damage done and the goal being pursued. Using pain to achieve pain, without offering possibility for behavioral change is simply indulging our appetites. There is much to be argued about regarding the efficacy of pain, where the lines should be laid, how to tell when you've crossed the line from reasonable firmness to abuse of power. But before we can have that conversation, we must accept the idea that pain has a purpose, and sometimes, it's the most effective way to communicate.
Could you accept executing a man like this, with a flogging before a non-gallows hanging?
What if you were told that he was a serial rapist and murderer who preyed on children?
Eugene Volokh, the blogger and law professor, has no problem with it:
I like civilization, but some forms of savagery deserve to be met not just with cold, bloodless justice but with the deliberate infliction of pain, with cruel vengeance rather than with supposed humaneness or squeamishness. I think it slights the burning injustice of the murders, and the pain of the families, to react in any other way.
Me, I'm not so sure. I've always found something disordered in the lethal injection table, because it's so bloodlessly clinical; execution made safe and clean, down to the last alcohol swab (a longtime foil of stand-up comics). Me for a hanging, public-style, where the crimes against the community are avenged before they eyes of the community. The soft transformation of existence to non-existence is what strikes me as truly creepy.
Yet at the same time, flogging before hanging just strikes me as gratuitous. To knowingly inflict pain, and to derive moral satisfaction therefrom, is a dangerous area to be getting into. If our purpose is to engage in a killing, let us engage in a killing, and be done with it. If our purpose is to inflict pain, then let us inflict pain, and then release. To inflict pain without the possibility of learning from pain is to de-humanize the victim, and to misunderstand the purpose of pain.
Pain having a purpose at all is an idea not much spoken of in modern America. We do not believe in pain. We believe in life, liberty and the pursuit of pain's opposite. This is noted among both sides of our political perspective: our liberals (aka "conservatives") believe pain is caused by excessive government; sweep that out of the way, liberals argue, and humanity will solve its own problems, with freedom and money. Our socialists (aka "liberals") believe that pain is an evil to be eradicated from every corner in which it might inhabit, except for pain caused to enemies of the people, which is deserved. Both groups rail against any discomfort, inconvenience, or hurdle standing in their way.
The liberal view is slightly preferable to the socialist, however naive it may be, because it holds pain as something to be transcended by the individual, not numbed away by the collective. The latter approach, sympathetic as anyone may be to it, runs counter to the Reality Principle: that everything which exists has a cause independent of it, a purpose it fulfills, however unpleasantly.
So what is the purpose of pain? You know what it is biologically: a signal of damage to the brain from the body, data that something has gone wrong. And like any piece of data, what matters is what you do about it. Some pain, like that coming from a cut, indicates that you should be more careful when you try to cut cheese. Should you do so, the pain will be avoided in the future. Other pain, like that you get in your muscles after exercise, tells you exactly what you wanted to hear: that you had a good workout. You'll want to repeat the experience as often as possible, until you have obtained the goal that you want. Thus the principle of gym: "No pain, no gain."
But outside that aerobic context, who want to hear that kind of talk? Who wants to be told that pain is a necessary evil, even a positive force in life? Who could even beging to see the positive aspects of pain except sadomasochists and people so buffered by money from the twists of fate that they'll never have to experience any pain they don't wish to?
I think this is an unacknowledged part of our political discourse. Liberals ("conservatives") can see that pain has a utility, albeit a negative one, and are willing to reserve to themselves the right and capacity to use it. Such folks tend to have a opinion of capital punishment, corporal punishment, the cruelties of the marketplace, and war that agrees to their use, given certain circumstances. Socialists ("liberals") hate war, hate the death penalty, hate spanking, and despise the invisible hand. Using these means to achieve any end, be it international security, local order, discipline among children, or wealth, is unacceptable to the leftist, because, in his mind, the means do not correspond to the ends.
War and spanking and the marketplace, and possibly the death penalty, cause suffering to those that do not deserve to suffer, for various reasons. Civilians killed in the crossfire of battle are certainly innocent, and the poor and unlucky businessmen are not just innocent but arguably wronged. Spanking just makes children resentful and quarrelsome, we are told, and the death penalty restores nothing to anyone.
Ignoring the merits of these arguments, we may see the core idea: to take action that may cause unjust suffering is wrong, to use suffering as a tool of civilization is idiotic at best and monstrous at worst. The notion is certainly consistent, and at first glance, well within the boundaries of Judeo-Christian tradition.
The problem with the argument is that pain and suffering, unquestionable physical realities though they be, are not absolutes. A child who gets soap in his eye is in agony unprecedented, a youth would scoff at such woes, but in the throes of unrequited love is suicidal, to the head-shaking amusement of more experienced men. All new pain is intense to the point of unbearability. Then the mind and body learn that it is not the end, and is thence able to withstand it.
Which brings us back to the wrongness of torturing someone and then killing them. Using pain to change behavior can be permissible, depending on the degree of damage done and the goal being pursued. Using pain to achieve pain, without offering possibility for behavioral change is simply indulging our appetites. There is much to be argued about regarding the efficacy of pain, where the lines should be laid, how to tell when you've crossed the line from reasonable firmness to abuse of power. But before we can have that conversation, we must accept the idea that pain has a purpose, and sometimes, it's the most effective way to communicate.
Annals of the Dead
Sorry I've been out of it. Six-Pack flu turned into a real cold from which I'm still recovering. I've got that Functional-but-wiped-out thing goin' on. I need some coffee to get me through until lunch.
Anyway, I found this Op-Chart in the New York Times covering statistics on the war dead interesting. The majority of war dead seem to be white men in their mid-20's with high school diplomas, and generally middle-class in origin.
Has anyone told Michael Moore? I'm sure he'll be pleased.
Anyway, I found this Op-Chart in the New York Times covering statistics on the war dead interesting. The majority of war dead seem to be white men in their mid-20's with high school diplomas, and generally middle-class in origin.
Has anyone told Michael Moore? I'm sure he'll be pleased.
Friday, March 18, 2005
Six-Pack Flu
I am beyond useless today...sweaty and vile. Stupid St. Patrick, with his mind-control beams making my drink like a fish last night. Next year I wear the tinfoil.
Monday, March 14, 2005
Glenn, Read your Email
Instapundit links to this post suggesting that any bankruptcy reform should "require credit card issuers and consumer lenders to prominently disclose information about (a) penalty rates and fees, and (b) the proportion of clients currently paying those fees."
Which if you read this space, you know to be already in the bill. Quoth the WaPo, from the day after the bill passed the Senate:
Either there is a massive disinformation campaign afoot, from one side or the other, or somebody isn't reading the bill (and for disinformation to be successful...).
Still no word from Instapundit. One of us is going to end up with egg on his face.
Which if you read this space, you know to be already in the bill. Quoth the WaPo, from the day after the bill passed the Senate:
Otherwise the bill remained essentially as it was introduced. It would require credit card companies to give customers more information on how much longer it will take to pay off their balances by making minimum payments, a requirement the industry fought but eventually agreed to.
Either there is a massive disinformation campaign afoot, from one side or the other, or somebody isn't reading the bill (and for disinformation to be successful...).
Still no word from Instapundit. One of us is going to end up with egg on his face.
Busy, Busy
Not much blogging today, unless the world turns chartreuse or the lion lies down with the lamb or something. Mayhaps tommorrow.
Sunday, March 13, 2005
More Music, Please
Here's a blog everyone who likes to listen to something other than the garbage the radio inflicts upon us should know: FluxBlog.
I'm puttin' em up permanent-like.
I'm puttin' em up permanent-like.
Saturday, March 12, 2005
The Tedium of Environmentalism
I wonder if gentlemen behind this environmental call-to-arms (Hat tip: Volokh) have ever read P.J. O'Rourke's All the Trouble In the World. I wonder if they could respond to it's arguments on Environmentalism as anything other than "a more entertaining version of the propaganda generated by the half-dozen market-loving Beltway think tanks listed in O'Rourke's acknowledgments," as Booklist does. I also wonder if anyone can actually get past more than a couple of paragraphs of this screed without their brain starting to cramp up. I sure couldn't.
Friday, March 11, 2005
Just who IS Gen-X, Anyway?
Here's a "30-Something" who calls herself Gen-X and writes a blog all about nostalgia for the 80's. Now I'm "20-something" (still), and I never even heard of Roxy Music. For me, 80's nostalgia means Transformers and the kind of fashion that the chick in Napoleon Dynamite wears.
Of course I'm Happy to see you, waddya think? GOSH!
All of which begs the question: if generations are defined by shared cultural touchstones, and people who are born at different ends of generations have different remembrances, then how valid can the determination of a "generation" be?
Of course I'm Happy to see you, waddya think? GOSH!
All of which begs the question: if generations are defined by shared cultural touchstones, and people who are born at different ends of generations have different remembrances, then how valid can the determination of a "generation" be?
Bankruptcy...All My Money's Run Away with Me...
The new hullabaloo in blog-land over the bankrupcy bill that just passed the Senate seems to me like much ado about nothing. The Washinton Post article I just linked lists three main provisions of the bill:
1. Requires credit cards to inform customers of how long it will take to pay off their balances by paying the minimum. The seemingly all-powerful credit industry fought this, to no avail.
2. Allows judges to further penalize the compensation of CEO's of bankrupting corporations. Other industry groups also fought this one, and ended up having to eat it, anyway.
3. Requires some borrowers to file under Chapter 13, rather than Chapter 7 bankruptcy, thus requiring them to actually pay off a portion of the debt owed.
I can feel the fury building up in you even now. Why, those BASTARDS!! To actually expect that some of the money they lend be returned to them! Why it's so horrific, we almost dare not speak its name! In fact, the blogosphere largely hasn't spoken its name, because this is the first analysis of the provisions of the bill I've actually read. And in the WaPo, no less. Admittedly, I've only looked in a few places. But Instapundit has only been denouncing the bill in general, not in specific, this guy is likewise more against the credit card industry than, it seems, the bill itself.
I'm not arguing from a position of screw-the-little-proles, either. I've been up to my eyeballs in C.C. debt, on more than one occasion. I am not, however, about to blame the C.C companies for that. The mere fact of offering "pre-approved" credit does not compell anyone to a) accept the offer, b) use the credit, or c) incompetently arrange one's budget so that it may not be paid off. In a free society, we freely enter contracts and are responsible for fulfilling them. I don't have a problem with people becoming more aware of that.
I've sent an email to Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit, asking him to explain his position more fully. I hope to hear from him soon. If not, well...there's no contract, is there...?
UPDATE: No word from Glenn. But Eugene Volokh responded to my geek eruption regarding this post with aplomb, which suggests that I might consider getting out more.
1. Requires credit cards to inform customers of how long it will take to pay off their balances by paying the minimum. The seemingly all-powerful credit industry fought this, to no avail.
2. Allows judges to further penalize the compensation of CEO's of bankrupting corporations. Other industry groups also fought this one, and ended up having to eat it, anyway.
3. Requires some borrowers to file under Chapter 13, rather than Chapter 7 bankruptcy, thus requiring them to actually pay off a portion of the debt owed.
I can feel the fury building up in you even now. Why, those BASTARDS!! To actually expect that some of the money they lend be returned to them! Why it's so horrific, we almost dare not speak its name! In fact, the blogosphere largely hasn't spoken its name, because this is the first analysis of the provisions of the bill I've actually read. And in the WaPo, no less. Admittedly, I've only looked in a few places. But Instapundit has only been denouncing the bill in general, not in specific, this guy is likewise more against the credit card industry than, it seems, the bill itself.
I'm not arguing from a position of screw-the-little-proles, either. I've been up to my eyeballs in C.C. debt, on more than one occasion. I am not, however, about to blame the C.C companies for that. The mere fact of offering "pre-approved" credit does not compell anyone to a) accept the offer, b) use the credit, or c) incompetently arrange one's budget so that it may not be paid off. In a free society, we freely enter contracts and are responsible for fulfilling them. I don't have a problem with people becoming more aware of that.
I've sent an email to Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit, asking him to explain his position more fully. I hope to hear from him soon. If not, well...there's no contract, is there...?
UPDATE: No word from Glenn. But Eugene Volokh responded to my geek eruption regarding this post with aplomb, which suggests that I might consider getting out more.
Thursday, March 10, 2005
Blah
Blah blah blah blah, blah
Blah blah blahblahblah, blah-blah
Blah blah blah, blah BLAH
I need to get out of this place before my will to live strangles me. Be back tommorrow.
Blah blah blahblahblah, blah-blah
Blah blah blah, blah BLAH
I need to get out of this place before my will to live strangles me. Be back tommorrow.
Wednesday, March 09, 2005
This is Brilliant.
Here's a teacher who's found a creative solution to macro and micro-economic problems. I do something similar: I charge knuckleheads who don't bring their book to class between a quarter and a dollar to use the extra copies I keep in the classroom. It's a handy source of lunch money some days.
Creative Destruction = Hooey.
Instapundit's posting of a reader's email invites a storm of correction on Hindu theology and the principle of "creative destruction." I've never accepted that term as being anything other than sophistry and self-justification. Sure, some destruction can get things out of the way for creation of better things, but the creation still comes after the destruction, and is not a guarunteed thing. The one is not the other.
Everybody who wants to destroy something believes their act to be full of righteousness; only nihilists believe otherwise. Many may even be sincere, and wish to create after they destroy, and destroy with that intention in mind. But destruction and creation remain two seperate acts, and how history judges them is dependent on how careful they are in destroying, and whether they get that chance to build again.
Incidentally, someone should let Glenn (or his reader) know that Brahma is the Hindu god of Creation, not Vishnu.
Everybody who wants to destroy something believes their act to be full of righteousness; only nihilists believe otherwise. Many may even be sincere, and wish to create after they destroy, and destroy with that intention in mind. But destruction and creation remain two seperate acts, and how history judges them is dependent on how careful they are in destroying, and whether they get that chance to build again.
Incidentally, someone should let Glenn (or his reader) know that Brahma is the Hindu god of Creation, not Vishnu.
Tuesday, March 08, 2005
Code Grumbling Bleg
I am starting to find Blogger's selective display of my ecosystem status really annoying. I refresh, I republish, and it still doesn't show up if it doesn't feel like it. Is anyone else having this problem?
Update: Never mind. The Bear says that the display feature is shut down. Maybe I should check the horse's mouth next time.
Update: Never mind. The Bear says that the display feature is shut down. Maybe I should check the horse's mouth next time.
Progressive Reactionaries
I agree with Matt Yglesias that National Security is the true weak spot of the Democratic Party, and the true reason why Bush won was Kerry's vagueness on the subject. "Moral values" voters may have demonstrated some of their true strength in '04, but that wasn't the tipping issue. I further agree that making the military just one of their special interests won't do the job either (Hat tip: The Corner). But Yglesias can't seem to bring himself to say what should be done: That the Democrats are going to have to out-hawk the Republicans.
Impossible, you say? Not at all. Forty years ago, the Democrats did exactly that. In 1960 and in 1964, the combination of liberal social policies and ferocious anti-communism (Kennedy's "pay any price" dictum) were all but unstoppable at the polls. A similar combination (lefty politics and ferocious anti-fascism) worked for FDR in the 40's. "Have pity on the weak, and slay the dragons," is a potent message indeed.
But to get it back, the Democrats are going to have to cut themselves off from the entire 1968 faction, all the professors and pundits who believe as surely as they believe the sky is blue that the U.S. is an imperialist power bent on world domination. I personally think Yglesias underestimates the degree to which this thinking has become reflexive in Democratic circles, even unconscious. As a matter of principle, most liberals don't think the U.S. is evil necessarily. But with every specific example of American force being used to defeat dictatorship, they seem to find themselves opposed.
It's going to take a lot for the average Democratic voter to cozy up to the institutions of power in American foreign policy: the military ("if we could take that money and spend it on food/education/free needles..."), the State Department (still primarily staffed by Ivy League upper-class types, though less so than before), and the CIA (the whipping-boy for every foreign policy miscue, when not accused of being the Sinister Icy Black Hand of Death for the entire Third World). Second-generation hippies are to be found everywhere, and if their politics are a bit of a pose, that doesn't make them any more willing to support the slaying dragons. Out of habit, they still oppose the knights.
So I agree with the nature of the problem, and I don't blame Yglesias for not speaking to specifically about the solution. He's going to have a hard time convincing the DU crowd that it's not "reactionary."
Impossible, you say? Not at all. Forty years ago, the Democrats did exactly that. In 1960 and in 1964, the combination of liberal social policies and ferocious anti-communism (Kennedy's "pay any price" dictum) were all but unstoppable at the polls. A similar combination (lefty politics and ferocious anti-fascism) worked for FDR in the 40's. "Have pity on the weak, and slay the dragons," is a potent message indeed.
But to get it back, the Democrats are going to have to cut themselves off from the entire 1968 faction, all the professors and pundits who believe as surely as they believe the sky is blue that the U.S. is an imperialist power bent on world domination. I personally think Yglesias underestimates the degree to which this thinking has become reflexive in Democratic circles, even unconscious. As a matter of principle, most liberals don't think the U.S. is evil necessarily. But with every specific example of American force being used to defeat dictatorship, they seem to find themselves opposed.
It's going to take a lot for the average Democratic voter to cozy up to the institutions of power in American foreign policy: the military ("if we could take that money and spend it on food/education/free needles..."), the State Department (still primarily staffed by Ivy League upper-class types, though less so than before), and the CIA (the whipping-boy for every foreign policy miscue, when not accused of being the Sinister Icy Black Hand of Death for the entire Third World). Second-generation hippies are to be found everywhere, and if their politics are a bit of a pose, that doesn't make them any more willing to support the slaying dragons. Out of habit, they still oppose the knights.
So I agree with the nature of the problem, and I don't blame Yglesias for not speaking to specifically about the solution. He's going to have a hard time convincing the DU crowd that it's not "reactionary."
Monday, February 28, 2005
Laurence D. Miniter 1930-2005
Blogging will be exceedingly light this week due to the death of my maternal grandfather, who passed yesterday afternoon, of lung cancer. Smoking kills.
Meanwhile, the entire Northeast braces for blizzards. It's not as good as an aurora borealis, but it'll do.
Full blogging will resume later this week, but I might pop in before that.
Meanwhile, the entire Northeast braces for blizzards. It's not as good as an aurora borealis, but it'll do.
Full blogging will resume later this week, but I might pop in before that.
Friday, February 25, 2005
The Essayist #4: Terms of Victory
I know that I promised that I would mostly stay away from the war on this new blog, and I know that I haven't fully kept that promise. However, I am prepared to deal with the matter somewhat more clinically, for lack of a better term. So if you're convinced that splattering explostions like today's means that we are headed for an embarassing defeat on a truly Vietnamese scale, I am not going to attempt to persuade you otherwise. What I am going to do is perhaps give us a set of terms we can agree upon for determining when we will have lost, and when (if ever) we will have won.
The truism of guerrilla war/counterinsurgency is that for the insurgents to win, they merely need to not lose, that by continuing to exist, they will sap the morale of the government forces and defeat them by convincing them that they cannot be destroyed: resistance is futile. Conversely, for the counter-insurgency to not lose, it must win: overwhelm and hunt down the guerrillas, while turning the populace against them.
Both of these are true, as far as they go. But I challenge their status as universally true, because both of them are dependent on a politically determined stratum of victory. In other words, for both guerrilla and government, victory comes when the people believe that the other side has not won and, moreover, will not win. Both insurgent and counterinsurgent aim to drive the enemy to the Futility Point.
In truth, the same could be said for any variety of war. But with unconventional warfare, the Futility Point becomes the more difficult to gauge. When the Red Army took Berlin in 1945, the Futility Point of WW2 had been reached for every German, including Hitler (whose opinion, given the nature of the Third Reich, mattered most). But how can we convince Zarqawi of the same? CAN we convince Zarqawi of that, and how much does that matter?
I argue that the relative position of the Futility Point for either side, in a guerrilla or any other kind of war, is dependent on the goals that both sides begin with. For example, in the Greek insurgency of the late 1940's, the Greek Communists were setting out with the goal of overthrowing the government and establishing a communist state in Greece. The postwar Greek government, on the other hand, was first concerned with survival, and then with the disruption of Communist activities, to weaken their capacities. By 1949 this had largely been accomplished, without government forces destroying guerrillas in large numbers. What tipped the Greek Communists past the Futility Point was the closure, on Tito's orders, of the Yugoslav frontier, which denied the insurgents the sanctuary from government operations that they had previously depended on. This and the failure of the insurgents two major offensive operations in the north of the country signalled the end of their ability to command respect in Greece.
Now, let us look at the goals of the two opposing sides in Iraq. The U.S. Government invaded Iraq with the following goals in mind:
1. Overthrow the Baathist regime headed by Saddam Hussein. Capture or kill Hussein and his major leadership.
2. Catalog and destroy Hussein's stockpile of WMD's.
3. Rapidly repair war damage and improve Iraq'a economic infrastructure.
All of which leads up to:
4. Establish effective control over the country, until such time as a new government could be created, one which reflected the goals and aspirations of the Iraqi people, and one which would be, if not grateful to the United States, then at least opposed to being a haven and source of Islamic terrorism, as Saddam had been.
Meanwhile, the goal of the insurgency has been:
1. Inflict major casualties on coalition forces, to the point where anti-war opinion worldwide precipitates a withdrawl of the coalition forces from Iraq.
2. Seriously disrupt the growth of the new Iraq. Prevent the new Iraqi government from functioning.
3. Cow the Shi'ites and Kurds into accepting continued Sunni dominance. Barring that, provoke a civil war which will hasten coalition withdrawl.
All of which lead up to:
4. Either re-establish a Baathist or establish a fundamentalist Islamic state in Iraq, or perhaps a hybrid of both.
While no one can effectively argue that the insurgency has been put down, few can argue that it has achieved any of its goals, or argue that the U.S. has not achieved most of its goals (#2 being the obvious exception, for reasons which are as yet unclear). All of which might still be awaiting events. Shi'ite dominance in Iraq might yet lead to a fundamentalist state. Even if it doesn't, the insurgency might be yet be able to survive long enough to overpower the new government, provoke the civil war and win the peace.
Such things are not beyond the bounds of possiblity. Yet as the U.S. presence in Iraq remains without a definite withdrawl date, while diplomatic pressure on the Baathist Syrian government, which supplies the insurgents with a possible source of haven and supplies, increases, while the new Iraqi government continues to enjoy legitimacy in the eyes of a majority of the country, these things become less and less likely.
Thus, while the U.S. has not yet achieved complete victory in Iraq, neither has it lost, and it appears that time is on its side. This would seem to be a rare position for the counter-insurgent to be in, and to explain this, we must look to the terms of victory.
The truism of guerrilla war/counterinsurgency is that for the insurgents to win, they merely need to not lose, that by continuing to exist, they will sap the morale of the government forces and defeat them by convincing them that they cannot be destroyed: resistance is futile. Conversely, for the counter-insurgency to not lose, it must win: overwhelm and hunt down the guerrillas, while turning the populace against them.
Both of these are true, as far as they go. But I challenge their status as universally true, because both of them are dependent on a politically determined stratum of victory. In other words, for both guerrilla and government, victory comes when the people believe that the other side has not won and, moreover, will not win. Both insurgent and counterinsurgent aim to drive the enemy to the Futility Point.
In truth, the same could be said for any variety of war. But with unconventional warfare, the Futility Point becomes the more difficult to gauge. When the Red Army took Berlin in 1945, the Futility Point of WW2 had been reached for every German, including Hitler (whose opinion, given the nature of the Third Reich, mattered most). But how can we convince Zarqawi of the same? CAN we convince Zarqawi of that, and how much does that matter?
I argue that the relative position of the Futility Point for either side, in a guerrilla or any other kind of war, is dependent on the goals that both sides begin with. For example, in the Greek insurgency of the late 1940's, the Greek Communists were setting out with the goal of overthrowing the government and establishing a communist state in Greece. The postwar Greek government, on the other hand, was first concerned with survival, and then with the disruption of Communist activities, to weaken their capacities. By 1949 this had largely been accomplished, without government forces destroying guerrillas in large numbers. What tipped the Greek Communists past the Futility Point was the closure, on Tito's orders, of the Yugoslav frontier, which denied the insurgents the sanctuary from government operations that they had previously depended on. This and the failure of the insurgents two major offensive operations in the north of the country signalled the end of their ability to command respect in Greece.
Now, let us look at the goals of the two opposing sides in Iraq. The U.S. Government invaded Iraq with the following goals in mind:
1. Overthrow the Baathist regime headed by Saddam Hussein. Capture or kill Hussein and his major leadership.
2. Catalog and destroy Hussein's stockpile of WMD's.
3. Rapidly repair war damage and improve Iraq'a economic infrastructure.
All of which leads up to:
4. Establish effective control over the country, until such time as a new government could be created, one which reflected the goals and aspirations of the Iraqi people, and one which would be, if not grateful to the United States, then at least opposed to being a haven and source of Islamic terrorism, as Saddam had been.
Meanwhile, the goal of the insurgency has been:
1. Inflict major casualties on coalition forces, to the point where anti-war opinion worldwide precipitates a withdrawl of the coalition forces from Iraq.
2. Seriously disrupt the growth of the new Iraq. Prevent the new Iraqi government from functioning.
3. Cow the Shi'ites and Kurds into accepting continued Sunni dominance. Barring that, provoke a civil war which will hasten coalition withdrawl.
All of which lead up to:
4. Either re-establish a Baathist or establish a fundamentalist Islamic state in Iraq, or perhaps a hybrid of both.
While no one can effectively argue that the insurgency has been put down, few can argue that it has achieved any of its goals, or argue that the U.S. has not achieved most of its goals (#2 being the obvious exception, for reasons which are as yet unclear). All of which might still be awaiting events. Shi'ite dominance in Iraq might yet lead to a fundamentalist state. Even if it doesn't, the insurgency might be yet be able to survive long enough to overpower the new government, provoke the civil war and win the peace.
Such things are not beyond the bounds of possiblity. Yet as the U.S. presence in Iraq remains without a definite withdrawl date, while diplomatic pressure on the Baathist Syrian government, which supplies the insurgents with a possible source of haven and supplies, increases, while the new Iraqi government continues to enjoy legitimacy in the eyes of a majority of the country, these things become less and less likely.
Thus, while the U.S. has not yet achieved complete victory in Iraq, neither has it lost, and it appears that time is on its side. This would seem to be a rare position for the counter-insurgent to be in, and to explain this, we must look to the terms of victory.
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, indeed.
Boxing Alcibiades asks what we've all been asking about the rash of female-teacher-adolescent-boy-relationships in the news.
Light blogging due to Snow Day
The Essayist #4 will be up later this afternoon. In the meantime, consider the argument put forward by this book: that the Democratic party has already been led rightward by the success of the Republicans in the 90's. This isn't new. As early as '96, some journalists were comparing Clinton to Eisenhower, the Republican who presided over the liberalizing of America.
Rather puts the Democratic Underground wing into perspective, doesn't it?
Rather puts the Democratic Underground wing into perspective, doesn't it?
Thursday, February 24, 2005
The Mask Slips
Instapundit links the latest in the series of "Gee, maybe Bush was right," escapes, this time from Der Speigel in Germany. Welcome as such developments are, we can't yet know whether Bush's Middle Eastern Gambit will play out. The place of Syria, Iran, and Saudi Arabia, not to mention Palestine, vis-a-vis (the French has been creeping in of late, hasn't it?) the fledgling Iraqi republic has yet to be delineated. But there's a section of the article I think worth noting:
How may it be possible that the regime of Cowboyus Maximus Bush Caeser Fascus is more progressive, for lack of a better term, than the multiparty, socially-oriented European People's states? I argued back in August, on the old blog, that the European states deserve the title of Bureaucracy, rather than Republic. I also thought the title might apply to the United States, if perhaps to a less severe degree. Maybe the strength of the popular will in the U.S., and it's relative youth as a nation, still gives it a progressive spirit that old, experienced Europe lacks. But if Der Spiegel is willing to give Americans credit for a greater desire to change the world, then perhaps the Liberal Revolution truly is on an upswing.
Europeans today -- just like the Europeans of 1987 -- cannot imagine that the world might change. Maybe we don't want the world to change, because change can, of course, be dangerous. But in a country of immigrants like the United States, one actually pushes for change. In Mainz today, the stagnant Europeans came face to face with the dynamic Americans. We Europeans always want to have the world from yesterday, whereas the Americans strive for the world of tomorrow.
How may it be possible that the regime of Cowboyus Maximus Bush Caeser Fascus is more progressive, for lack of a better term, than the multiparty, socially-oriented European People's states? I argued back in August, on the old blog, that the European states deserve the title of Bureaucracy, rather than Republic. I also thought the title might apply to the United States, if perhaps to a less severe degree. Maybe the strength of the popular will in the U.S., and it's relative youth as a nation, still gives it a progressive spirit that old, experienced Europe lacks. But if Der Spiegel is willing to give Americans credit for a greater desire to change the world, then perhaps the Liberal Revolution truly is on an upswing.
Wednesday, February 23, 2005
Please, Make me "Wanker of the Day"...
Daily Kos seems excited because a bunch of College Republicans chanted "Hey hey, Ho ho, Social Security's got to go." Apparently this means that "the GOP is drowning on Social Security." He tells us that Atrios and Yglesias explain why. Atrios, as far as I can tell, mentions nothing but the same College Republican story, and Yglesias, has nothing but a vague claim that the argument is being won, while excorciating a particular democrat for being a "turncoat," (i.e. coming to the compromise position that raising taxes and private accounts will be required).
Yeah. The GOP is really swirling the drain. Their college recruits are enthusiastic to the point of hyperbole, and the House caucus is tricking Democrats into arguing a "terrible political idea," that will backfire on them. Wow. Them righties are in so much trouble.
Yeah. The GOP is really swirling the drain. Their college recruits are enthusiastic to the point of hyperbole, and the House caucus is tricking Democrats into arguing a "terrible political idea," that will backfire on them. Wow. Them righties are in so much trouble.
Whipping Boy
There is nobody, and I mean nobody, that right-wing bloggers enjoy pimp-slapping more than Ted Rall. Not even Michael Moore excites as much contempt as Rall, who's moved beyond the echo-chamber into a kind of rubber room, where words and phrases just seem to tumble out of his head without thought to how they will be heard, and of course, no unsatisfactory elements will ever get in. Today, Instapundit, Day by Day and Captain's Quarter all pile on.
If he didn't so eminently deserve it, I'd almost feel bad for him.
If he didn't so eminently deserve it, I'd almost feel bad for him.
Ecosystem Bizarritude
How is it that a man who posts six times a year gets awards and has a higher rank than me?
1. The Ecosystem is monstrously unjust.
2. "Mr. Cranky" is a way cooler name than "The Essayist".
Methinks, the latter.
1. The Ecosystem is monstrously unjust.
2. "Mr. Cranky" is a way cooler name than "The Essayist".
Methinks, the latter.
Ah, back to normal...
Chirac goes about his usual tricks. But the speaking of French at a formal occasion looks more cosmetic than anything else, an idle display of independence (quelle François!). As to the busting up of NATO, well, why should the corpse remain now that the spirit is dead?
NATO's raison d'être was, in the words of Churchhill, "to keep the Germans down, the Americans in, and the Russians out." Goal one has largely been accomplished, in fact, accomplished so well that we are now managing to keep the Russians out of the Ukraine simply by example. No one pretends to keep the Germans down any longer, and only a few still want the Americans in. Et Voilá...
Update: Mark Steyn weighs in with a good point: (via Instapundit)
Dont'cha just love nuance?
NATO's raison d'être was, in the words of Churchhill, "to keep the Germans down, the Americans in, and the Russians out." Goal one has largely been accomplished, in fact, accomplished so well that we are now managing to keep the Russians out of the Ukraine simply by example. No one pretends to keep the Germans down any longer, and only a few still want the Americans in. Et Voilá...
Update: Mark Steyn weighs in with a good point: (via Instapundit)
America and Europe both face security threats. But the difference is America's are external, and require hard choices in tough neighbourhoods around the world, while the EU's are internal and, as they see it, unlikely to be lessened by the sight of European soldiers joining the Great Satan in liberating, say, Syria. That's not exactly going to help keep the lid on the noisier Continental mosques.
Dont'cha just love nuance?
Tuesday, February 22, 2005
The Inevitable Logic of the Nanny State...
...that which is bad for you becomes a crime. (Via Drudge)
This is justified via the "cost to the state" argument: the state will be called upon to care for this individual, ergo the state has an interest in this individual's health, ergo it has a right to compell treatment. Insurance companies do it all the time, why can't the gov'mint?
This is justified via the "cost to the state" argument: the state will be called upon to care for this individual, ergo the state has an interest in this individual's health, ergo it has a right to compell treatment. Insurance companies do it all the time, why can't the gov'mint?
Huzzah, Slimy Mollusc!
Thanks to the After Abortion blog, which also touches on issues of euthanasia. To be clear, I've never been a fan of abortion, and I've never cared who knew it. To women who say "If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrement," I say ladies, how little you understand us.
If men could get pregnant, childbirth would be a sport.
If men could get pregnant, childbirth would be a sport.
Enemis ne Plus?
Took the weekend off to visit the smoochie-poo in NYC. I now resume:
Is it me, or is it...odd, the way that Chirac, and the Canadians, and the EU, are suddenly amenable to our Middle East policy? I suspect one of two possibilities:
1. The power of Europe to resist our imperial might is limited. When they discovered that we would not be shamed from a warlike response to 9/11, they meekly knuckled under. Bush's re-election nailed this coffin shut.
2. The sneaking suspicion that Iraq has not been an unmitigated disaster and, indeed, has become a qualified success has led them to look for places on the bandwagon. Ever pragmatic, and realizing that their own security situations has so far not worsened, and could possibly improve, Europe cautiously files in behind.
It would be easy to say, both, but I suspect it's more the latter than the former. The 2004 election would have meant nothing if Iraq had come apart like 1968 South Vietnam. Let's not underestimate the images of blue-fingered Iraqis defying the bringers of blood. I don't think Europe has ever doubted the value of democratizing the Middle East, merely the likelihood of its success. One can hardly blame them, given the testimony of human history, for that.
Is it me, or is it...odd, the way that Chirac, and the Canadians, and the EU, are suddenly amenable to our Middle East policy? I suspect one of two possibilities:
1. The power of Europe to resist our imperial might is limited. When they discovered that we would not be shamed from a warlike response to 9/11, they meekly knuckled under. Bush's re-election nailed this coffin shut.
2. The sneaking suspicion that Iraq has not been an unmitigated disaster and, indeed, has become a qualified success has led them to look for places on the bandwagon. Ever pragmatic, and realizing that their own security situations has so far not worsened, and could possibly improve, Europe cautiously files in behind.
It would be easy to say, both, but I suspect it's more the latter than the former. The 2004 election would have meant nothing if Iraq had come apart like 1968 South Vietnam. Let's not underestimate the images of blue-fingered Iraqis defying the bringers of blood. I don't think Europe has ever doubted the value of democratizing the Middle East, merely the likelihood of its success. One can hardly blame them, given the testimony of human history, for that.
Friday, February 18, 2005
The Essayist #3: An Infinity of Soapboxes
Using a blog to write about the blogosphere is a bit like trying to control the ocean by spitting in it. I'm fully aware of this, but the title of the web site is The Essayist, not The Fatalist, so I'm going to give it a go.
In part, writing about this is futile because the blogosphere is already pretty navel-gazing. We bloggers are self-consciously devoted to our craft, to the joy of saying "Look at me publish!" We enjoy what we do and enjoy the connection to worldwide events that it brings us. Blogs bellowed in triumph at bringing down Trent Lott, Dan Rather, Eason Jordan, and yes, that Gannon chap. Those of us not quite so influential as Reynolds or Kaus or Wretchard cling to the hope that one day we will be, and in the meantime, we enjoy being part of the national dialogue.
Or maybe that's just me.
What about a website like, say....this one? Looks like a blog. Has posts and entries like a blog, links like a blog. But...is it journalism? What about xilan's blog? My girlfriend's LiveJournal? What shall we call the other millions of LiveJournals where people happily trade pictures and record the non-contentious, non-earth-shaking events that constitute life for the majority of us? Are they part of the sphere?
Peggy Noonan, with her noted quality for getting to the heart of a matter, has proclaimed in her most recent column that blogs are "a public service." I understand what she means, but I disagree. A public service is a duty and a bore, a mass institution to serve the masses. I hear the words "public service" and think of those obligatory ads warning kids about drugs. Every kid sees the same message, and after the first 50 or so, diminishing persuasiveness returns start to set in. But we see them all the time, because how is an instituion supposed to change it's marketing to please one person? There's no future in it.
The blogosphere is not public, but uniquely private, a million windows to a million minds, each connected to the others, yet each self-contained. Regardless of labels that some apply to Daily Kos, there is no Hive mind online. There's no way to enforce one. Anyone who wants to is free to disappear without trace, or to set up one's own shop, because everything done online is voluntary. Every actor is radically free, to do something positive, something negative, or nothing at all. What kind of system can be imposed on that?
Using terms like "left-blogosphere" or "right-blogosphere" are valid only up to the point of stating that the two don't talk to each other a whole lot. Beyond that, describing their habits and stereotyping their methods according to some aesthetic straw-man (yeah, those mindless liberals, they're like insects, man) means ignoring all the other details, all the other minutia. And when we want that, we've got the MSM waiting for us to sit down and accept their information flow.
The bane of TV reportage is that the camera, all appearances to the contrary, is a strikingly limited means of capturing data. There are only so many, and only so many capable of funding their preparation and use. The wide world that the camera did not see was the Great Unenfranchised in the era of Big Media. We would be foolish to replicate their error by creating false tribes and false descriptions gleaned from the segment of blogs that devote themselves to the daily political kerfuffle. As partisan as we are, we're not here to create voting blocs.
So I start where I began, in a declaration of largeness. And I'm okay with that.
In part, writing about this is futile because the blogosphere is already pretty navel-gazing. We bloggers are self-consciously devoted to our craft, to the joy of saying "Look at me publish!" We enjoy what we do and enjoy the connection to worldwide events that it brings us. Blogs bellowed in triumph at bringing down Trent Lott, Dan Rather, Eason Jordan, and yes, that Gannon chap. Those of us not quite so influential as Reynolds or Kaus or Wretchard cling to the hope that one day we will be, and in the meantime, we enjoy being part of the national dialogue.
Or maybe that's just me.
What about a website like, say....this one? Looks like a blog. Has posts and entries like a blog, links like a blog. But...is it journalism? What about xilan's blog? My girlfriend's LiveJournal? What shall we call the other millions of LiveJournals where people happily trade pictures and record the non-contentious, non-earth-shaking events that constitute life for the majority of us? Are they part of the sphere?
Peggy Noonan, with her noted quality for getting to the heart of a matter, has proclaimed in her most recent column that blogs are "a public service." I understand what she means, but I disagree. A public service is a duty and a bore, a mass institution to serve the masses. I hear the words "public service" and think of those obligatory ads warning kids about drugs. Every kid sees the same message, and after the first 50 or so, diminishing persuasiveness returns start to set in. But we see them all the time, because how is an instituion supposed to change it's marketing to please one person? There's no future in it.
The blogosphere is not public, but uniquely private, a million windows to a million minds, each connected to the others, yet each self-contained. Regardless of labels that some apply to Daily Kos, there is no Hive mind online. There's no way to enforce one. Anyone who wants to is free to disappear without trace, or to set up one's own shop, because everything done online is voluntary. Every actor is radically free, to do something positive, something negative, or nothing at all. What kind of system can be imposed on that?
Using terms like "left-blogosphere" or "right-blogosphere" are valid only up to the point of stating that the two don't talk to each other a whole lot. Beyond that, describing their habits and stereotyping their methods according to some aesthetic straw-man (yeah, those mindless liberals, they're like insects, man) means ignoring all the other details, all the other minutia. And when we want that, we've got the MSM waiting for us to sit down and accept their information flow.
The bane of TV reportage is that the camera, all appearances to the contrary, is a strikingly limited means of capturing data. There are only so many, and only so many capable of funding their preparation and use. The wide world that the camera did not see was the Great Unenfranchised in the era of Big Media. We would be foolish to replicate their error by creating false tribes and false descriptions gleaned from the segment of blogs that devote themselves to the daily political kerfuffle. As partisan as we are, we're not here to create voting blocs.
So I start where I began, in a declaration of largeness. And I'm okay with that.
Thursday, February 17, 2005
If you hear the word "Christian" and recoil...
...then see if this guy fits your stereotype.
Yeah, I'm not sure where the "hedonism" part starts, either. But I'm intrigued nonetheless.
Yeah, I'm not sure where the "hedonism" part starts, either. But I'm intrigued nonetheless.
First, Explanations...
My Tarantino essay is turning into a monster beyond my control. I don't think I've got in in me, not yet, to do what I really want to do. So that one's on indefinite hiatus. I think tommorrow's essay will take in some blogospheric ponderings.
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
Jay was Right...
You know how you know race relations in America are all right? When a black comic rips off a white director, and no one even notices.
I refer to Chris Rock, who, as the media bonfire around him begins to heat up has been revealed to think that any woman who gets an abortion is loose:
So quotes Dorinda Bordlee, a lawyer for Americans United For Life in a piece for National Review that defends Rock:
My guess is Bordlee never saw Kevin Smith's Dogma, in which Rock stars, and in which recurring doofus and druggie Jay, after a loud proclamation of pro-choice beliefes, explains that he's hanging out in front of an abortion clinic to meet loose women. If she had, she might not be in such a rush to call this a revolutionary statement.
But let's go back to that idea, that abortion exists primarily to protect the Sexual Revolution. Surely, this is right-wing logic. No lefty could accept such reasoning, right?
Wrong. Here's Ellen Fulton in Salon, five years ago, urging men to vote for Gore or ruin their sex lives:
She goes on to say that, when such happens, only guys who voted for Gore will be considered "sponge-worthy," as it were, and therefore that she encourages men everywhere to "vote with their dicks."
Charming, but let's summarize:
Conservative woman says: "Abortion exists to allow men to have sex as much as they want with no consequence."
Liberal woman says: "Get rid of abortion rights, boys, and see your sex life dry up."
I love it when a plan comes together.
Update: SuperBiff comments to tell me that the joke is Rock's after all, and Kevin Smith used it for the movie. I guess white artists are still ripping off black artists. Some things never change.
I refer to Chris Rock, who, as the media bonfire around him begins to heat up has been revealed to think that any woman who gets an abortion is loose:
Abortion, it's beautiful, it's beautiful abortion is legal. I love going to an abortion rally to pick up women, cause you know they are f*!@*%g...
So quotes Dorinda Bordlee, a lawyer for Americans United For Life in a piece for National Review that defends Rock:
So here we are, five years into the new millennium, and a comedian has the nerve to say out loud what men across America know full well: that legalized abortion is great for their sex lives; that abortion on demand makes women into sex objects with the full consent of the highest court in the land; and that if their sexual use of a woman results in the unfortunate side effect of a pregnancy, then $300 and their "kindhearted" support of the woman's "right to choose" will take care of the problem.
My guess is Bordlee never saw Kevin Smith's Dogma, in which Rock stars, and in which recurring doofus and druggie Jay, after a loud proclamation of pro-choice beliefes, explains that he's hanging out in front of an abortion clinic to meet loose women. If she had, she might not be in such a rush to call this a revolutionary statement.
But let's go back to that idea, that abortion exists primarily to protect the Sexual Revolution. Surely, this is right-wing logic. No lefty could accept such reasoning, right?
Wrong. Here's Ellen Fulton in Salon, five years ago, urging men to vote for Gore or ruin their sex lives:
Women, on the other hand, won't be so understanding about this election. To many of us, this election is important. I hear a lot of women talking about the Supreme Court, because the idea that Roe vs. Wade would be overturned is an idea that many of us genuinely fear, even if we have qualms about abortion. Our rights are at stake in this election, and we know that "strict constructionist" judges don't support our rights. We hear pro-life types talk about how banning abortion is just a first step to getting rid of birth control pills and other types of birth control methods like IUDs. Now, even if you oppose abortion and think that overturning Roe vs. Wade is a good idea, think about the effect that changing the legal landscape for women's reproductive rights will have on your ability as a man to get laid. Then forget getting laid at all, because women whose options for dealing with an unplanned pregnancy have changed will decide to spend nights with vibrators instead of you.
She goes on to say that, when such happens, only guys who voted for Gore will be considered "sponge-worthy," as it were, and therefore that she encourages men everywhere to "vote with their dicks."
Charming, but let's summarize:
Conservative woman says: "Abortion exists to allow men to have sex as much as they want with no consequence."
Liberal woman says: "Get rid of abortion rights, boys, and see your sex life dry up."
I love it when a plan comes together.
Update: SuperBiff comments to tell me that the joke is Rock's after all, and Kevin Smith used it for the movie. I guess white artists are still ripping off black artists. Some things never change.
That Popping Sound You Hear...
...is the sound of conservative's heads exploding as the Navy announces that the newest Seawolf submarine will be named after Jimmy Carter.
See, boys? If you had just been patient, Ronald Reagan could have a cool sub named after him instead of that lame airport.
See, boys? If you had just been patient, Ronald Reagan could have a cool sub named after him instead of that lame airport.
Tuesday, February 15, 2005
A Response, Not a Fisking
Among my fellow Lowly Insects I found a man who has seemingly left his blog behind (he last posted in December, announcing a hiatus, and hasn't been back since). He wrote an essay, let's call it, describing his vision of the ideal president and the ideal policies, ones which he felt would resonate among all Americans. I am taking it upon myself to respond to them, point-by-point. This isn't a fisking, because, as I wrote here, a fisking implies contempt. I am just going to question.
What Our Nation Needs
At this time of division in our nation, many people are asking the question, "What does our nation need?"
It does not need a religious fanatic. It does not need a corporate crony. It does not need a warmonger. It does not need another talking head who recites party policy.
These things we know to be true.
This is boilerplate. Your standards of "religious fanatic," "corporate crony," "warmonger," and "talking head," are not mine. Therefore, I'm afraid I can't agree with your implication that the President is all of these, which makes it difficult to join your "we".
We still leave the question unanswered. What DO we need?
The United States needs a leader. A statesman. Someone like FDR or JFK. Am I stating that either of these two men were perfect? Of course not. No man is perfect.
However, both men were strong willed. Both new how to address the people of the nation. Both worked to restore a feeling of safety and comfort to the people.
Is it your estimation that Reagan, just as an example, had none of these qualities? Just asking.
FDR was elected during the great depression. He had a plan. He pushed the plan into action. Today, we still have programs he initiated in place. Social Security. Unemployment insurance.
Social Security is an argument for another time. Unemployment insurance I have no criticism of. But I notice that you don't mention any of JFK's achievments. What was it about his presidency that you admired? I, personally, don't see much at all to esteem, though he did cut taxes.
So what plan does this great American statesman, that our nation needs, need? He needs a plan to address terrorism. Not one of attacking other nations, but one of securing our homeland. He needs a plan to secure our borders, to prevent terrorists from gaining entry. He needs a plan to secure our nuclear power plants, our shipyards and harbors. At a time when American should be consolidating our military power at home, we are instead fighting battles abroad and spreading our military too thin in the task.
You seem to be implying that the way to combat terrorism is to have the military police the targets that terrorists are most likely to attack, to be building up our domestic security apparatus, to be sealing the borders that terrorists will not get in. In other words, since trying to change other nations is out of bounds, we must accept a permanent police state, empowered to do whatever is necessary to prevent another damaging attack. I have to say that I don't think the consensus exists for this. If I have misread you, may I ask for more details?
He needs a plan to control government spending. He needs a plan to lower and eventually dissolve the national debt. He needs a plan to bring jobs to the US, not send them abroad. He needs a New Deal.
As I understand it, the New Deal involved a vast increase in government spending. I agree that such spending needs to be reined in. But the most expensive programs happen to be the most popular ones. Regardless of what spending gets cut, someone is going to get angry.
One way to "bring jobs to the US" might be to decrease corporate taxes and burdensome regulations that drive companies overseas. A president who does this, however, will undoubtedly be referred to as a "corporate crony." It also will make getting rid of the debt more difficult.
He needs a plan to enact corporate responsibility. He needs a plan to bring healthcare costs under control and to cover every American citizen with a national healthcare plan. He needs to ensure that illegal immigrants are either urged to earn US citizenship, and not play the green card system for their own personal gain.
How are we to give every American citizen healthcare and rein in government spending?
He needs to bring taxes in line with wealth. The more you make, the more you pay and vice versa. He needs to protect the American worker, the lower, the middle, and the upper classes. He needs a vision of fair treatment and constitutional guarantees of equal and inalienable rights.
I am given to understand that this is how the system already works. The tax system is based on graduated percentages, so the more you make, the more you pay. I would like to see the evidence that this is not true.
As to the constitution, what rights do you have in mind that are not already enshrined in the constitution, or rather, how are the rights we already possess not "equal and inalienable"?
A true statesman would welcome transparency in his government. A true leader has nothing to hide.
He should neither tow the party line nor follow the party creed. He must, most importantly, think first of what will benefit the American people the most. He must be a humanitarian. Yet, at the same time, he must be prepared to defend the American people with military force as a last resort.
At what point may the "last resort" be employed? There seems to be a sea of disagreement on this subject.
He must be willing to compromise on some issues, while refusing to budge on others.
All politicians have some issues on which they will not budge, and some on which they are flexible. What specific issues did you have in mind?
It's a tall order. Some would say that it is impossible to fill. I say that it is not impossible.
We in America seem to have fallen for the myth that a truly great president must be wealthy, college educated, and well-known. I say that that myth is wrong. The greatest thing a US president can possess is a patriotic spirit and a healthy dose of common sense.
Common sense, you ask? Yes, good old fashioned common sense.
I agree with this up to a point, because I don't know that "common sense" is as widely accepted as perhaps it once was. Many people find some of the notions that some call "common sense" offensive, and I don't know that anyone has defined "common sense" in any but a few specific cases.
I'll give a hypothetical example.
To protect our nation from terrorists, what could a man of common sense do?
You'll forgive me, but this isn't very hypothetical at all. Terrorism is a well-known issue about which many opinions exist. You seem to be trying to declare what you think a president should do to be "common sense." I don't think this a very persuasive tactic.
First, he must listen to his intelligence advisors. Then he must question their authenticity. He must ask questions, and expect answers. He cannot ignore warnings. We saw on 9/11 what happens when warnings are ignored.
What if he gets a warning, from his intelligence advisors, questions their authenticity, and errs in so doing? If all warnings must be accepted as valid, it is difficult to question them. Also, what is your basis for assuming that the President does not do this?
If the intelligence groups cannot provide the answers needed, then he must err on the side of caution and then address the issue of inadequate intelligence agencies. He must communicate with the American people on a regular basis. He must reassure the people. He must increase the security at our borders and increase security on our airlines. He must push for standardized training guidelines for security officers.
In other words, the intelligence and security apparatus of the federal government must be vastly increased, and the capacity of the government to watch the people inside the borders made stronger. Again, I feel that many will object to this.
To pay for this, he must stop wasteful government spending. He must urge congress to actually read the bills that they are voting on. If the result is a slower legislative process, then so be it. We as American people must learn to slow down, to think before we act, to understand before we rush headlong into an issue.
There is absolutely nothing I can object to about this, in principle. I must ask however, precisely which government spending do you consider "wasteful"? It matters, because one person's "wasteful" is another person's "needful". Many groups are attached to certain programs, anc can motivate members of the populace to vote with that in mind. It is a political hurdle that every president has dealt with.
The statesman must present this case to the American people. He must then pursue a more progressive tax plan. He must streamline social programs and make them more efficient. He must seek to lower bureaucratic wastefulness and red tape.
So, less spending, more taxes. That's going to be a tough program to sell.
Most importantly, the statesman must gather a diverse team of advisors, from all professions, representing the interests of the American people. They must be black, white, Asian, democrat, republican, conservative, liberal, religious, and non-religious, and on and on. He needs to listen to their advice, and weigh the alternatives to determine the best, most effective choice for the American people.
Not to be glib, but a body like this already exists. It's called Congress, and for the President to get anything done, he must listen to them.
He must remember that he is a federal employee and a civil servant. He must remember that the office of president is not a priviledge, but a job. He must be a man of the people, and a servant of the people.
Every President since Jackson has labored to make this his image. What is your basis for assuming that Bush does not agree with every word of this?
I believe, that if such a person were to present a common sense approach for the American people, that the American people would unite behind that person. That grass root donations would and could pay for his presidential campaign, without the need for corporate sponsors who would later expect favors.
I've pointed out several points where people might not agree. But let us assume you were right, and a president came to power with a vast popular mandate to increase the surveillance powers of the federal government, decrease spending, increase taxes, close the borders, etc. What problems can you for see with such policies being implemented? How should they be addressed?
Maybe its all just a dream, but it is the American Dream.
Be careful of such assertions. I'm an American, and I don't know that this is my dream.
Allow me to reiterate that I find these arguments merely questionable, not offensive. It's said that such is about all we have in the way of consensus these days. But I guess that is the nature of an argument.
What Our Nation Needs
At this time of division in our nation, many people are asking the question, "What does our nation need?"
It does not need a religious fanatic. It does not need a corporate crony. It does not need a warmonger. It does not need another talking head who recites party policy.
These things we know to be true.
This is boilerplate. Your standards of "religious fanatic," "corporate crony," "warmonger," and "talking head," are not mine. Therefore, I'm afraid I can't agree with your implication that the President is all of these, which makes it difficult to join your "we".
We still leave the question unanswered. What DO we need?
The United States needs a leader. A statesman. Someone like FDR or JFK. Am I stating that either of these two men were perfect? Of course not. No man is perfect.
However, both men were strong willed. Both new how to address the people of the nation. Both worked to restore a feeling of safety and comfort to the people.
Is it your estimation that Reagan, just as an example, had none of these qualities? Just asking.
FDR was elected during the great depression. He had a plan. He pushed the plan into action. Today, we still have programs he initiated in place. Social Security. Unemployment insurance.
Social Security is an argument for another time. Unemployment insurance I have no criticism of. But I notice that you don't mention any of JFK's achievments. What was it about his presidency that you admired? I, personally, don't see much at all to esteem, though he did cut taxes.
So what plan does this great American statesman, that our nation needs, need? He needs a plan to address terrorism. Not one of attacking other nations, but one of securing our homeland. He needs a plan to secure our borders, to prevent terrorists from gaining entry. He needs a plan to secure our nuclear power plants, our shipyards and harbors. At a time when American should be consolidating our military power at home, we are instead fighting battles abroad and spreading our military too thin in the task.
You seem to be implying that the way to combat terrorism is to have the military police the targets that terrorists are most likely to attack, to be building up our domestic security apparatus, to be sealing the borders that terrorists will not get in. In other words, since trying to change other nations is out of bounds, we must accept a permanent police state, empowered to do whatever is necessary to prevent another damaging attack. I have to say that I don't think the consensus exists for this. If I have misread you, may I ask for more details?
He needs a plan to control government spending. He needs a plan to lower and eventually dissolve the national debt. He needs a plan to bring jobs to the US, not send them abroad. He needs a New Deal.
As I understand it, the New Deal involved a vast increase in government spending. I agree that such spending needs to be reined in. But the most expensive programs happen to be the most popular ones. Regardless of what spending gets cut, someone is going to get angry.
One way to "bring jobs to the US" might be to decrease corporate taxes and burdensome regulations that drive companies overseas. A president who does this, however, will undoubtedly be referred to as a "corporate crony." It also will make getting rid of the debt more difficult.
He needs a plan to enact corporate responsibility. He needs a plan to bring healthcare costs under control and to cover every American citizen with a national healthcare plan. He needs to ensure that illegal immigrants are either urged to earn US citizenship, and not play the green card system for their own personal gain.
How are we to give every American citizen healthcare and rein in government spending?
He needs to bring taxes in line with wealth. The more you make, the more you pay and vice versa. He needs to protect the American worker, the lower, the middle, and the upper classes. He needs a vision of fair treatment and constitutional guarantees of equal and inalienable rights.
I am given to understand that this is how the system already works. The tax system is based on graduated percentages, so the more you make, the more you pay. I would like to see the evidence that this is not true.
As to the constitution, what rights do you have in mind that are not already enshrined in the constitution, or rather, how are the rights we already possess not "equal and inalienable"?
A true statesman would welcome transparency in his government. A true leader has nothing to hide.
He should neither tow the party line nor follow the party creed. He must, most importantly, think first of what will benefit the American people the most. He must be a humanitarian. Yet, at the same time, he must be prepared to defend the American people with military force as a last resort.
At what point may the "last resort" be employed? There seems to be a sea of disagreement on this subject.
He must be willing to compromise on some issues, while refusing to budge on others.
All politicians have some issues on which they will not budge, and some on which they are flexible. What specific issues did you have in mind?
It's a tall order. Some would say that it is impossible to fill. I say that it is not impossible.
We in America seem to have fallen for the myth that a truly great president must be wealthy, college educated, and well-known. I say that that myth is wrong. The greatest thing a US president can possess is a patriotic spirit and a healthy dose of common sense.
Common sense, you ask? Yes, good old fashioned common sense.
I agree with this up to a point, because I don't know that "common sense" is as widely accepted as perhaps it once was. Many people find some of the notions that some call "common sense" offensive, and I don't know that anyone has defined "common sense" in any but a few specific cases.
I'll give a hypothetical example.
To protect our nation from terrorists, what could a man of common sense do?
You'll forgive me, but this isn't very hypothetical at all. Terrorism is a well-known issue about which many opinions exist. You seem to be trying to declare what you think a president should do to be "common sense." I don't think this a very persuasive tactic.
First, he must listen to his intelligence advisors. Then he must question their authenticity. He must ask questions, and expect answers. He cannot ignore warnings. We saw on 9/11 what happens when warnings are ignored.
What if he gets a warning, from his intelligence advisors, questions their authenticity, and errs in so doing? If all warnings must be accepted as valid, it is difficult to question them. Also, what is your basis for assuming that the President does not do this?
If the intelligence groups cannot provide the answers needed, then he must err on the side of caution and then address the issue of inadequate intelligence agencies. He must communicate with the American people on a regular basis. He must reassure the people. He must increase the security at our borders and increase security on our airlines. He must push for standardized training guidelines for security officers.
In other words, the intelligence and security apparatus of the federal government must be vastly increased, and the capacity of the government to watch the people inside the borders made stronger. Again, I feel that many will object to this.
To pay for this, he must stop wasteful government spending. He must urge congress to actually read the bills that they are voting on. If the result is a slower legislative process, then so be it. We as American people must learn to slow down, to think before we act, to understand before we rush headlong into an issue.
There is absolutely nothing I can object to about this, in principle. I must ask however, precisely which government spending do you consider "wasteful"? It matters, because one person's "wasteful" is another person's "needful". Many groups are attached to certain programs, anc can motivate members of the populace to vote with that in mind. It is a political hurdle that every president has dealt with.
The statesman must present this case to the American people. He must then pursue a more progressive tax plan. He must streamline social programs and make them more efficient. He must seek to lower bureaucratic wastefulness and red tape.
So, less spending, more taxes. That's going to be a tough program to sell.
Most importantly, the statesman must gather a diverse team of advisors, from all professions, representing the interests of the American people. They must be black, white, Asian, democrat, republican, conservative, liberal, religious, and non-religious, and on and on. He needs to listen to their advice, and weigh the alternatives to determine the best, most effective choice for the American people.
Not to be glib, but a body like this already exists. It's called Congress, and for the President to get anything done, he must listen to them.
He must remember that he is a federal employee and a civil servant. He must remember that the office of president is not a priviledge, but a job. He must be a man of the people, and a servant of the people.
Every President since Jackson has labored to make this his image. What is your basis for assuming that Bush does not agree with every word of this?
I believe, that if such a person were to present a common sense approach for the American people, that the American people would unite behind that person. That grass root donations would and could pay for his presidential campaign, without the need for corporate sponsors who would later expect favors.
I've pointed out several points where people might not agree. But let us assume you were right, and a president came to power with a vast popular mandate to increase the surveillance powers of the federal government, decrease spending, increase taxes, close the borders, etc. What problems can you for see with such policies being implemented? How should they be addressed?
Maybe its all just a dream, but it is the American Dream.
Be careful of such assertions. I'm an American, and I don't know that this is my dream.
Allow me to reiterate that I find these arguments merely questionable, not offensive. It's said that such is about all we have in the way of consensus these days. But I guess that is the nature of an argument.
Faux Terrorists
John O'Sullivan has a recap on the terrorists who used to have movies made about them: The IRA. He suggests that the President ought to snub Sinn Fein on next St. Patrick's Day. I'm all for it. My contempt for the IRA is greater than that I have for the Islamofascists. They, at least, have the courage (twisted, cruel, monstrous courage, but courage nonetheless) of their convictions. They truly believe, in their bigoted way, that their actions are going to bring about the rule of holiness and virtue on Earth, the destruction of all that is evil. That is not to say that there are not charlatans and sinecure-hunters among them; there are. But their religious fury, horrific though it be, is genuine.
The IRA, methinks, doesn't even pretend to genuine relgious fury, if ever they have it. The "troubles" in Ireland are tribal, not really religious. It isn't about the varieties of Christian doctrine that Catholics and Protestants are fighting; it's the settling of old scores, and new ones. The Catholics in Ireland are the "natives" who've lived there since the Bronze Age. The Protestants are the "newcomers," mostly Scottish, who settled during the 17th Century (Never mind that a goodly number of the Scots came originally from Ireland; Ireland was once called Scota, and please please let's keep this logic from the Indians, shall we?). The slapping's been going on ever since.
I doubt very much that the IRA even believes its going to accomplish its stated objective of driving British authority from Northern Ireland. After 30 years, they've accomplished hardly a thing towards that end. By way of comparison, the Communists in Vietnam started from being a nothing organization in the 1940's to controlling half their country in 1954 to controlling all of it by 1976. Those guys meant what they said, and killed millions to accomplish what they said they wanted.
These ersatz Mick revolutionaries are a bunch of clowns, drug dealers and street thugs with expensive toys and nasty connections playing at war. They're not willing to really fight for what they say they want, not enough to achieve it, anyway. Plus, they're fighting the ground nubbin of yesterday's war. The Penal Laws have been abolished. The Irish Republic has been a going concern for decades, and it has a real army of its own. There's more southerners still mad at Sherman than there are Irish still mad at William III.
All these "boyos" need to be steadily penetrated, arrested, and sent away to the Isle of Man, like the FBI's been doing to the Mafia. And if George Bush isn't going to spend Columbus Day with the consiglieres of the Five Families, I don't see that he should be in the same time zone as Gerry Adams on St. Patrick's Day.
The IRA, methinks, doesn't even pretend to genuine relgious fury, if ever they have it. The "troubles" in Ireland are tribal, not really religious. It isn't about the varieties of Christian doctrine that Catholics and Protestants are fighting; it's the settling of old scores, and new ones. The Catholics in Ireland are the "natives" who've lived there since the Bronze Age. The Protestants are the "newcomers," mostly Scottish, who settled during the 17th Century (Never mind that a goodly number of the Scots came originally from Ireland; Ireland was once called Scota, and please please let's keep this logic from the Indians, shall we?). The slapping's been going on ever since.
I doubt very much that the IRA even believes its going to accomplish its stated objective of driving British authority from Northern Ireland. After 30 years, they've accomplished hardly a thing towards that end. By way of comparison, the Communists in Vietnam started from being a nothing organization in the 1940's to controlling half their country in 1954 to controlling all of it by 1976. Those guys meant what they said, and killed millions to accomplish what they said they wanted.
These ersatz Mick revolutionaries are a bunch of clowns, drug dealers and street thugs with expensive toys and nasty connections playing at war. They're not willing to really fight for what they say they want, not enough to achieve it, anyway. Plus, they're fighting the ground nubbin of yesterday's war. The Penal Laws have been abolished. The Irish Republic has been a going concern for decades, and it has a real army of its own. There's more southerners still mad at Sherman than there are Irish still mad at William III.
All these "boyos" need to be steadily penetrated, arrested, and sent away to the Isle of Man, like the FBI's been doing to the Mafia. And if George Bush isn't going to spend Columbus Day with the consiglieres of the Five Families, I don't see that he should be in the same time zone as Gerry Adams on St. Patrick's Day.
Monday, February 14, 2005
Black Comic. "Anti-Gay" Remarks. The Oscars. Get Ready.
And all this time I thought I was the only one that hated the Oscars.
BTW, I'm fine with the Academy deciding to dispense with Rock's services as host. No one has the obligation to continue to work with someone who publicly disparages them (even if I mostly agree with the disparagment, especially the "fashion show" line). I really don't think he's the kind of comic that the Oscars do well with. They like their patter to be self-involved and chirpy, and they like it to come from an actual movie star. Chris Rock has done movies, but he's more the angry black comic than the relaxed movie star. Billy Crystal, Steve Martin, Whoopi Goldberg come to mind. But then, they all got their start in stand-up, so what do I know?
This: if given a choice, I'd rather watch Chris Rock than the Oscars.
BTW, I'm fine with the Academy deciding to dispense with Rock's services as host. No one has the obligation to continue to work with someone who publicly disparages them (even if I mostly agree with the disparagment, especially the "fashion show" line). I really don't think he's the kind of comic that the Oscars do well with. They like their patter to be self-involved and chirpy, and they like it to come from an actual movie star. Chris Rock has done movies, but he's more the angry black comic than the relaxed movie star. Billy Crystal, Steve Martin, Whoopi Goldberg come to mind. But then, they all got their start in stand-up, so what do I know?
This: if given a choice, I'd rather watch Chris Rock than the Oscars.
Backing Myself Up
This Boston Globe piece (Hat Tip: Instapundit) goes a long way towards backing up my description of the left in the Essayist #2. Observe:
But you see, that's the point. The Left is synonymous with Social Revolution, and the Social Revolution means attacking whatever authority happens to exist, "speaking truth to power," in its own tendentious phrase. Liberal democracy is only to be embraced when it's a means of sticking it to the Man. Once democracy has been established, it loses it's value, and becomes the new Man to be taken out.
Revolutions. At war. Dig?
What a strange moment for the left to lose faith in democracy. The Soviet Union and other Leninist dictatorships are gone in a puff of smoke. Democracy is taking root in Latin America. South Korea, Indonesia, Taiwan, Mongolia, and Thailand are all newly democratic. Throughout the 20th century, war and authoritarianism were inseparable. For 30 years, democracy and free markets have surged and no war has occurred anywhere on the scale ofKorea and Vietnam, let alone World War I and World War II.
But you see, that's the point. The Left is synonymous with Social Revolution, and the Social Revolution means attacking whatever authority happens to exist, "speaking truth to power," in its own tendentious phrase. Liberal democracy is only to be embraced when it's a means of sticking it to the Man. Once democracy has been established, it loses it's value, and becomes the new Man to be taken out.
Revolutions. At war. Dig?
Friday, February 11, 2005
News Ponderings
I've only done viewings of Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction, so Essayist #3 is going to have to wait for the weekend. In the meantime, consider these half-assed rimshots:
1. North Korea: It it just me, or when you claim to have nuclear weapons, shouldn't you...blow one up, in an underground lab or something, you know, to demonstrate this fact?
NEWS FLASH!: Kim Jong-Il, will give up power to his son, Kim Jong-Chol, thus completely ruining my impression of how Koreans get their names. The succession of Il-Sung to Jong-Il made be believe it was a Russian Middle-name-is-dad's-name deal. You know, like Yuri Andreivich. I shall just have to wander about.
2. The Budget: Folks, it's real simple. We, as a people, want more from the government than we're willing to give it. Until that changes, the budget will not add up.
3. Charles and Camilla: You know, Chuck, just because you're going to be King of England, doesn't mean you have to marry a drag queen.
4. Corey Feldman and Michael Jackson: Still no confirmed testimony as to which one stole the other's clothes first...
5. Eason Jordan: I still don't get it. If he's no longer affirming what he suggested might be happening, where's the scandal?
1. North Korea: It it just me, or when you claim to have nuclear weapons, shouldn't you...blow one up, in an underground lab or something, you know, to demonstrate this fact?
NEWS FLASH!: Kim Jong-Il, will give up power to his son, Kim Jong-Chol, thus completely ruining my impression of how Koreans get their names. The succession of Il-Sung to Jong-Il made be believe it was a Russian Middle-name-is-dad's-name deal. You know, like Yuri Andreivich. I shall just have to wander about.
2. The Budget: Folks, it's real simple. We, as a people, want more from the government than we're willing to give it. Until that changes, the budget will not add up.
3. Charles and Camilla: You know, Chuck, just because you're going to be King of England, doesn't mean you have to marry a drag queen.
4. Corey Feldman and Michael Jackson: Still no confirmed testimony as to which one stole the other's clothes first...
5. Eason Jordan: I still don't get it. If he's no longer affirming what he suggested might be happening, where's the scandal?
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
"white supremacist Nazi's shouldn't be allowed to advertise"
Last week I argued that a Liberal society is not necessarily bound to permit all forms of expression; certain things can be named anathema. Here's the kind of thing I mean.
Granted, they're just publicizing their existence. But can we name them unutterable? According to most constitutional scholars, no. Yet we would censor many things that they would say, and probably not permit them to buy ad space on television. Where precisely is the line drawn? Legal scholars?
BTW, why didn't the county just annoy them and rename the road "the Rosa Parks Memorial Highway," or some such?
Granted, they're just publicizing their existence. But can we name them unutterable? According to most constitutional scholars, no. Yet we would censor many things that they would say, and probably not permit them to buy ad space on television. Where precisely is the line drawn? Legal scholars?
BTW, why didn't the county just annoy them and rename the road "the Rosa Parks Memorial Highway," or some such?
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
Meanwhile, Across the Pond...
Here's a fun blog to check out, if you're curious as to what the hell is going on in Europe. I especially like this item, in which President Chirac of France calls for a globaly anti-poverty tax. You can't make this stuff up.
"Anti-poverty tax"...is it just me, or is that a bit like "anti-pregnancy sperm"?
"Anti-poverty tax"...is it just me, or is that a bit like "anti-pregnancy sperm"?
Glenn Reynolds as Ahab
Number of times that the phrase "Eason Jordan" is found on the front page of Instapundit: 23.
In case you haven't been following, Jordan is a CNN executive who made a statement to the effect that the U.S. Military has been deliberately targeting foreign journalists. Then he unsaid it, and then...I don't know. I don't know what's giving the story legs, other than a chance for the blogs to say "gotcha!" at the MSM again. Which is fun.
In case you haven't been following, Jordan is a CNN executive who made a statement to the effect that the U.S. Military has been deliberately targeting foreign journalists. Then he unsaid it, and then...I don't know. I don't know what's giving the story legs, other than a chance for the blogs to say "gotcha!" at the MSM again. Which is fun.
Monday, February 07, 2005
The New Week's Work
This week I leave behind politics for pop-culture, appropriate in the week after the oddly anti-climatic Super Bowl (the game was pretty good, but the commercials were a fizzle).
Specifically, I'm going to be writing about the films of Quentin Tarantino. I have a theory as to why his films remain popular, despite the fact that they are neither artistic masterpieces nor predictable formula pieces. Outside thoughts are most welcome.
Specifically, I'm going to be writing about the films of Quentin Tarantino. I have a theory as to why his films remain popular, despite the fact that they are neither artistic masterpieces nor predictable formula pieces. Outside thoughts are most welcome.
Saturday, February 05, 2005
Link's Up
Added the two blogs I've invaded to the blogroll. The Snoblog, on the other hand, appears not to be updated regular. I might have noticed that if the dates weren't grey text on a white background. That's my story, anyway, and I'm sticking to it.
Friday, February 04, 2005
The Essayist #2: The Age of Revolution.
Time Magazine's decision to name George Bush as Person of the Year was surprising, not for the choice (was the MSM really to name its mortal enemy, the blogosphere?), but for the tone it took. The picture of the President bore the caption: "George Bush: American Revolutionary." Surely, the title wrankled many on the left, for whom the term "Revolutionary" means leftism by definition. While I didn't see much play in the mainstream press about it, it did not escape notice. A standard objection may be found here, a standard defense here.
I have no objection to the term, even as one who considers himself politically conservative had had hoped that in voting to re-elect the President I was putting another conservative in power. And my lack of objection speaks to my premise, which is that we live in the Age of Revolution.
One of the better works of history I have come across has been Will and Ariel Durant’s Story of Civilization series. They are massive; 6-700 pages each, and overwhelming in the detail with which they flood the reader. The Durants give us politics, law, the lives of kings, the quirks of past historians, the grandeur of architecture; the passions of poets and philosophes, and the overall taste of ages past. One gets the sense of having been in the mind of St. Paul, or Titian, or Augustus Caeser, of having witnessed Cannae and the Reign of Terror, of having walked through narrow streets chatting with Ben Jonson or Catullus.
They are not without their downside, of course. They require disciplined readership; to date I’ve only managed to devour Volume 9: The Age of Voltaire. I don’t remember why I started there; somehow I’ve always felt an affinity for Voltaire, which perhaps stems from the fact that he and I share the same birthday (Nov 21). I’ve skimmed parts of other volumes, absorbed sections of others, but never fully. Perhaps when school lets out I’ll devote the summer to them.
The other downside is that they tend to lose their majestic scale as they progress. Volume 1 includes the millennia of Stone Age humans, Egypt, and Mesopotamia. Volume 2 tells the life of Ancient Greece, Volume 3, Rome and the Rise of Christianity, Volume 4, the thousand years between Rome’s fall and the Reformation. But there are 11 volumes, and so the briefs become smaller in scope. The 15th, 16th, and 17th centuries roughly occupy volumes 5-8, and the 18th is the scope of volumes 9 and 10. By the time we get to volume 11, the "Age of Napoleon," we get but 26 years.
There’s something of the aesthetic to this objection, but 26 years is hardly an age. Durant has no difficulty filling the tome, with names and facts both familiar and surprising, and Napoleon is well deserving of many books about him. But while the years 1789-1815 were certainly epoch-making, they are not themselves the epoch. Durant’s work is best when bringing the large perspective to history, and here that is sadly lacking.
All of which begs the question: What defines our age? What gives moral legitimacy to our social structures? What justification drives our politics?
What can it be, but "Revolution"?
Ours is an age of speed, when today is pushed quickly into the past and yesterday as soon forgotten. What is our hurry? For millennia mankind lived generation-to-generation with so few ripples in its cycle that they have come down to us by name. Tribe grew to kingdom, kingdom grew to empire, empire wallowed in excess and was overwhelmed by tribes. Whether you name it Akkad, Maurya, Zhou, or Roma, the story is always the same. The center expands, the center rots, the king is shuffled off and all good men shout God/Buddha/Allah Save…
Then, in the last quarter the 18th century, humanity, began to reject this dynamic utterly. I date the beginning of the Age of Revolution from 1775, not 1789, not because I believe the American Revolution to be the only one that matters, but because I do not believe the French Revolution, and her daughter the Russian, to be the only ones that matter.
But let us halt, and define our terms. By "Revolution," I mean the willful casting aside of a political and/or social order for a presumed better one, and when that order is established, defended and expanded. The call to Revolution is heard daily in modern discourse. Whether you are animated by feminism, Marxism, gay rights, environmentalism, and yes, even free-market capitalism, you are seeking to change the existing order to one which will be more beneficial to whichever group you happen to care about. The image of truth struggling against mass perversity has been powerful in every age, but it is absolute in ours.
No time in human history has been more hostile to arguments of (small-c) conservatism. In times past, heritage and tradition had powerful holds on human imaginations. To a lesser degree, they still do, but to argue on the basis of nothing else has long been held to be the last refuge of the bigoted ignoramus. Since the 18th century, everything humanity has believed itself to understand has been subject to scrutiny. I do not judge that scrutiny to have been wholly negative. Indeed, I regard it as part of a natural rythmn of the collective grasping of truth. I merely point out how total and merciless the scrutiny has been, how all-encompassing.
The ancient laws regarding political, familial, sexual, and moral order have all either been overthrown, or have a loud party seeking their overthrow. Even in the absence of pressure to reform or undo a tradition, there is a seeming presumption that changing the world, and changing it now, would be the moral choice. It has entered the popular and commercial discourses as well, in the fuzzy-minded utopianism of pop singers and stand-up comics. To them, the status quo is always "so fucked up," and the Man is always to blame, whoever He happens to be (generally, anyone who speaks three kind words in favor of old traditions), and if only we could find the will…
Let me be clearer. I am not in favor of bringing anything back to the pre-1775 order. I am fine with the abandonment of monarchial feudalism, scientific creationism, the exclusion of women from the public sphere. I am not even opposed to humanity’s ongoing self-scrutiny. The Reality Principle decrees that what humans do, they have a reason for doing, and I must be careful in judging it. At present, I am merely describing the age we live in, the presumptions that are encoded in our words.
One of the problems is that we do not agree on Revolution (but of course…if we did, we would not need it). Many would place the proper ends of it towards this problem but not that one, to destroy this institution but leave that one alone. Vague labels, such as "right" and "left" muddy these waters even further. I think the best explanation is that there are two kinds of Revolution: the liberal and the social.
The Liberal Revolution is the enemy of the state. Anything which restricts the political or economic rights of the individual, the Liberal Revolution opposes. And by "rights," I mean the freedom of the individual to engage in self-generated political or economic activity. In a liberal state, no person is artificially restricted from saying or selling, from starting a political party, or a business. That is where the revolution ends. No one in a liberal society has any claim on anyone else, other than that his rights will not be violated.
Note that these rights are not necessarily intended to be taken to their logical conclusion: the right to say or sell anything. This is the difference between a liberal and a libertarian. The Liberal Revolution is not opposed to forms of social control; rather it depends on these, and not the state, to create social order. Censorship may be and is applied to all things which a balance of society names anathema: pornography, sedition, human slavery (if one is free to sell anything, why not human beings?). But the Index Expurgatorius is sharply limited and open to debate.
In addition, liberal societies tend to place restrictions on the state’s power to prosecute criminals. There are elaborate legal safeguards, regulations on how crime is investigated, and extensive right of appeal. None of which always prevents an innocent man from being convicted, but it falls entirely within the concept of the place of, and fear of, government in a liberal society. It is there to serve; not to be served.
The Social Revolution, arguably the Liberal's angry son, has a widely different, even open-ended, goal. The Social Revolution is the enemy of wherever power, authority, or influence is being exercised. Following Rousseau, the socialist believes that human structures are inherently unjust. In the extreme form, social programs advocate violent destruction of existing modes of power, with the expectation that humanity, thus freed from falsehood like the man in Plato's Allegory of the Cave, will start again, down the path that has now been made clear, whatever that might be. In the more moderate form, the socialist acts as critic and gadfly, exposing the injustices and failures in society and demanding, in as loud a voice as possible, a redress. Where the liberal opposes centralized tyranny, the socialist opposes local injustice, and through the cracks in the system, denounces the whole.
These two revolutions have been at war at least since 1789, when a social revolution piggy-backed over a liberal one and, from its starting point of tearing down the Sun Monarchy in France, moved on to attacking the institution that gave France her social control: the Catholic Church. From there, Napoleon fought not for the restriction of the state but for the social dominance of the new, enlightened ruling class. The last liberal revolution occurred in 1848, in Germany, and it was defeated by a monarchy that would use the program of socialists to retain dominance. Since then, Europe has moved ever gradually toward the social camp, growing an ever-larger bureaucracy with which to legislate the end of any form of inequality. This has even occurred in Britian, which gave birth to liberalism in the 17th Century.
Taken in that context, the history of the 20th century is the history of the clash of the two Revolutions. That the social-militarist Kaiserreich in Germany should have proven poor soil for the liberal Weimar state does not surprise, nor that the even more Socialist, even more Militarist Third Reich. Many deny that Hitler and Mussolini were socialists, despite the evidence, because they were nationalists and used nationalist symbols. But as I have defined the Social Revolution, nationalism need not be excluded from it, if the ruling class is deemed anti-national, as the Weimar state was. As there are many forms of human society, so there are many forms of social control, so there are many injustices, real or imagined, to rebel against. The fascist was merely a different form of socialist than the communist. Both hated liberals.
In the Cold war, therefore, we see the liberal and the social revolutions wrestling one another to the ground; the one that tapped out lost. The collapse of the Soviet Untion however, does not mean the end of social revolutionaries or socialist criticism. During the Cold War, both the U.S. and Europe, bastions of liberalism, became more socialist. European socialism has been earlier described. American socialism took the more moderate form of social criticsm and undermining traditional mores. The results have been mixed; greater public acceptance of women and racial minorities, coupled with an increase in social pathologies and venereal diseases, and a decrease in the birth rate.
Thus, the proper way to try to explain the differences in the American poltical dynamic to non-Americans, increasingly important in this day and age, is to drop the terms "conservative" and "liberal". American "Conservatives" seek to protect and expand the Revolution of 1775, the last and arguably most successful Liberal Revolution. American "Liberals" are actually socialists, who reject the title because of its connotative connection with Communism. But it is social injustices that "Liberals" fight, and social solutions that they propose and seek to defend against liberal attacks, like the proposed reform of Social Security (perhaps the last honestly named program in the federal government).
The Republican party is thus the party of American liberals, and the Democratic party that of American socialists. Both defend a Revolution, both believe themselves oppressed by the other, both promise that freedom will follow their success. In his wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, President Bush has thus made the expansion of the Liberal Revolution to be the weapon against both Islamism (a grotesque cross-breeding of medieval will-to-power with anti-semitic fascism) and the increasingly socialist international bureaucracy. Which side will win will be the story of at least the first part of this century.
Thank you, drive through...
I have no objection to the term, even as one who considers himself politically conservative had had hoped that in voting to re-elect the President I was putting another conservative in power. And my lack of objection speaks to my premise, which is that we live in the Age of Revolution.
One of the better works of history I have come across has been Will and Ariel Durant’s Story of Civilization series. They are massive; 6-700 pages each, and overwhelming in the detail with which they flood the reader. The Durants give us politics, law, the lives of kings, the quirks of past historians, the grandeur of architecture; the passions of poets and philosophes, and the overall taste of ages past. One gets the sense of having been in the mind of St. Paul, or Titian, or Augustus Caeser, of having witnessed Cannae and the Reign of Terror, of having walked through narrow streets chatting with Ben Jonson or Catullus.
They are not without their downside, of course. They require disciplined readership; to date I’ve only managed to devour Volume 9: The Age of Voltaire. I don’t remember why I started there; somehow I’ve always felt an affinity for Voltaire, which perhaps stems from the fact that he and I share the same birthday (Nov 21). I’ve skimmed parts of other volumes, absorbed sections of others, but never fully. Perhaps when school lets out I’ll devote the summer to them.
The other downside is that they tend to lose their majestic scale as they progress. Volume 1 includes the millennia of Stone Age humans, Egypt, and Mesopotamia. Volume 2 tells the life of Ancient Greece, Volume 3, Rome and the Rise of Christianity, Volume 4, the thousand years between Rome’s fall and the Reformation. But there are 11 volumes, and so the briefs become smaller in scope. The 15th, 16th, and 17th centuries roughly occupy volumes 5-8, and the 18th is the scope of volumes 9 and 10. By the time we get to volume 11, the "Age of Napoleon," we get but 26 years.
There’s something of the aesthetic to this objection, but 26 years is hardly an age. Durant has no difficulty filling the tome, with names and facts both familiar and surprising, and Napoleon is well deserving of many books about him. But while the years 1789-1815 were certainly epoch-making, they are not themselves the epoch. Durant’s work is best when bringing the large perspective to history, and here that is sadly lacking.
All of which begs the question: What defines our age? What gives moral legitimacy to our social structures? What justification drives our politics?
What can it be, but "Revolution"?
Ours is an age of speed, when today is pushed quickly into the past and yesterday as soon forgotten. What is our hurry? For millennia mankind lived generation-to-generation with so few ripples in its cycle that they have come down to us by name. Tribe grew to kingdom, kingdom grew to empire, empire wallowed in excess and was overwhelmed by tribes. Whether you name it Akkad, Maurya, Zhou, or Roma, the story is always the same. The center expands, the center rots, the king is shuffled off and all good men shout God/Buddha/Allah Save…
Then, in the last quarter the 18th century, humanity, began to reject this dynamic utterly. I date the beginning of the Age of Revolution from 1775, not 1789, not because I believe the American Revolution to be the only one that matters, but because I do not believe the French Revolution, and her daughter the Russian, to be the only ones that matter.
But let us halt, and define our terms. By "Revolution," I mean the willful casting aside of a political and/or social order for a presumed better one, and when that order is established, defended and expanded. The call to Revolution is heard daily in modern discourse. Whether you are animated by feminism, Marxism, gay rights, environmentalism, and yes, even free-market capitalism, you are seeking to change the existing order to one which will be more beneficial to whichever group you happen to care about. The image of truth struggling against mass perversity has been powerful in every age, but it is absolute in ours.
No time in human history has been more hostile to arguments of (small-c) conservatism. In times past, heritage and tradition had powerful holds on human imaginations. To a lesser degree, they still do, but to argue on the basis of nothing else has long been held to be the last refuge of the bigoted ignoramus. Since the 18th century, everything humanity has believed itself to understand has been subject to scrutiny. I do not judge that scrutiny to have been wholly negative. Indeed, I regard it as part of a natural rythmn of the collective grasping of truth. I merely point out how total and merciless the scrutiny has been, how all-encompassing.
The ancient laws regarding political, familial, sexual, and moral order have all either been overthrown, or have a loud party seeking their overthrow. Even in the absence of pressure to reform or undo a tradition, there is a seeming presumption that changing the world, and changing it now, would be the moral choice. It has entered the popular and commercial discourses as well, in the fuzzy-minded utopianism of pop singers and stand-up comics. To them, the status quo is always "so fucked up," and the Man is always to blame, whoever He happens to be (generally, anyone who speaks three kind words in favor of old traditions), and if only we could find the will…
Let me be clearer. I am not in favor of bringing anything back to the pre-1775 order. I am fine with the abandonment of monarchial feudalism, scientific creationism, the exclusion of women from the public sphere. I am not even opposed to humanity’s ongoing self-scrutiny. The Reality Principle decrees that what humans do, they have a reason for doing, and I must be careful in judging it. At present, I am merely describing the age we live in, the presumptions that are encoded in our words.
One of the problems is that we do not agree on Revolution (but of course…if we did, we would not need it). Many would place the proper ends of it towards this problem but not that one, to destroy this institution but leave that one alone. Vague labels, such as "right" and "left" muddy these waters even further. I think the best explanation is that there are two kinds of Revolution: the liberal and the social.
The Liberal Revolution is the enemy of the state. Anything which restricts the political or economic rights of the individual, the Liberal Revolution opposes. And by "rights," I mean the freedom of the individual to engage in self-generated political or economic activity. In a liberal state, no person is artificially restricted from saying or selling, from starting a political party, or a business. That is where the revolution ends. No one in a liberal society has any claim on anyone else, other than that his rights will not be violated.
Note that these rights are not necessarily intended to be taken to their logical conclusion: the right to say or sell anything. This is the difference between a liberal and a libertarian. The Liberal Revolution is not opposed to forms of social control; rather it depends on these, and not the state, to create social order. Censorship may be and is applied to all things which a balance of society names anathema: pornography, sedition, human slavery (if one is free to sell anything, why not human beings?). But the Index Expurgatorius is sharply limited and open to debate.
In addition, liberal societies tend to place restrictions on the state’s power to prosecute criminals. There are elaborate legal safeguards, regulations on how crime is investigated, and extensive right of appeal. None of which always prevents an innocent man from being convicted, but it falls entirely within the concept of the place of, and fear of, government in a liberal society. It is there to serve; not to be served.
The Social Revolution, arguably the Liberal's angry son, has a widely different, even open-ended, goal. The Social Revolution is the enemy of wherever power, authority, or influence is being exercised. Following Rousseau, the socialist believes that human structures are inherently unjust. In the extreme form, social programs advocate violent destruction of existing modes of power, with the expectation that humanity, thus freed from falsehood like the man in Plato's Allegory of the Cave, will start again, down the path that has now been made clear, whatever that might be. In the more moderate form, the socialist acts as critic and gadfly, exposing the injustices and failures in society and demanding, in as loud a voice as possible, a redress. Where the liberal opposes centralized tyranny, the socialist opposes local injustice, and through the cracks in the system, denounces the whole.
These two revolutions have been at war at least since 1789, when a social revolution piggy-backed over a liberal one and, from its starting point of tearing down the Sun Monarchy in France, moved on to attacking the institution that gave France her social control: the Catholic Church. From there, Napoleon fought not for the restriction of the state but for the social dominance of the new, enlightened ruling class. The last liberal revolution occurred in 1848, in Germany, and it was defeated by a monarchy that would use the program of socialists to retain dominance. Since then, Europe has moved ever gradually toward the social camp, growing an ever-larger bureaucracy with which to legislate the end of any form of inequality. This has even occurred in Britian, which gave birth to liberalism in the 17th Century.
Taken in that context, the history of the 20th century is the history of the clash of the two Revolutions. That the social-militarist Kaiserreich in Germany should have proven poor soil for the liberal Weimar state does not surprise, nor that the even more Socialist, even more Militarist Third Reich. Many deny that Hitler and Mussolini were socialists, despite the evidence, because they were nationalists and used nationalist symbols. But as I have defined the Social Revolution, nationalism need not be excluded from it, if the ruling class is deemed anti-national, as the Weimar state was. As there are many forms of human society, so there are many forms of social control, so there are many injustices, real or imagined, to rebel against. The fascist was merely a different form of socialist than the communist. Both hated liberals.
In the Cold war, therefore, we see the liberal and the social revolutions wrestling one another to the ground; the one that tapped out lost. The collapse of the Soviet Untion however, does not mean the end of social revolutionaries or socialist criticism. During the Cold War, both the U.S. and Europe, bastions of liberalism, became more socialist. European socialism has been earlier described. American socialism took the more moderate form of social criticsm and undermining traditional mores. The results have been mixed; greater public acceptance of women and racial minorities, coupled with an increase in social pathologies and venereal diseases, and a decrease in the birth rate.
Thus, the proper way to try to explain the differences in the American poltical dynamic to non-Americans, increasingly important in this day and age, is to drop the terms "conservative" and "liberal". American "Conservatives" seek to protect and expand the Revolution of 1775, the last and arguably most successful Liberal Revolution. American "Liberals" are actually socialists, who reject the title because of its connotative connection with Communism. But it is social injustices that "Liberals" fight, and social solutions that they propose and seek to defend against liberal attacks, like the proposed reform of Social Security (perhaps the last honestly named program in the federal government).
The Republican party is thus the party of American liberals, and the Democratic party that of American socialists. Both defend a Revolution, both believe themselves oppressed by the other, both promise that freedom will follow their success. In his wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, President Bush has thus made the expansion of the Liberal Revolution to be the weapon against both Islamism (a grotesque cross-breeding of medieval will-to-power with anti-semitic fascism) and the increasingly socialist international bureaucracy. Which side will win will be the story of at least the first part of this century.
Thank you, drive through...
Wednesday, February 02, 2005
Just in Case You Thought We Were Done Talking About Vietnam...
...Daily Kos is reviving it (Hat Tip: TCS). Whatever would the Left do without Vietnam to serve as an analogy for every foreign war (led by Republicans)?
The argument runs as follows: in 1967, South Vietnam had free elections, with high turnout, despite being warned by the Viet Cong not to vote. We did not win in Vietnam. Ergo, we will not win in Iraq.
One hates to have to fight old battles, but since the left seems stuck in the 60's, we're going to have to oblige them. The 1967 South Vietnam elections would seem to be not exactly the kind of elections we just saw in Iraq:
Unless Kos is prepared to argue that the Iraq election has been fraudulently conducted, that candidates have been barred, that newspapers have been suppressed, or that Zarqawi=Buddhist Peace Candidate, I don't see how his analogy holds together.
Let us shout it from the rooftops: ONLY. VIETNAM. WAS. VIETNAM!
The argument runs as follows: in 1967, South Vietnam had free elections, with high turnout, despite being warned by the Viet Cong not to vote. We did not win in Vietnam. Ergo, we will not win in Iraq.
One hates to have to fight old battles, but since the left seems stuck in the 60's, we're going to have to oblige them. The 1967 South Vietnam elections would seem to be not exactly the kind of elections we just saw in Iraq:
In elections held in South Vietnam in September 1967, former generals Nguyen Van Thieu and Nguyen Cao Ky were elected president and vice president, respectively. A number of popular candidates, including Buddhists and peace candidates, were barred from running, and newspapers were largely suppressed during the campaign. Even so, the military candidates received less than 35 percent of the vote, although the election took place only in areas under the Saigon government's control. When proof of widespread election fraud was produced by the defeated candidates, students and Buddhists demonstrated and demanded that the elections be annulled.
Unless Kos is prepared to argue that the Iraq election has been fraudulently conducted, that candidates have been barred, that newspapers have been suppressed, or that Zarqawi=Buddhist Peace Candidate, I don't see how his analogy holds together.
Let us shout it from the rooftops: ONLY. VIETNAM. WAS. VIETNAM!
Fun With De Tocqueville
The debate at De Tocqueville Boulevard seems to be winding down. We've each said our piece, and a degree of philosophical impasse has been reached. That said, there are some areas upon which we can agree:
1. The issue is complicated. Reforming so Titanic a beast as SocSec is going to require time and energy and thought. It's not going to be a Gordian knot.
2. Many things are going to need to be done to fix the problem. Partial privatization will not do it alone.
3. There is no excuse for inaction. We need to do something about this now, while we still can.
That sounds like the beginnings of consensus, if people are willing to be fair with one another. I wonder if anyone's told Congress yet?
1. The issue is complicated. Reforming so Titanic a beast as SocSec is going to require time and energy and thought. It's not going to be a Gordian knot.
2. Many things are going to need to be done to fix the problem. Partial privatization will not do it alone.
3. There is no excuse for inaction. We need to do something about this now, while we still can.
That sounds like the beginnings of consensus, if people are willing to be fair with one another. I wonder if anyone's told Congress yet?
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