As expected, Trump’s team has reorganized the Republican National Committee’s donation system, arranging for maximum donations to go first to Trump’s presidential campaign, then to Trump’s Save America political action committee, and finally to the RNC to elect down ballot candidates.
I wonder if Betsy DeVos helped him with this RNC pyramid model, because, you know -Amway. I must say I would enjoy it immensely if the Trump/Putin "MAGAtized" RNC paid Trump's legal bills and starved every other GOP campaign for donations. And yes, George Conway is correct, it should be called the MAGAPutins or something similar. Regardless of the name, it is a criminal organization working to attack the Republic (as a representative democracy), destroy vital institutions such as Social Security and public education, and burn the U.S. Constitution and Declaration of Independence.
Senators Budd, Lee, Cruz, and Paul -are all part of the MAGA movement -and Cruz also stood against certification of the 2020 election with 146 other MAGAtized extremists who should be considered for expulsion from Congress.
MTG- WHO does she think she is? And WHY? And WHEN and HOW did she become who she thinks she is? WHAT more can she and her cronies-in-crime do before they are
"put in their place."
HOW has she been allowed to do her detrimental "thing"
There are 'useful idiots’ and then there are 'outrageous useful idiots'. She does what she does because she is encouraged and rewarded for it. She distracts and people bite on the distractions, and if she distracts enough while the hidden dirty work proceeds apace, all the better. Look at all the footage there was of her in her stupid costume at the SOTU address. Look at the footage of Biden making a face at her getup on that occasion. All a waste of everyone’s time and attention, but the so called fourth estate can't get enough of it. So it, 'it' being the nihilistic behavior of an outrageous useful idiot, continues ad nauseam.
Ego is the most dangerous drug of all; and yet we all have one. Ego literally means "I", and it's there for good reason. R. L. Stevenson's point in "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde" is that Hyde is part of human nature; and there is an addictive appeal to exerting unaccountable power. There is a touch of it in my sneering at MTG, but few (if any) of us are total saints. Certainly her behavior is worthy of condemnation.
I become dangerous if I begin to tell myself that only my preferences, only my rights matter, that other people are only obstacles, tools, or toys. Or perhaps only those of my race, nation or cohort are worth to live or find their own way. Trump seems to have no brake on narcissism; he appears ready to maliciously cheat/betray anyone. Weird that he is admired for that, but that's far from new in the course of history. We as a species keep making that same mistake over and over, and as our species' power to do increases, it threatens to kill us all.
Evolution also selected our powers of reason and the better angels of our nature, love, reason, empathy, conscience, compassion, etc., the "angel" one shoulder and "devil" on the other. We collectively need to get smarter fast about which to follow.
Seriously, what is the point of Maggot Traitor Gangrene? She is doing NOTHING to work on the issues facing the people in her constituency, and is harming them and the rest of the country in the bargain. And WTH is Johnson doing recessing the House? He really doesn't grasp his job, either as a representative or as the Speaker, does he? (That isn't really a question.)
Heck, I just spell it right out for folks: Empty Greene. Completely empty of brains, empty of any ability to shut her yap, empty of any sense of decorum or dignity and yes, empty of any form of common sense.
The Freedom Caucus, if that's the word for it now, is determined to follow through on bringing down the "administrative state", it's all out now regardless of the chaos, and that just seems to be their gameplan. Anarchy, since there is no way other members of Congress can go along and maintain their political sanity, or survival.
Of course, the "Freedom Caucus" would be right out of a certain Orwell novel. I think CHAOS Caucus would be more fitting - or even more appropriate, KAOS, like the international organization of evil in "Get Smart" (the '60s TV comedy, for those of you under age 50).
I wonder what their electorates are thinking right now. Are they as bad as their reps? Some of the random street comments from Trump supporters doesn't feel encouraging. But ...
A goodly number of their supporters just want to own the libs and have all the biases that these members show. Also a certain part of the population loves the idea of thumbing their noses at authority and being totally uncivil. Death star has given them carte blanche to act out and being in the face of everyone they perceive to be different.
Read an article about trumpers being interviewed about how they felt about trump's insulting the handicapped. "It's a political campaign thing." It's terrible" etc. Would you still vote for him? Yes.
1984 was the most ominous book i ever read. Age 16 or so, one night in a basement. Chilled me to the heart. (offset - the year my second child was born)
My species awes and disappoints me, even scares me. There is so much to like, so many "gifts"; it's nuts the degree to which our species is it's own worst enemy.
I used to like people; now, I just want to get away from most of them. Perhaps our species is more palatable in small doses. "Zero population growth" was a stellar idea!
I think a lot of our big problems have been exacerbated by population growth, including immigration issues, climate change, and seeming disintegration of a sense of community. It not the only factor, but it complicates a lot.
"Repressive Regressives" is about perfect, Gary. I think certain ones may be called "Aggressive Repressive Regressives", or the ARRs! Pirates one and all!
HCR's letters remind us that Lincoln's republican party stood for investing in the infrastructure of society so that free men could build their lives upon a strong foundation that only a collective (the government) can build and maintain. The republican party of my lifetime (62 years) has always wanted to do the opposite. Let the corporations, already powerful rich white men, take over and usurp everyone else. Of course they admire Putin.
" The legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves---in their separate, and individual capacities.
In all that the people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought not to interfere." - Lincoln
I would not take "individually do as well for themselves" to mean "let the billionaires buy up everything, and pay whatever they ask for it". That's "Reganomics".
Perhaps, instead of buying megayachts, or spaceships, etc., the obscenely rich could invest in the country, as their predecessors did in "the good old days". Andrew Carnegie comes immediately to mind.
Carnegie was still a ruthless creep but I liked his libraries. The problem is even when the not so predatory rich do genuinely good works, they do so according to their vision/understanding which can be one-sided or out of touch. We benefit from philanthropy, and we can benefit from visionaries, who sometimes see what's needed before the crowd; but as a rule, the People are going to be the final authority on what the people need and where the people want to go. That's a democratic society. Somehow spaceflight was more exciting to me when we as a nation chose to go to the Moon and do the other things than watching preening billionaires make it their personal playground.
Well, "conservative" can mean "prudent", as in a "conservative estimate". In that sense it acknowledges the pitfalls of hubris, which is to say it implies a degree of humility. I consider "the scientific method" to be conservative in a good way. "Conservation" was an early name for "environmental protection", which is conservative. Wantonly destroying resources and climate balance is not.
What is most familiar about repressiveness in the 1800s is the pompous pretext for imposition of a hierarchical society, with very rich males at the top. In this case, white males, but you will see similar scams across the globe, with some persons and cohorts spouting flowery rationalizations proclaiming the righteousness of bullying and ripping everybody else off.
In the 1850s, follow the money. In the 2020s, follow the money.
It seems to me that trust is crucial to a free and open society. Not blind trust of course, but reasonable trust. No, the Nigerian Prince probably is not palnning to share millions of dollars with you if you just send some money, but we entrust things to others every day. Significant cheating poisons a social environment. We can adapt to it to some degree, but at some point the society will degenerate into despotism or chaos or both. We must all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately".
The truth we get to know can be somewhat elusive, but we can at least tell the truth, so far as we understand it. I think societies thrive on good faith, and tyranny is sustained by lies.
Though I think of it more as the Party of Selfishness, and that extreme, pathological selfishness results in deaths. Maybe even that of our whole species (the universe is perfectly capable of ending all of our stories unexpectedly, but likely won't any time soon). Knowledge without wisdom can be dangerous, let alone charting the future on damnable lies. Unbridled Selfishness + Unaccountable Power = Disaster
It's a selfishness that leads to death: of rights, of our democracy, of the planet, of genuine patriotism, of what Jesus taught, of any kind of human decency. We are headed more quickly than expected to making the planet unlivable. I find wisdom to be a fairly rare commodity. As for knowledge, someone will always figure a way to use it dangerously.
Wisdom does not seem to get much press these days. I'm not even sure how to define it, but I think that at least in part it has to do with with seeing extended consequence and an improved sense of what most matters.
The Latin root of "vermin" means "worm". Worms are attractive bait for many fishes. Worms can be used to lure an unpopular variety of fish known as "Suckers".
"This morning, conservative lawyer George Conway suggested that “we should stop defiling the memory of the party of Lincoln by referring to the current organization” as the Republican Party."
Nonsense. Revisionist in the worst way - abdicating responsibility. It's been Republicans all the way down and as far back at least to Nixon, Reagan, Gingrich, et al. Direct and even blood heirs of the Confederacy - ever since opening their arms to the Dixiecrats and jumping into bed with the religious right. From William F. Buckley and George F. Will through Murdoch, Bannon, and Jones to Truth Social. From the Powell Memorandum through the Federalist Society and Politics of Faith to the Seven Mountain Mandate and Heritage Society Project 2025. Republican Party it is. Through and through. Warp and woof.
Thank you, it’s been for most of my adult life, I liked Ike and Everett Dirksen, the others have just been apologists for the worst of the worst. Even Will Rogers knew on November 26, 1932. “The money was all appropriated for the top in the hopes that it would trickle down to the needy. Mr. Hoover didn’t know that money trickled up. Give it to the people at the bottom and the people at the top will have it before night, anyhow. But it will have passed through the poor fellow's hands.” Mr Hoover may have believed that money trickled down, but no republican since ever bought that crap. My humble opinion for most of my long life.
It infuriates me to be wrong when I know I’m right.
—Molière
To err is human, to repent divine; to persist devilish.
-- Benjamin Franklin
Kathryn Schulz "On Being Wrong"
"Being wrong is an inescapable part of being alive. And yet we go through life tacitly assuming (or loudly insisting) that we are right about nearly everything - from our political beliefs to our private memories, from our grasp of scientific fact to the merits of our favourite team. Being Wrong looks at why this conviction has such a powerful grip on us, what happens when this conviction is shaken, and how we interpret the moral, political and psychological significance of being wrong. Drawing on philosophies old and new and cutting-edge neuroscience, Schulz offers an exploration of the allure of certainty and the necessity of fallibility in four main areas: in religion (when the end of the world fails to be nigh); in politics (where were those WMD?); in memory (where are my keys?); and in love (when Mr or Ms Right becomes Mr or Ms Wrong)."
The OSS psychological profile of Hitler described his use of the big lie:
His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.
Yes. Let the name continue to be used until it goes down in flames. Let it join the "No Knothings, the Federalists and the Whigs in the dust bin of American history. Republican now means "crooks and traitors". Let it die.
Hopefully, a new center right party will be formed that can provide a normal and natural balance to our political ecosystem. Such things exist in other democracies. A natural yin and yang. Hopefully it will be led by honest patriots. They won't get my vote, but they could be at least be legitimate participants in the electoral process.
Hopefully. We continue to have Hope. Hope for our nation, our people, our world. It’s an ancient emotion that must be accompanied with action. Voting, protesting, even obstructing the wrongs and crimes.
How long does it take for Voters to burn out, become so discouraged that they believe they have no voice. That’s one of the repubs’ best tactics: delay, obstruct, distract, lie: Brave New World isn’t just a novel.
"How long does it take for Voters to burn out, become so discouraged that they believe they have no voice. That’s one of the repubs’ best tactics: delay, obstruct, distract, lie:"
It is a tactic of vote splitting ideologues across the spectrum. Including such as Jill Stein, RFK, Cornell West, No Labels et sl
Bill, I grew up supporting Democrats -- even Adlai Stevenson -- before I could walk. I began reading the Washington Post under Kennedy, saw my father weep as we imagined nukes raining down on us during the Cuban Missle crisis, loved LBJ when he looked me squarely in the eye to say "We shall overcome!", knew I could never vote for Tricky Dicky when he said "you won't have Nixon to kick around anymore", learned to detest Nixon when he assured us "I am not a crook", saw my father turn white as a sheet when I told him Ford had just pardoned Nixon, and then my father died just before Raygun removed Jimmy Carter's solar panels, and then the elder Bush failed to sign early climate change legislation, and Bill Clinton (a truly talented straight-faced liar) brought sleaze to the White House but governed better than Reagan, at least, and then Bush Junior lied us into Iraq, and then Obama.... Ah Obama! inspired me and gave me hope, but perhaps didn't realize how badly he had shocked and dismayed the bigots and racists and xenophobes and -- it appears -- the super-wealthy powers that be, and then, and then? God Help Us !!
Eisenhower was arguably a good choice to lead us into the mostly unavoidable Cold War, and there have been several honorable GOP governors and a couple of Senators in my lifetime who voted intelligently when it really counted, and Liz Cheney has given us all an important lesson in true patriotism, but the Republican Party is a goner, a memory, all that's left of Lincoln's good idea that really went off the rails to become unrecognizable, a danger to our country, to the human species and to all life on Earth.
At this late (-ish, I hope) stage of my life as a non-believer, I discover that Trump is the Devil incarnate and that no one can save us from ourselves but us.
David, your recap of our national historic spiral dive is spot on. And...this "non-believer" also has decided that there may actually be a devil (or more) on Earth. Not sure if I can come up with another explanation.
Given Trump's history of slapping his name all over anything he "owns" I could see "Trumpublican" being the name. Or, since it's already an established brand, "MAGA". Whatever, so long as he's in charge, he'll be choosing the name.
I could never understand how anyone in their right minds could support Reagan. Then again, it was US which went into Vietnam to lose and cost Vietnam over a million lives, and while I understood taking on Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, what of the falsely justified invasion Iraq which led to ISIS, and the wholesale invasion of Afghanistan, from which which US withdraw after 20 years of futility, handing the country back to the Taliban?
Reagan was an actor who knew how to perform a role and recite the lines he'd memorized (written by his admittedly clever handlers) with a certain smug conviction. He was a far classier shyster than Trump, but a shyster nonetheless.
Our problem is not that so many American voters are not in their "right" minds, but that they are way Right on certain issues the rest of us thought had been decided a long time ago: that of course rich people should pay progressively higher taxes than the rest of us; that government exists to help citizens by levelling the capitalist playing field enough that everyone benefits; that we really do have equal rights, however differently we may each look or talk or dress or make love to one another; that sometimes we might do well to emulate the ways other countries give their citizens pensions and healthcare and daycare and regular paid vacations, etcetera, etcetera ad nauseam.
We Americans are exceptional in many ways, including in our short-sighted stupidity. No, not all of us, but a lot.
Enter The Handmaid's Tale. One of the most upsetting books I have read. What was even more upsetting were the women who were supporting this life style (holding down (hand holding) while a woman was basically being raped. Sounds like Schafler?
Part of levelling the capitalist playing field is taxation; the other essential part is regulation. And part of the effect of fairer taxation is being able to put teeth into regulation enforcement.
Why are we even in the Middle East? oil? Suez Canal? Big ticket items though. That area is the perfect example what happens when religion? or pretend religion merges with government.
Vietnam? There are river cruises going through there with side tours to Thailand.
You don't go far enough back. Harry Truman had some pithy things to point out about Republicans. I heard him say some of these things in 1947 when I was nine. Lifted this one: “Republicans approve of the American farmer, but they are willing to help him go broke. They stand four-square for the American home--but not for housing. They are strong for labor--but they are stronger for restricting labor's rights. They favor minimum wage--the smaller the minimum wage the better. They endorse educational opportunity for all--but they won't spend money for teachers or for schools. They think modern medical care and hospitals are fine--for people who can afford them. They consider electrical power a great blessing--but only when the private power companies get their rake-off. They think American standard of living is a fine thing--so long as it doesn't spread to all the people. And they admire of Government of the United States so much that they would like to buy it.”
People ( well, my people anyway) listened to him back then and knew it was true. Can we get anyone to listen these days? Or is it just sound bites on a cell phone that matter?
I love it. It is so true of today. Politicians are rich, get a good pension, I'm going to guess healthcare. What do they care about the regular people?
When I find a quotable quote such as your post, I copy the link to the post and send it to myself via email with the subject line "notes to myself -- subject line here" to help me find it again later. The link to the post is included in the link to the right of the name of the person who posted it.
Right Carolyn; Not enough has been or is commonly spoke of "Give 'em Hell Harry." Must be generational lapses; Are we not learning that 'all this' has happened before, or at least it all rhymes ?
David , keeping quiet about the hidden fascism was the case until 45.
Now the Republicans have been given permission (encouragement) to say the quiet parts out loud. When you add to that the books and articles lifting the corner of the tent and shining a bright light on the elephant dung, it’s hard to ignore what has been revealed.
The good thing is that many of us have been rudely awakened. Starting with Nixon’s and Agnew’s dirty deeds and culminating in 45, leading HIS Republican Party, we realize that, while we thought that things were the same for both parties , the US oligarchs and Dixiecrats were remodeling the Grand Old Party in their image and it ain’t pretty. As is said after many disasters, we can’t unsee the carnage and we’re called upon to get off the couch and fight.
David, thank you for your reply. It’s so encouraging to read a comment that acknowledges how often we ignore our gut feeling to keep quiet out of politeness.
Not quite. While I share your criticism of the GOP of yore, there is a clear distinction between the Ghosts of GOP Past and the Whitened Sepulchers of its MAGAtized Present.
As just one of many examples, Richard Nixon, who normalized relations with China, ushered in the EPA as well as wage and price controls with Sanders-esque zeal, would be considered a Bolshevik by the mobs supporting Despicable Don on Fifth Avenue and everywhere else
But in an interesting move he enacted the EPA to mitigate the confusion of a myriad of state regulations. My guess it was to make it easier for businesses to comply, or not.
Abraham Lincoln was of course, the first Republican President. In his famous second Inaugural Address, he called on all Americans to call on "the better angels of our nature".
While it was at least possible, if somewhat impractical, to hear Republicans from the Reagan era speak in such lofty and aspirational tones, it is literally impossible to imagine the current Kool Aid drinking Party calling itself Republican to do so.
Even further back when the Republicans added states to increase their senate members and also allowed the troop withdrawals from southern states opening the Jim Crow reign of terror.
Re: the origins of Republican "alternative facts" and the entire right wing revisionist history from erecting national traitors as heritage heroes in every town square to banning books in every public library.
[An aside Yesterday I heard that master tailor (to presidents and star) Martin Greenfield had died. He'd learned to sew as a child in Auschwitz. My first thought was, how long would it take Ron DeSantis et al to add to the school curriculum that the Holocaust was a boon to Jews because the concentration camps provided opportunities to develop skills which Jews could later apply for their personal benefit? ("DeSantis, however, is continuing to defend Florida’s new curriculum, ... which includes the assertion for middle school instruction that “slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit."" https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/07/22/desantis-slavery-curriculum/ ]
OK back to the GOP replacing history with hagiography.
In 1907 American ex-pat Henry James published The American Scene, his observations on a sentimental journey home. In chapter XII, starting on page 365 (of the text linked below), James speaks of his visit to Richmond, VA - seat of the defeated Confederacy.
"This then the tragic ghost-haunted city, this the centre of the vast blood-drenched circle, one of the (370) most blood-drenched, for miles and miles around, in the dire catalogue aforesaid . . . to one's first dismay; a sort of intellectual bankruptcy, this latter, that one felt one really couldn't afford. There were no references-- . . . to the conception that, almost comic in itself, was yet so tragically to fail to work, that of a world rearranged, a State solidly and comfortably seated and tucked-in, in the interest of slave-produced Cotton . . . whereby was laid on the Southern genius the necessity of getting rid of these discords and substituting for (374) the ironic face of the world an entirely new harmony, or in other words a different scheme of criticism. Since nothing in the Slave-scheme could be said to conform--conform, that is, to the reality of things--it was the plan of Christendom and the wisdom of the ages that would have to be altered. History, the history of everything, would be rewritten ad usum Delphini--the Dauphin being in this case the budding Southern mind. This meant a general and a permanent quarantine; meant the eternal bowdlerization of books and journals; meant in fine all literature and all art on an expurgatory index. It meant, still further, an active and ardent propaganda; the reorganization of the school, the college, the university, in the interest of the new criticism."
Linda, you think what's happening now is a "last gasp" effort? the GOP is shredding itself over accomplishing its extremist goals. Most important, is enough of the "ex-GOp" and independent vote up for not seeing social support and other regularity functions of modern government take a dive?
Imagine! Three Party of MAGA House Reps are quitting early as many on both sides are, because of the dysfunction! Our own fabulous Dem Elissa Slotkin is quitting to run for Senator, and she would be fantastic.
MAGA is the current-day acronym for KKK. Read Timothy Egan's book, "A Fever in the Heartland" about the rise of the KKK in the Midwest in the 1920's. When I saw the marchers at Charlottesville in 2017 on TV, I came out of my chair when I heard them shouting, "Jews will not replace us?" What? Where did that come from? That's Klan talk.
Chump made that clear on day one, our MSM blathered the “both sides” crap to muddy the waters. It’s time that, even though the hoods are off, we recognize that their hearts are as evil as they ever were.
I get TFFG's emails to see what he's doing. He is grifting the hell out of his base because (1) he doesn't have the money that he claims to have, and 2) because he can. Here's his pitch that just came in:
Keep your filthy hands off Trump Tower
President Trump
This email was sent by the organization that owns the logo shown.
Yes, heaven only knows to whom he is now indebted. All along I felt that because of Putin blackmailing Trump with Moscow hotel room photos and videos, Trump was Putin's pigeon. Trump's mendacity is such that I believe it would have caused Saddam Hussein to blush. What we need to fear, of course, is what he will do if given a chance.
What classy begging, NOT. But he knows what opens their wallets. I’m your savior, they are really after you. I really loved the garbage sent to me by Jr. “ok, enough playing games, my dad and i need your help now. “ couldn’t believe the stupidity. He should let his dad be the family beggar…
Thanks for that. I once got snail-mail from the GOP: sending it back (I forget if I had to put a stamp on the return envelope) with appropriate commentary (to wit, "Go to Hell") stopped any further invasion of my mailbox by that god-forsaken organization.
I like to get straight to the point. I call it The New American Nazi Party, just as the AfD in Germany is overtaking the Heimat Party as The New German Nazi Party. I was at a rally last Sunday in a city in Northern Germany where on signs people are more clearly naming the AfD, known for its anti-immigrant stance, as Nazis. In the film God & Country, which I recently saw they talk about the symbiotic relationship between Treacherous-treasonous-traitor-Trump and the White Nationalist Evangelicals. The question is asked, is this Christianity, and the film makes a compelling case that it is not, it is more like what the Nazis were and are. Here is a discussion with the director Dan Partland and the Producer Rob Reiner. https://youtu.be/Q8QasbXXNZc?si=VAKY1dv5kInRcKrp
"The question is asked, is this Christianity?" I'm a minister (Presbyterian) and I agree with the answer except much more forcefully. It's time for the Church to ask the question, "What would Jesus do?" The shortest verse in the Bible is two words, "Jesus wept." Jesus is weeping now. These blasphemous people and organizations need to be called out by religious leadership, esp. preachers from pulpits. As Roberto Duran said to Sugar Ray Leonard, "No mas! No mas!"
Robert, I’m the granddaughter of a Methodist minister who was also a Professor of Sociology at the University of Chicago. (U of Chicago has deep Baptist roots). I was raised Catholic. My grandparents and parents were active in the Civil Rights movement and considered their actions to be their Christian duty. My “duty” turned out to be protecting the environment, as in protecting ALL of God’s creation. For my efforts, I received death threats from so-called Christians who preferred the prosperity gospels; which as most of us know is not exactly the true version of Christian principles.
The lack of public outrage from Christian leaders about the hate filled rhetoric, and policies to keep immigrants out and help rich people get richer is pretty damning in my opinion. Thank you for speaking up here.
And could someone here please explain why the good people of Georgia elected MTG? In what Universe is she qualified to be a US Representative who took an oath to protect and uphold the constitution?
Yes. Religion is supposed to be about morality. Anyone who doesn't know that the First Amendment refers to freedom of religion should learn more about Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine. Separation of church and state. A wall between church and state. We are NOT a religious state.
Sheila, she isn’t qualified, in any sense of the word. As I recall, and this was a while ago, and she’s not my representative, she did originally have some opposition, but he dropped out of the race, and she was the only one left on the ballot, in a ruby red district in north Georgia.
The question really was rhetorical, Camille. I just wish there was a way to put her on the ropes like Boebert is. Boebert is unlikely to return to Congress. Good riddance. But when you lose decent conservatives like Mike Gallagher, and retain the idiot flame throwers, policies don’t get passed. And we pay those bozos pretty well… ugh!
Thank you, Shelia. I went to Vanderbilt Divinity School which had deep roots in the Methodist Church. Mercifully, like Chicago and the Baptists, we separated from them over 100 years ago. It sounds as if you were reared in a marvelous family and it also sounds as if you are keeping the family traditions alive. Thank you! I am hoping against hope that MTG is replaced in November. When the election is closer, I will write a letter to her newspaper begging the people to vote her out. I won't do any good, but I'll feel better for trying.
I've been referring to them as magamorons, but haven't gotten much traction. Probably not politically correct. I have a real problem feeling either pity or sympathy for traitors.
Once again, we see the price being paid because Merrick Garksnd refused to prosecute the seditious members of Congress who participated in the insurrection. And we never hear Joe Biden mention this. I know what’s wrong with Garlsnd, because I follow Sarah Kendzior’s writings. But WTF is wrong with Biden? He should have called of these members of Congress to be indicted and expelled in his inaugural address!!!
Ted Budd was in the House and voted against certifying the Electoral College vote. The Trump MAGA party has come up with ways to attack American institutions that would never have been considered before.
Good point Peter. I suppose I could have said "explosion from Congress" -but I don't want any Congresspersons or legislative staff who actually believe in democracy to be hurt. Besides, I'm more justice, less extrajudicial activity sort of person. :)
Likewise, George. A Cromwellian solution is undesirable, but when all constitutional safeguards against blatant betrayal from within have broken down so badly that public safety is endangered, it surely becomes necessary to think and act "outside the box".
The Republic has been taken hostage (along with most of what used to be the Republican party) in a move by insiders far more effective than the January 6th shambles... and America seems not even to have noticed...
How sick can our countries get?
In what became the Confederate states, slaves will of course have been unaware of owners' decisions to dispose of their chattels as they thought fit.
Likewise, American citizens pursue their daily business blissfully unaware that they and their country have been "sold down the river".
How is this grotesque situation possible?
*
All my working life, I had such respect for the ablest jurists with whom I had dealings. But when a state of laws has degenerated into a state of lawyers, pure otherworldly abstraction takes hold and, in the end, even fools can see that Lex asinus est -- the law is an ass.
In such a State, public safety is endangered, citizens' rights and freedoms are at risk. The very existence of citizenship is in the balance, and the prognosis is dire.
The enemy within the gates knows very well how autocrats -- kings by divine right or dictators -- act in such instances. Beheadings. The Night of the Long Knives.
Is America really bound in chains of her own making?
Is there really no recourse against betrayal from within the system?
Is Americans' "Can Do" spirit really dead? Or has it, too, been hijacked?
Peter, you definitely have your finger on the pulse of events. And, we should be very much concerned. I just finished reading Adam Gopnik's review of Timothy W. Ryback's book about Hitler's rise to power in a democracy, entitled Takeover: Hitler's Final Rise to Power." The review is in the latest edition of "The New Yorker." The takeaway? Hitler didn't grab power; he was given it. Trump's supporters are fools to think that he would be loyal to them. What will Trump do with immigrants here if he comes to power? The Final Solution? After all, their blood is poisoned. Obviously, we need to be more serious now than ever before. It isn't just Trump, but also his stupid enablers.
Yes, the system has not evolved with the threats. If it had, Trump would have been removed and addressed in the first impeachment -as well as his co-conspirators and accessories after the fact.
Thank you, but it is such an unhappy business, trying to speak the truth, as I perceive it.
And now, I've just been talking with a Canadian friend... about the great things found in America. And some of the horrors, like going into small town grocery stores in black districts of upstate New York or Pennsylvania, and seeing that what was being sold was produced by the same firms that sold to whites , but -- going by his description -- half price and half way between that up-market fare and pet food.
And, once again, here we have what was noticed by a trained observer, one who spoke, too, of seeing in those places poor folk worn down by lives of stress, cruel exploitation, exhaustion. And comparing with conditions in Canada, where public healthcare and social security make life so much more bearable even for the under-privileged. (Some very sharp observations, too, on national complacency and the downside of Canadian policies...)
South Carolina beach communities, then time travel on secondary roads, moving just a few miles inland... and a century back... to shacks and barefoot kids playing in the dust.
That "Am-I-my-brother's-keeper" cruelty and indifference. And, he feared, many, many who'd be voting for Trump who despises and hates them. Anything, anything to make a break with a status quo that cares nothing for lives on the wrong side of the tracks, whether in the States, in Hebron or in Gaza.
I, who do not share the political views of this friend or his stark pessimism, despite the undeniable quality of his observations and his fellow-feeling for suffering humans, am bound to take account of that pessimism and of the dark places to which people's despair may lead them and us.
Thanks, Peter. Your writing is exquisite, your sensibility deep and mature. What an expression!: "Am-I-my-brother's-keeper" cruelty and indifference." and "a status quo that cares nothing for lives on the wrong side of the tracks..." Bellissimo! I had that sensation driving across the deep South on back roads a number of years ago. Reminded me of the poorest parts of Nigeria (where I lived for 2 years). Why can we not do better at sharing our blessings?
There is no doubt, when people are in jail for minor drug or property offenses, and people who have attacked our system while acting to the benefit of murderous adversaries like Putin are free on appeal, or bond, or just completely ignoring the justice system. *
*except for Navarro -because that's just too darn funny not to mention here.
"In any case if someone else leaves . . . it will save Johnson from trying to herd cats."
But is he? Trying?
Johnson always says of his pig-mess 'this is what democracy looks like.' At first I thought he was just lying. Now I think it's PR for Johnson et al's push for corporate-clerical fascism.
Cats are rarely vindictive, although I have known the rare exception, Priscilla, who died late last year was vindictive - but she's the only one I had who was vindictive.
I feel an abject shame at what the U.S. is NOT doing. I had hoped that Speaker Johnson was keeping his powder dry to get the budget bill through. But no, a recess for more than two weeks. Ukraine is being abandoned. Yes, the United States has made mistakes for what she did do militarily. This doing nothing to push back this ghastly invasion feels far worse.
😢
If Mikey Mouse is vacated, moderate Democrats and Republicans can form a coalition to keep him in power provided that he usher through Ukraine aid, pronto. Perhaps the discharge petition will work, if the members proposing it can get the House of Reprehensibles back into session. These Putin puppies need the be 'House' broken.
Why do any of them stay when they now don’t have any financial support from the RNC? Or don’t they understand that yet? What a total and utter fiasco they have become. I still can’t believe the RNC takeover was allowed to happen, and so easily. It’s chilling, really.. absolutely shocking.
Well, in Wisconsin at least, this is thankfully no longer the case. Any Republicans, not just the non-extremist variety, are now well and truly fucked.. by their own RNC. They’re vulnerable. It’s still an uphill battle, we’re still in a fight for our lives with billionaire MSM conglomerates (what is MSNBC *thinking* by hiring that woman?). But any campaign — think about the campaigns just waged against Warren and Baldwin, too, not to mention those tight congressional contests all over the country — will require massive fund raising and self funding. Everything else is going to Trump. It’s the biggest grift we’ve ever seen. Hopefully we’re seeing the first signs of mutiny afoot.
I just messaged Rep. Sessions (TX) and suggested that if he, too, is considering resigning his seat from this dis-functional House, he first pressure Speaker Johnson (or whoever is Speaker after April 9) to bring Ukraine funding to a vote.
Hopefully, the thought of resigning takes hold . . .
I also messaged Ted Cruz that he should consider resigning his honorable seat in the Senate to run for a seat in the dis-functional House, where his brazen disregard for governance would be de rigueur.
Living in small-town East Texas, I am driven to lash out at times...
In a similar vein, there are a number of Republicans who have lost or will lose thier seats in primaries. If they decided to vote independently they could help make Jeffries speaker very soon. They could at least turn the tide in the house against MAGA.
We can only hope more will resign and get shut of this nonsense in the Republican Dominated House..Keep at it Teddy Cruz, Matt Gaetz and the loveliest clown, Marjorie Taylor Green.
There must be a few sane Republicans in the house who could be lured away by the Biden Administration by offering them choice but not critical positions in his Administration (the "deep state", ahem!). Nothing wrong with the Dems seizing the house in this manner and it would get the few 'good' Republicans still standing in the House to a much healthier environment in so many ways.
The Senate passed a $1.2 trillion federal spending bill early Saturday morning – but not before missing a midnight deadline which triggered a brief partial government shutdown.
The spending package easily cleared the upper chamber in a 74-24 vote.
Like most commenting here, I keep up on the news. Like most, too, I very much value Heather’s takes on things as she near-daily puts out her “Letters from an American.”
But today’s too much combines the dreadful. First, the total lunacy from the idiot Republicans in their clown show chaos relacing what had been the U.S. Congress. Marjorie Taylor Greene a "leader" there? Such a despicable illiterate, only gaming to thrust her back-of-the-woods slack-jawed twang and
boorishness ever onto center stage.
Now, too – can it be? – ISIS in a mass terror attack on Putin's Russia, a country itself terrorized by a mass murderer?
Well, Putin does what all the most vulgar always do – reduce all life to group loathing. Now this has a hate-filled group hating him, too.
So much group hatred. So much grouped loathing. And the schools? Can American schools get rid of their hate-filled preachers, tribal demagogues, paranoid censors, numbering-relentless standardized testers? Can we join others in the world for higher human standards -- for humanities and essays, for seeing individuals, neighboring characters in so many of their nuances, complexities, communities?
You know, Phil, I keep seeing you beat this drum for the humanities in schools and politics. My heart is with you, and I admire your consistency. I'm usually not the voice of pessimism here, but as someone who actually possesses a Bachelor's Degree in one of the humanities (dramatic arts) as of a few years ago, I have absolutely no idea how this would possibly solve anything. I am willing to engage and am hoping you or someone else can change my mind on this, but...
Firstly, what do you mean by the humanities? That is *very* broad. And when you say schools, do you mean middle school, high school, university, all of the above? If you mean history and civics in middle & high school, then sure. That's basic information that any developing mind should know and fits well in an academic environment with a good teacher to connect it to the present. However, last I checked those are still required subjects in American schools practically everywhere. The most popular AP exams are Composition, History, and US Government; literally millions of students take these each year.
If you mean arts and philosophy, we diverge in our philosophy. Yes, yes, yes, arts are necessary to nourish the soul, open our minds, and connect with our common humanity. I'm with you. I love art. That is why I have an arts degree. And the process of getting that degree solidified what I have felt since before I attempted it: that culture dies in academia. Absolutely dies. There is nothing that wrings the life out of any piece of culture as having to approach it in the context of an assignment, complete with pop quizzes corrected by some professor (read: failed artist) that thinks they know more about the work than the creator ever did. It's every author or artist's worst nightmare. I would bet double my life savings without blinking that way more kids have been turned off from reading than turned on to reading by the existence of English classes. From the word go, reading becomes something you need to put yourself through to please the higher-ups, rather than pleasurable or rewarding. Way more kids - even smart ones - hate school than love it. It's an unpaid job that keeps you away from playing with your friends, and anything that time is spent on in there will dollars to donuts become put in the box in the brain marked "drudgery." And now you want *more* culture to be ruined this way, and in a more thorough manner... with ESSAYS??? Please tell me I'm off base.
Sidebar: God I hated essays. Hated, hated, hated them. They teach you nothing except how to be as pretentious, self-regarding, and uninspired as the person grading them. A few years of those made ME feel like I hated humanities. I sincerely regret my degree for this reason. Not financial ones, but for how much the process sapped my joy for one of the most joyful things in life. Essays are motherf---ing evil little bastards. Which leads me to...
Art of all types MUST allow itself to be encountered on its own terms with an enthusiastic and willing audience to thrive. The greatest barriers to the humanities reaching their rightful place at the center of our society are not a devaluation in scholastic environments, but economic barriers to the average person experiencing a wide variety of art in *that art form's ideal place of mutual experience,* followed by an authentic conversation with other enthusiasts of the form. (For a book, that would be cozied up in a library corner or your bed at home, taking all the time you need.) LOWER THE DAMN PRICES for theater, movie, and concert tickets, give screenings and bookings to a greater variety of work, and watch the audiences grow for a greater variety of work. Make museums more accessible in terms of location and admittance, and watch the crowds come.
When people can afford to try something new, they will tend to try it. When they approach it on their own terms, that is when they are most open to receive it. When they have received something exciting, they will want to share it with a friend. That is how the humanities spread. Not in essay form, in flesh-and-blood human form.
EVEN THAT BEING SAID, while many impressionable minds in this country are crying out for humanities to nourish them if only given the right space, a metric ton of people in this country have never and will never be interested in partaking. They just aren't curious or empathetic or creative enough to want to be nourished in that way, and any attempt to make them engage on that level will get you branded a fancypants. Humanities are an elite pastime to them; they just want to make money and be entertained. They aren't unempathetic and uncurious because they didn't get taught enough humanities; they don't see the point to humanities because they are unempathetic and uncurious. No amount of inspiring teachers will make that any different, and pretending that there was a time in recent history when these types of people were less a factor in our body politic is - as best I can tell - a fantasy.
Humanities belong at the center of our society. They won't get there by scholastic rigor, but by popular access. You know, democratizing them. Only then could I forsee them helping our democracy more directly.
Will, you seem to have experienced the Humanities via the 'Dead White Guys' rout. Where do you think your considerable powers of communication came from? Who is it that entertains the masses? Writes the speeches? What do you think is the impetus for Rock, Punk, Funk, Hip-Hop, or Rap? Everything starts with art. All science, political thought, psychology, started with a creative spark. I see your art in your posts. I'm sorry your past educators tried to beat it out of you. I'm glad they failed.
If it is any comfort, the UCs (at least Irvine) moved quite sharply away from the "Dead White Guys route" in recent years with regards to humanities, to a focus on "underrepresented and global voices" in order to "affect positive change." Yay! Unfortunately they are teaching these vitally diverse (and occasionally not dead) voices in the same soul-quelching way that they were the Dead White Guys, apparently unable to realize it is not the works taught that are deadening the field per se, but the entire academic approach regardless of the work at hand. (Plus, some of the Dead White Guys actually hold up. Go figure.) No one expects the computer science geeks to not actually code, or the chemistry students to not use the lab, but the art students are expected to use all their time analyzing the context for other art, rather than creating their own. It makes sense that education gives you necessary appreciation of what came before, but the sort of person who loves an art form enough to want to spend their life on it is almost always the same person who will seek out those great works themselves, and seek out the other people to connect over them. You could see people come alive each time we actually got a chance to *discuss* our passions, and the deadness that would set in when we realized this was going to be just another fodder for bibliography. There was also a particular shared look everyone developed for when a professor would admonish us how we "must find a way to get out and see more current art," like yeah, I would love to, but you keep sucking up every ounce of my time and money and energy with whatever this is instead. Maddening disingenuousness is the name of the game.
In short, there is no amount of structured, rigorous, disciplined study that will actually substitute for actually doing something.
Allow me to point out that you have just written and published AN ESSAY!
And a pretty darned challenging one, at that.
I do question some of your epistemology. Do you have some convincing evidence that those you cast aside as "unempathetic and uncurious" are doomed never to be inspired by a good teacher? I am sure that all of us have heard stories to the contrary.
If I were asked to offer a remedy to our present malaise, I would recommend that everyone read Lewis Carroll's two "Alice" stories to their children. That, and maximize their exposure to people of varying origins.
Well, I think of it more as a rant than an essay, but that is probably semantics.
To be clear, I dont think there are types of people who can be grouped together as *incapable* of appreciating *any* cultural efforts of quality. But there are all types of people in this world, and many people just don't see the point in art. Some are perfectly nice people in other aspects, but they just don't get it. Some are that way with science, or business, or cooking. I don't think I need a peer-previewed longitudinal study for something that seems so self-obvious, and I view the idea that anyone can be reached and inspired to their better angels by the right person at the right moment to be a progressive fantasy. How I would love it to be true, though.
Will, you are one of the best "ranters" in this forum. Thank you. Great thinking, great writing. I don't always agree with every detail, but it's elucidating and enjoyable.
Rant, essay, and a powerful expression of a complex set of dilemmas I view as an expose. On a feeling level, my life as a lover of learning began when I stopped going to school. As a what-iffer, I continually imagine how school buildings could be facilitated as spaces aimed to assist in the organizing of experiences students elect to have -- always structuring the school's assets (space, mentoring, technology, meeting places and shelter, health care and social services) to serve students' successes. Yes, adaptive, unpredictable, chaotic (or chaordic), and also what seems to be the circumstances we humans are in now, whether we like it or not. We're not ready for that fantasy and we're not ready for our current realities, or are we?
Thanks, Will. Bored to death of high school, I accelerated and started college at 16. Apart from math, and gah, how I hated math, I felt self taught K-12. The stretching of my thoughts occurred in a small liberal arts college. Thankfully before distribution requirements became a thing. WF in elementary functions. Brilliant rant today. Don’t get me started on children’s athletics, where parents think the little darlings future will depend on their success in travel ball.
". . . distribution requirements": ah, Gail, what a death trip.
So much of what could be alive instead got relegated to departments, all mutually isolated from each other, all void of humanities, all dead to personal speech.
Emily, I have seen some of the very best teachers be totally unable to reach some of the most broken children. It is heartbreaking. A lot of people really don’t know and many don’t want to see what happens to children in our world. Empathy is born of our very first human interactions. Just like our ability to hear, it can be nearly impossible to develop those neural pathways if the window of opportunity passes.
“As “Born for Love” reveals, recent changes in technology, child-rearing practices, education, and lifestyles are starting to rob children of necessary human contact and deep relationships—the essential foundation for empathy and a caring, healthy society. Sounding an important warning bell, “Born for Love” offers practical ideas for combating the negative influences of modern life and fostering positive social change to benefit us all.” Born for Love was coauthored by Bruce Perry
I went to a little public country elementary school. If the caring teachers had not introduced us to classical music, chorus and band, I may never had developed passion for these musical delights.
Art was mostly allowing us to express our own ideas and perhaps an introduction to great art.
In English class we were taught the basics and then encouraged to express ourselves. We had to recite poems in front of our small class and participate in public speaking. We may have had to speak in front of our classmates but we may never have learned that skill.
I heartily disagree with you. Humanities should be
Ann, I think you meant to respond to me, rather than Christy? If so, rest assured I think humanities such as you describe should *absolutely* be a part of school, full stop. When you describe what the presence of art and music meant to you in your elementary school, how you were "allowed to express your own ideas," "developed passion for delights," and an "introduction to great art," that is exactly what arts and letters should be doing for developing minds, why they are so essential to being a healthy human being in spirit, and exactly how it should be approached. "Reading is fun, try these books of poems!" or "draw us a picture, show us what is in your head!" Great!
My gripe - and boy do I have gripes - primarily rests on how humanities are approached in higher education and university, where the essence of the subject - the enjoyment and nourishment and beckoning to expression you described - is completely forgotten in an avalanche of term papers featuring forced, joyless posturing and self-regarding meta-analysis.
There is a chasm between "The museum is a place of wonder!" and "Now give me 2000 words on Friday in MLA style regarding post-Impressionism in the context of historical upheaval (in the exact way this book I made you read had in mind)" and within that chasm the point of having humanities in our lives gets lost entirely.
Ann I 💯💯💯💯agree with you. I think you are disagreeing with another comment, but I’m not sure which one. If it’s Will, my sense is that he is more opposed to the experience he had then the general need to teach “humanities”, which basically encompasses everything except for science and math. Imagine a world without history, literature, sociology, theology, philosophy let alone the spirit enhancing arts. They don’t call them “human”ities for nothing!! 🤩❤️ 🤗
I loved school, maybe because it was an alternative to my home. Opened doors to different worlds. Not a bad thing…. When I hear people say they hate school, I wonder what they love. Some have problems in school that I never did, I weep for them.
Jeri, this could have been me writing this…although not the “home alternative” you had; my parents were “working class” who valued education and the teachers in our small town. Most of my school friends came from the same background, although with varying degrees of problems. I feel badly for the many for whom school was at best, a negative experience.
Same for many probably, my parents were caring but flawed. They always put education first, thinking that it would give us opportunities they didn’t have. My Dad’s brother dropped out in elementary (their Dad was killed when they were 4 and 5). He went back in high school, graduated, and became a judge for many years. He was the family hero and role model. But we were the poor folks, so we dreamed…
I agree, Jeri! I loved school because it was a challenge to heard new ideas and do new activities. I’m still taking classes and learning new things in my mid ‘70s. All people should quest for knowledge! It keeps you young!
Yep, did continuing Ed for decades after I needed it. I didn’t realize how hard school is for some, especially those for whom “home” is anything but. Testing for learning disabilities, emotional problems and myriad physical problems taught me plenty. Some have no place where they can get what school did for me. Prison is often the road most traveled for many. I once asked high schoolers in a counseling group what they learned from their family of origin. The answers were shocking.
I so appreciate folks with empathy and who try to understand others. Thank you. Being fair is what we need as much as anything, and it’s amazing to me how hard that is for so many people.
Thank you, I learned so much from stressed teens. One even wrote on FB that I seemed to have a soft spot for their struggles. Made me feel that no effort is wasted.
👏🏼👏🏼 And then they get called dumb and stupid. As if they didn’t feel inadequate enough to begin with. And then they try to express an idea (cause they really aren’t stupid! And they do have good ideas!) but a well educated and very articulate person with what they think is a better idea can talk circles around them. And we wonder why people are frustrated and angry. When we talk about inequality we have to account for the inequality of being born into a home that is lacking in the same fertile ground for everyone. Leveling the quality of education and economic opportunities is part of it. Nurse parent partnerships to new parents are very effective. Teaching brain science 101 to everyone at the earliest ages. Mentorship like big brothers or sisters.
Nurse/partnerships sounds like a great idea. I was born into a home that had little fertile ground, but had parents who told us such existed. And that education would lead down that road. Brain science 101, hope that includes keeping young brains away from lead in pipes, paint, etc. I still hear of such, boggles my old mind.
Wonder what they define as love. Once in another life, I thought I'd like to ask that question to some inmates in a prison. Probably would have made a volume or two
Most states have requirements to teach civics and/or government but very few states require of full year of it, which to me is just crazy. I also think that schools should start kids on a second language beginning at a very young age and continuing all the way through high school. But...
The bigger issue, taking a step back from what the schools do or don't require, is the blatant anti-education (aside from teaching what's useful for a job) and anti-intellectual stance that conservatives have been dug in on for decades now. It's done a lot of damage and I don't see a clear path to solving the problem.
Will, I always enjoy your essays/rants. So thought-provoking.I’m a boomer so a bit older.
My fave teacher was Mrs.Carlson,high school English lit. She made me love reading and writing. I also love to dance.So…what did I study? My degrees were science-related(nutrition and public health) as you have “to make a living.” Oh, and I thought I was going to save the world.That obviously didn’t happen! Life twists and turns and I honestly don’t have regrets. But I did return to ballet in my 50’s and it’s been joyful.Although I wonder how joyful it is for some of the younger dancers pushed to perform at a pre-professional level.It certainly wasn’t like that back in the day…including the expense.🩰
Agree. The focus on competition in order to fill the instructor’s wallet was abhorrent to me as my daughter was coming along. Finding a school that didn’t concentrate on dance competitions wasn’t easy. Glad you’ve returned to something you love!
Will, for a hater of the essay you do an amazing interpretation. Yes, the PROCESS of educating has been subsumed to teaching a bunch of facts. Those facts are separated from any implementation or use, represented as necessary to know. Yes, deadly to curiosity, dulling the mind who seeks to UNDERSTAND, and killing the pleasure of learning. Yet, you and I survived, still WONDERING. Imagine what it would be like if more people were asking questions instead of their starved minds taking up violence because they knew they had the facts.
many thanks for your essay ! I’ll be re-reading it. my first thoughts : you’ve put into words what I’ve often thought. Especially about academia and tiresome overthinking.
Sounds like you had some pretty crappy teachers and writing assignments. Clearly you like to write. It doesn't have to be an exercise in killing experience and pinning it to a display board with academic jargon, but some teachers do seem to prefer that.
There are better teachers out there, so not everyone will hate writing essays, even if it is not possible to convince everyone to love it. And despite the worst efforts of your teachers, you still developed--or retained--a capacity for critical thought, an appreciation of history, and, I'd venture, even some sense of what aesthetic criticism can achieve if it can somehow rise above the grift of academic, social and monetary capital. As long as the academy is chained to a business-first economy, and students go in expecting to learn how to get a good job rather than how to think, these tensions will remain: the production of "work" for the sake of the production of "work" vs thinking through political, cultural, and social problems at whatever pace is needed to keep one's own biases in clear view while looking at what others have to say; churning out career-bound graduates who have had their allegiances duly narrowed to capital and big business vs teaching adults to question what they are told, even if it is the professor speaking; killing creativity (so inefficient!) vs cultivating it.
Etc.
Our culture does not value history. It teaches us that the individual is responsible for every single circumstance of their lives and can overcome anything at all--so why should we have to learn from the mistakes of all those people who lived before us? "Critical thought" is a term of derision. Pushing back on received narratives earns the sobriquet of "snowflake". Hell, California is the epicenter of digital libertarian futurism, the cult of "disruption" for profit, and the bizarre belief that billionaire STEM researchers will soon cure death. Fastest way to kill a planet: breed immortal consumption machines.
I went to the Bay Area Cal; living atop Silicon Valley for 20 years was its own education in egoistic denial and utter disregard for consequence. These subcultures are only too happy to facilitate far right misinformation and the rise of fascist strongmen--as long as it is profitable and they still get to break whatever they want.
There has to be a way to teach some other sets of values. We cannot pull them out of thin air; their seeds exist in the vast cultural records of human history, as well as in a methodical and critical consideration of what we have found out about deeper time: how do we reckon our relationship to the rest of life on Earth? Science and technology can provide the raw materials, the growing record of what has transpired here, but it cannot provide the ethical, aesthetic or philosophical judgment we need so badly to understand how we might survive.
Humanities education in the US can suck, sure. It can--and has, if not consistently--also done much better. If we cannot get it to serve life instead of the capitalist death drive, we don't stand a chance.
Sorry for the days-late reply, Eric, but I think this is a provocative and thoughtful comment and you deserve a reply.
When you say "Sounds like you had some pretty crappy teachers and writing assignments. Clearly you like to write"... well, nope to both, I'm afraid. The professors were ostensibly outstanding; Irvine was a top-ten program in the nation (or very close) when I went there. It's highly likely the problem is me here: I've always hated writing, and only vaguely like it if I can do it to organize and/or spill out my thoughts in an informal setting as if it were a rambling conversation, such as here (and even then not all that often). Yet I don't think it's very reasonable to expect everything in an academic or work setting to be something I like. That would be a little immature.
My gripe is that endless essaying and assignment-ing is an inherently distancing endeavor to apply to something like art, culture, or philosophy. These things are invaluable to the human experience because they connect human beings together on an emotional and aesthetic level that is ideally quite personal. I think rigor and standards and curriculars are anathema to experiencing the true value of these subjects. I think the fact that they can't be justified in a metric of money or practical progress (like medicine or engineering) or accumulated expertise (like history or geography) gives a certain insecurity to the people who teach it. They attempt to prove its seriousness by treating it in a self-serious and disciplined way, but that defeats the purpose entirely. The purpose is joy and resonance and emotion, not rigor. Heck, even someone who does criticism for a living knows the main point of that career is to guide an audience to what they might appreciate. Memorizing legal cases can make you a better lawyer, but memorizing IMDB will not make you a better filmmaker, or even one at all.
I actually wish they had taught us more with just getting a job in mind, rather than trying to teach critical thinking and well-roundedness. Critical thinking I already had. Well-roundedness I can get from the library. What I asked for was practical skills and experience in a creative career. Being able to bullshit your way to exactly the 2000 word count provided absolutely none of that.
This got long really quickly. Which doesn't surprise me, but.. well. Read if you wish:
So the academic route was not for you, then. There is nothing wrong with that, especially if critical thought comes naturally to you. I'd also argue that top 10 does not necessarily equal great teaching; I went to Berkeley and found some really awesome teachers. And some real stinkers who, I have to assume, impressed the administration with their research or writing or... something that was clearly not teaching.
Neither my experience nor yours are universal. I was exactly where I wanted to be, insofar as I wanted to learn to read as precisely as possible many of the writers I had already been reading for years. And to understand them and better experience what they were on about. Despite the fact that I already wrote reasonably well (and liked it, so essays were not as painful for me as they were for you) and that I had begun to see through my Fundamentalist upbringing by the time I was 15 or so without any help at all, seeking continued practice in reading and writing was one of the best things I did for myself for both my creative and critical practices. I'd go back in a heartbeat.
That said, I did study Art History on and off, but even after taking a seminar with TJ Clarke, one of the best in the field, I decided I would rather make art than analyze it--and for some of the reasons you cite: creating things is a much more direct aesthetic experience, and thus more powerfully compelling than analyzing others' creations. For me, anyway. I don't know that this is necessarily the case for Clarke, say, who recently wrote a book in a somewhat experimental academic style about his experience of viewing two Poussin paintings and being so drawn in by them that he felt compelled to go back to the museum(s?) to see them again and again. Instead of painting a picture or writing a song in response, he wrote a book. Not what I would have done. It's an interesting exercise in aesthetic analysis that allows itself to pause over an experience that remains refractory to that analysis. And it is one of the approximately 105 books I am partway through, so I cannot yet say what his conclusions are.
Be all that as it may, I would strongly caution against appealing solely to emotion and experience. To Godwin this thread--but are we not here because we have already been Godwined by our American fascists?--the German Nazis had a vigorous aesthetic program that aimed to stir deep emotions in the German populace where it was at the time: trying to understand its own origins and character, with direct reference to contemporary interpretations of classical Rome and Greece and to its own literary and philosophical traditions. In large part, they were reacting to repeated military humiliations stretching back to the French Revolution, and to the difficulties of creating a nation out of a polyglot of states, cultures, and linguistic dialects. Germany had been a nation state for not yet 50 years at the end of WW I.
German Nazi aesthetics were restrictive, of course, but their method was meant to provoke strong emotional reactions without reflection: with all else they did, it was a rousing success that lasted long enough to nearly destroy Europe altogether. Although our historical situation is different, it seems pretty clear to me that reactive emotion is a central currency of authoritarian regimes: Evangelical Christianity does the exact same thing: don't think about it. Just feel. The truth of your convictions can be measured by their strength, not by their reasonableness. Human reason, for Evangelicals, is Satanic foolishness. God wants conviction (and submission), not critical analysis.
Ultimately, there has to be a balance between analysis and experience, between logic and emotion. After the destruction of World War II, Western European academics and intellectuals launched a critique against a hegemonic (white, Christian, heteromormative) logocentrism--ie, analyzing things literally to death. It leaked over to the US to a degree, but some US academics still dismiss it as a kind of regression. Maybe some of them teach or have taught at Irvine?
I don't dismiss it; what work I have done has been part of that critique. Experience and emotion are as necessary as is the reflective ability to judge the reactions that rise up in us in response to them. But without the latter, we risk lapsing into reactivity, resentment, and violence. Or thus has been the tendency in what we call Western culture, including here in the US.
There are certainly many ways to get there. That one way did not work for you does not mean it cannot possibly work for anyone else. And it certainly doesn't mean we should stop analyzing tout court. The academic criticism of Enlightenment values has proceeded on very precise terms, while acknowledging where the limits of that precision lie: not all experience is amenable to language or reason.
I think we need a third way, if you will, one that is not exactly singular but can engender multiple modes of understanding without falling into reactivity. It may be that opposing emotion and logic is our first mistake, but it would take some time to articulate why that might be, and this is already long enough.
If you or anyone else read this whole thing, you have my deep thanks. Truly.
Let's go to the missing ingredient in teaching essays, humanities, Will.
That's what you also refer to as audience.
First, the audience in the room. I'd like to see everyone in the room read each other's first essays (copies for all), discuss, and rewrite. New versions quote others in the room, directly, indirectly, as to how their experiences enlighten, frame one's own.
I'd like all first essays to be introductory of oneself, how one learned to inhabit the necessaries: food, clothing, shelter. We all inherit these willy-nilly as parents and community give them to us, and then we also adjust, defying our betters, questioning the styles first given, to varying degrees moving styles from our peers. Modifying our styles in food, in clothing, and as for shelter, citing styles in indoor design (our rooms) outdoor landscapes (where we spend time), and transportation types.
Essaying, Will, can focus on how we learn from others, personally. Name others. Credit them. Cite others in the room. Then expand the naming, to include novels, films, songs, live theater, memoir, photographs. Larger specificity. Tighter focus on shared themes.
Remember, Will. All this for some time stays in the room. For re-writing, discussion.
Eventually all the essays go as a group to another room -- in another part of the campus, another city, or a neighboring culture, where English may be a second language. Those in the other group read all the essays. Discuss them. Then write new essays of their own citing, celebrating individuals and changes in persons from the group introducing themselves.
Teachers never test. Only help edit, for mechanics, for connections more deft.
I call this "Essaying Differences."
Keep all writing alive, referring to live people. Humanities aiding in, linked to that.
You've said things here, Will, vouching for things I hope for. The only places I'd recommend changes in your writing are when your sentences have no active verbs, but only labeling: copulatives such as "They aren't" this or "They aren't" that.
Labeling kills. Sinks back to grouping, abstracting.
But so many other things you say here radiate, reach out to human people, human themes, individual experience.
Thank you for the thoughtful reply, Phil. Sorry mine is a few days late. I hope you didn't think I was being too harsh the first time around... it wasn't directed at you per se.
I think you are thinking of humanities in a broader sense than I am: more an introduction of a personal, human element into any given line of study rather than an organized line of study into itself. I will admit that I find your "Essaying Differences" proposal intriguing. Now, it is completely foreign to any conception I have to essaying, sounding like a bit of a cross between group therapy slash debate prep slash exchange program, and I am not sure how the repeated addition of the act of writing would aid the process more than simply a moderated conversation, but that is probably just my own personal predilection coming into play. Either way, intriguing.
I feel I can defend my use of the lack of active verbs near the end because I purposefully used them to describe passive people. Make no mistake, I do not find any given demographic of people to be more doomed to passivity than another, simply an acknowledgement that many people go through life relatively passively. Still, noted!
One way I have of seeing our trajectory, our sometimes progress, our ongoing self-trials is through the 12-step experience, where first one has to hit bottom i.e.
go no lower, then admit to a certain powerlessness. The non-god oriented form which arose in the '80s simply stated the truth of being stuck and ready to be open and learning especially one's part in everything, one's connection with society, making amends and recognizing one's self-worth.
Seems to me a lot of that is already going on just not coordinated in that way.
Maybe we need to start
by figuring out a name for the group, for the process...
Phil, i very much appreciate your description of the ''despicable illiterate'' Maggot Traitor Goon Greene. I hate and despise that witch hag almost as much as i do Donald TUMP. I am almost embarrassed to admit i live in Georgia because of her hateful, boorish, ignorant. and arrogant attitude. Her Congressional district borders the county i live in 30 miles to the north of my residence, and the illiterates that vote for her are indeed, back-of-the-woods redneck hicks just like she is. Most of the people that live in my area are the same kind of redneck hicks as the ones that vote for her.
I heard there were at least 100 reporters waiting for her on the steps of congress when she left the building. Imagine if not a single reporter were there for her performance. The media needs to STOP giving her oxygen. Once she realizes nobody cares what she has to say she will become irrelevant.
Read an article about her, can’t recall where but trying to find it again. She is a complete fabrication. She’s an attention seeker, a wannabe famous for being famous. Has never been one of the people. Comes from a wealthy family. And yet, you are right. She will be re-elected. I travel in her district to visit family, and her signs are disgusting, and seem to be in every yard. I cannot connect what is going on in peoples’ minds to the reality of her and her ilk.
Thank you, Lynn. I am a bit surprised to hear that she comes from a wealthy family. I did read she was raised in the most racist town in Georgia, Cumming, GA.
I also cannot connect what is going on the people's minds to the reality of her. Same goes with DJT, in my opinion, he is worse than the notorious Al Capone. DJT is almost as horrible as Adolf Hitler was.
I want to find the apt words of rage because that woman is not just who she is, but also front for all the billionaires who went out of their way to kill the best of American schools. They robbed the schools of humanities as part of their need to get Americans anesthetized, blinded to their vaster agendas of thievery. A goon from the Georgia woods will do. Will do by her white trash vulgarity to cover for the infinitely worse elite vulgarity.
I wrote my doctoral dissertation, "Appalachia and Detroit" (1977), with full appreciation of the frontier spirit, full acquaintance with the "humor of the Old Southwest," which ran from Davy Crockett, Mike Fink, and Sut Lovingood to Twain and Faulkner. Vital, this vernacular.
But they in their day engaged the conceits, pretenses, charades of the powerful. Not today. Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Gazpacho, Matt Gaetz, James Comer, Gosar, Stefanik, the orange fat one, and all the dehumanized rest of them only comfort the comfortable, their antics key to distracting us from the good work of a few good public figures trying really to help the millions damaged by the elite predators.
Will I be kicked off Substack again for using the phrase "poor white trash"? How is that worse than "red neck hicks "? Or has the standard changed? Or maybe reality finally hit.
Thx. If we elevate the conversation, perhaps we also name the issue rather than simply sling mud. They are racists, haters, folks who would hate others no matter their socio-financial status. They lack empathy, decency, honesty, truth, compassion, or morality as their Fuerher Trump does. Narcissist s? Sociopaths? There is a mental illness that has swept large swaths of our country from the brainwashing and normalizing of ugly behavior, thought, and action that has been encouraged by the party formerly known as Republican. Even if we win this next election, one of my deepest concerns is how we will find healing for the incredible number of people deluded and invited into derangement over these years. The brainwashing is complete.
I do not consider myself as having, ''Lazy habits of mind'' I do not respect any of those right wing fascists that are hell bent on destroying our nation and trying to force their phony Christian Nationalist crap on all of us. DJT should have been imprisoned 3 years ago along with all of his corrupt minions. MTG is dumb as a rock and not qualified for anything. She is arrogant, hateful, and utterly useless.
Do you refer to the wonk which universities teach now in order to protect the neutered clamoring for safety in tribal, trigger-warnings-needed, group identities?
You like the anodyne, John? You like elites dehumanized as part of the far-right game plan since the Powell memo of 1971?
How much "analysis" might attract you, John, if it's all void of the personal, the human, such as Diane Ravitch chronicled corporate schemers doing to all levels of American education ("The Language Police," 2003)?
These people that worship and vote for those corrupt and arrogant Fascists and Authoritarians like MTG and Donald TUMP deserve to be insulted as far as i am concerned. They do not deserve any respect whatsoever. Are we supposed to like these people? DJT and that loudmouthed MTG are corrupt and are traitors to our nation. They are out to destroy the United States, are we supposed to respect them?? They will take away all of our freedom and our safety net and many will die because of these treasonous traitors. They incited the insurrection and riots on JAN 6 2021 and caused 5 deaths. I am not going to bow down to those Fascist creeps. I will call them what i want to call them and i do not care what someone else says. If they kick me off here, it won't be the first time i have been kicked off of a site like this. I do not care. I will save my fee they charge me every month.
John T Phillips, I don't have a problem with your descriptive words. So many of us, including myself, have been justifiably outraged and fearful for almost a decade and so I understand. We have to vent somehow, so we don't lose our sanity too. And I cannot imagine having to live immersed everyday, as you do, with these blathering, violent lunatics outnumbering the sane folks. Bless you, John.
Years of research have shown most human violence occurs because of the feeling of being disrespected. I struggle perhaps more than most bringing respect to someone like tffg. I’m just stating common knowledge in the study of violence. I’m not claiming to be able to execute what I understand to be true. There is a difference between not feeling respect towards someone versus showing them disrespect. Between countries it’s called diplomacy.
Also if all children were to be respected in their formative years we would see far more peace in the world.
Just because I feel justified in seeing someone as deplorable doesn’t mean I’m going to make the world better if I treat them that way. Law and order works. You do the crime you pay the fine. It’s a consequence. It’s justice. Once an adult has spent a childhood being disrespected it can be very hard for them to break free of those chains.
“After all, "white" is the only racial group that needs a modifier for it to become a slur. There's no "black trash" or "Hispanic trash" or "Native American trash," presumably, because for most of American history, those people were assumed by those in power to be poor, uneducated and criminal.
White trash, as described by Wray, is an oxymoron. Black trash, by that thinking, is almost redundant. He says that white trash "is a term that really has white supremacy baked into it, because it's kind of like it's understood that if you're not white, you're trash."”
White trash is a derogatory racial and class-related slur used in American English to refer to poor white people, especially in the rural areas of the southern United States. The label signifies a social class inside the white population and especially a degraded standard of living.
The term has been adopted for people living on the fringes of the social order, who are seen as dangerous because they may be criminal, unpredictable, and without respect for political, legal, or moral authority.[4] While the term is mostly used pejoratively by urban and middle-class whites as a class signifier,[5] some white entertainers self-identify as "white trash", considering it a badge of honor, and celebrate the stereotypes and social marginalization of lower-class whiteness.[1][6][...
Now if I wanted to talk about the billionaires in a derogatory manner, it would be ok because they can buy their way out of trouble, but poor white trash are usually trapped in poverty. It's the behavior that is criticized, for example
One thing everyone can count on is that I’ve never voted for a Perdue or Trump and never will! If I lived in the Rome area, I’d be really embarrassed to know MTG represents me!
The do-nothing repubs made budget brinkmanship routine. At first people got alarmed when they held us all hostage, and that let them extort a better deal. But fatigue is setting in - not just in the legislature; the public isn't all that impressed either! You can't keep playing the same trick and expect everyone to play along and pretend it's original forever.
I'm sick of this. It's a dumb game, and I don't want to play with repubs any more. VOTE BLUE 2024!!
I have heard that some supposedly in the know suspect that the attack was staged by Russia, much like the 1999 apartment bombings that gave Putin carte blanche -- more like carte rouge -- to pursue the second Chechen War.
🤢
Personally, I am hoping it is a vengeance jihad against Russia for what Russia did to Muslims in Syria up to (50,000 killed); Afghanistan (at least 900,000 killed), and Chechnya (roughly 300,000). Sure hope so; been waiting two years for this second, asymmetric front.
🤞
For her part, U.S. has killed roughly 150,000 Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan (but still too many; that datum likely under-stated).
I’m thinking your second thought makes the most sense. It was something I wondered about too. Russia was pretty bad to Afghanistan. And right now Russia is busy trying to take over Ukraine and has lost a lot of military strength so they are vulnerable.
By that reasoning the USA “deserved” 9/11 then? Violent Islamist Jihadists are working world wide to terrorize us. It’s a major scary problem. Their end game (they say) is to establish Islamist Theocracies everywhere. This is also the intention of Hamas.
No, the intention of Hamas is narrower: eliminationist anti-semitism. I will repeat what I replied to another fan of Dr Richardson in a moment. Please know that these people are in the minority. As we are seeing in Ukraine, it may take a while for the decent majority to wake up and defeat these darker forces; but the good guys almost always do. We may find ourselves in such a time these dark days. Yes, one is reasonable to have fear, but let us stick together so we can remain confident that ours is the quiet unity of enduring strength.
"Like I.S.I.S. and American settlers on the West Bank whom I have seen interviewed on television, these homicidal hypocrites use religion as a cover story for doing what they want to do: injure, even kill, people and break things, notwithstanding many strict strictures in Judaism, Xianity, and Islam not to do such things. If there is divine retribution, those people, someday, will leave us to go somewhere a lot hotter than their heads are now. My fear is that there is no divine justice and these enemies of the love J.C. himself exemplified [-- as a rabbi, a Xian, and the second most important prophet in Islam --] will bring Hell to us here, now."
P.S., Annie, be assured, s.v.p., that I am not a complete nut-job -- partially for sure, but not quite complete; I am a stark, raving agnostic. 🤭🫣😉
I like your perspective. I might mention this is ISIS-K and what little I read from one of Heather’s sources on the the Winslow Center it appears their goal is more narrow as well. They are even an enemy of the Taliban and wish for a “pure” Afghanistan with no minorities or alternate religious viewpoints. Somewhat like the white Christian nationalists here. Still puzzled about their attack on Moscow.
Unlikely. This incident is going to weaken Putin's standing as a guardian of the Russian people. At the very least, it's an embarrassment coming on the heals of the sham Russian election.
Suggest folks read the commentary by Nadine Brzezinski https://nadinbrzezinski.medium.com/ - she really is connected with the "other Russia". One needs to be aware of its only too real existence.
I did read his letter tonight yet he just gave a chronology of events and didn’t posit why ISIS acted. Reading a CNN report it appears there have been other attempts against Russia by ISIS in March that had been thwarted.
Speculation about the why of terrorist acts is surely most inappropriate, although sometimes their purpose will be evident.
One gets the impression that Americans and most Westerners have no idea of the extraordinary diversity of the Russian population across the country's vast territory, of what this implies or how the Kremlin has dealt with the problem of keeping sometimes huge minorities in line. Especially at a time as fraught as now.
I don’t think speculation on why terrorist group act is inappropriate. And people here realize the diversity of Russian culture. I suspect our intelligence spends a fair amount of time trying to understand motives to help predict what group might terrorize and when. In fact reports state our intelligence tried to warn Putin of this attack and he dismissed it which I find fascinating. His own intelligence seems not up to snuff. This reporting is one of the things that makes me think it wasn’t an inside job.
Brandy, I lost your other comment relating to this when I tried to reply to it, agreeing that one should always try to understand an enemy's motives but a little confused beyond that.
On seeing the news of the latest attack on a Moscow venue, I thought back at once to earlier atrocities, horribly, brutally mishandled by the Russian security services. I just wrote "mishandled", but anything that puts fear into the general population bolsters the regime.
After those, the Chechen boss, Kadyrov, was given a free hand... and used and abused it to maximum effect, Putin's purpose being peace, quiet and total control over all Caucasian territories and the country's Muslim minority, while silencing or physically eliminating critics with nuisance value and potential political rivals.
I shall stick my neck out and state categorically that both the October 7th atrocity and 9/11 were deliberately designed as trigger mechanisms to set off chain reactions. In other words, both appeared to the victims to be gratuitous assaults by fanatics, but both were in reality strategic actions, the attack on Israel being a far deadlier trap in that America was not under any compulsion to undertake such acts as occupying Afghanistan for decades or invading Iraq, whereas the geographical nature of Gaza and the formidable tunnel network built under the conurbation meant that there was no way in which even a more clinical approach to punishing Hamas and rescuing hostages could avoid causing great physical damage to the city and harm to the civilian population.
In this case, however, the enemy knew and understood Netanyahu and sidekicks, while the latter despised Hamas and grossly underestimated an able and totally ruthless enemy pursuing long-term global aims, prepared even to sacrifice both its current fighters -- at a cost -- and the martyred Gaza population.
Why go on about all this? Because the strategic purpose of both atrocities is evident, even if Americans still do not seem to have grasped the fact or woken up to what it revealed of flagrant imbalances that still make the US and the West vulnerable to dangerous threats both internal and external.
Returning, then, to the assault on a huge Moscow concert hall, the form of this closely resembled previous attacks in Russia and the Bataclan atrocity in Paris in November 2015.
[At the moment when that happened, I was attending a meeting in Germany and sitting next to the organizer, who told us what was happening. I turned to him at once and said, "The attackers come from Brussels". Not even intuition, familiarity with the city where I was living.]
Despite the clear adherence to the same pattern, despite all the indications that this was not, like the bombing of apartment buildings used as a pretext for the second Chechen war, an inside job, the complex hatreds and rivalries within Russia and, in particular, Chechnya and neighboring republics are, to put it mildly, confusing to outside observers, but it would surely be surprising if the attackers, like those who attacked the Bataclan music hall, did not have a local support network.
Finally, the Israeli government received plenty of advance warnings over a long period of time, and not long before the October 7th attack, and these were ignored. Likewise the current horror. In Russia today, it is hard to assess what is going on, but anything that raises the level of terror and paranoia within the population may be regarded by the regime as useful. They can surely be counted on to find ways of using this in the total war against Ukraine.
Meanwhile, the Little Greene Gals and Men occupy Congress on behalf of "President" DT and his mentor in Moscow quite as effectively as their predecessors occupied Crimea in 2014 and far more effectively than the January 6th mob. Curzio Malaparte would have relished the technique of this so far successful coup.
Chaos is clearly useful to a dictator. Yet I still believe this was ISIS-K. Yes, Russia will try to use this to justify its war in Ukraine. They wouldn’t want the people to believe their safety and security isn’t that great. Frankly I don’t think most of the Russian people are that stupid as to buy everything Putin says. Our intelligence was right and eventually even our warning will get through to enough Russian people to cause more damage to the integrity of Putin. I suspect these attacks are separate each with their own motives. HAMAS is more clear. ISIS-K’s not so much. But clearly they saw an opening while Russia is busy with Ukraine.
Russia still has a large military presence in Syria and other parts of the Middle East. They are friends and trading partners with Iran. The Russians are interfering with Muslim countries in Africa. I'm sure they have even more reasons that I am unaware of.
The CIA and intelligence services from all over the world have infiltrated Russia. Of course, it is likely, the GRU and FSB are here in the US in larger numbers than most of us know about.
We shouldn't be surprised if an attack like this happens here. We all need to be diligent.
Recently, several large grow houses of pot in ME have been discovered that are run by Chinese nationals. I doubt that ME is the only state they have their operations.
We have 11 neighbors within a quarter of a mile and I can only see one of their houses from our property.
Waiting for the explanation from ISIS. But this group is known to operate in Afghanistan. Before we spent 20 years meddling there, Russia did the same. They wasted the country and slaughtered many. Perhaps karma has arrived? Not sure...
I've just turned 79, and I can vividly remember, around the time of Freedom summer, thinking that we were not going to survive the Civil Rights struggle. Then during the Cuban missile crisis thinking that I probably wouldn't live to see my twenty first birthday. I watched following Brown v Board how so many of us couldn't accept the simple truth of humanity. And then we plunged into Vietnam and I spent four years of my life in the army, including that awful year of 1968, not sure how the country would hold together. We barely got out of that one intact, perhaps saved only by three extraordinary men going to the moon surrounded by our profound will to put them there. Then there were the Pentagon Papers and Watergate and the disastrous collapse of trust in the government. And so on.
You know, I often think I've spent my whole life in a storm. I spent over 40 years teaching American history and attempting to give my students some sense of the extraordinary story of our founding and the reasons for it, all the while watching that extraordinary promise frittered away by men and women with small souls, biased hearts, limited vision, stunted morality, and increasing partisanship.
So now, watching this current mess, I guess I'm a little less horrified than I ought to be because I've become so used to such people calling themselves Americans and thinking that they are a legitimate part of this grand experiment when in fact they have utterly failed to understand who we were designed to be. Yes, that design was flawed from the start, primarily by slavery, but the dream was there in the minds of those (admittedly all white males) who endured that long, hot summer in that closed-windowed building and created something another American would one day call "the last best hope of earth".
I still believe, with Lincoln, in the great task remaining before us, but lord, sometimes it is awfully damned hard.
Yes. When the draft was ended, I recall thinking this will change our country forever. It has always surprised me that this big socioeconomic change in the 1970s isn't cited more by historians as a factor in the remaking of patriotism that has brought us to where we are today.
As a retired history/civics teacher myself, I tend to frame the current within the longer lens of history. (It’s one of the things I love about Letters From an American: HCR’s insights are so often presented in this context.) Our nation’s history can be viewed through numerous lenses, of course: race, class, gender, labor v business, war, territorial acquisition, politics, power, money… and different cause-effect chains become evident when this kind of analysis is applied. So, what’s an approach to illuminate the current threat? I think a useful lens is demagoguery, i.e., “political activity that gains support by appealing to the desires and prejudices of ordinary people rather than by using rational argument.” Our democracy has been evolving since its inception and the challenge has been how to expand democracy to empower the marginalized in the face of entrenched, reactionary power. To me, that frames our current dilemma. There are simply a LOT of Americans who reject the notion of democracy if it is inclusive. They will support (worship?) the demagogue who uses race, religion, gender, and ideals based on “tradition” to create an in-group/out-group tribalism that attracts them. This explains why poor white men would fight to uphold slavery. And it explains the appeal of Trump as he seems to speak for an aggrieved demographic whose world view feels besieged by “wokeness.” Across American history, each era’s demagogues have surged and then faded, but as James Quinn outlined, in his lifetime alone, the struggle has been relentless. Do I mean to suggest that democracy will always win out? Absolutely not. What history teaches us is that there is constant struggle between the reactionary and the progressive. Far from endorsing complacency, this understanding confirms the efficacy of civic vigor. I hope we’re up for it this time around.
About halfway through my teaching career I had one of those moments which, if I read it right, gave me an insight into how to present our history in terms kids could understand and use. I took the scientific method as taught in their science classes and applied it to history. As we've all (I hope!) been taught, there are several stages to that method, beginning with posing a question, gathering data pertinent to it, forming a hypothesis, testing that hypothesis, modifying it to accept new or contradictory data in order to form a theory, and so on. So I took as the question that which motivated the Founders - could the citizens of a state or nation together rule themselves justly. They, or at least some of them, primarily Madison, collected the data they had from their understanding of history, and the Constitution was their hypothesis. They knew that time and circumstance would certainly make modifications to that hypothesis necessary so they included a method of doing so. As you note in your own way, we've been testing it ever since. I don't think we've quite gotten to the theory stage - there are just too many variables, and our increasing diversity, technology, and connection to the rest of the world have only added to them.
The concept was a bit simplistic, but it seemed to work with enough of my students so that I continued to use it for the remainder of my career.
For myself, I think the essential problem is that too many of us have never thought of this nation as an ongoing hypothesis, but rather as something already written in stone mirroring their own conception of it. Having been formally trained in anthropology with a particular interest in human origins, I think the whole process mirrors that other great theory in human development, Darwin's concept of decent with modification, Both, being at the very core of human existence, have always been the source of intense controversy. Indeed I often think of the story of the bishop's wife who, when confronted with Darwin's idea that we arose from earlier forms of life (apes!), noted to her husband, "My dear, let us hope it is not true; but if it is true, let us hope it will not become generally known."
Her response came to me with particular force with the rise of the MAGA crew who certainly hope this Constitutional hypothesis isn't true and are doing everything they can to make sure it is not either true or generally known.
I'll bet you were a wonderful teacher! As my teaching skills evolved, I too moved from teaching history as a narrative to something more thematic, which helped my students connect dots across time and see patterns that made the whole endeavor much more meaningful to them. You are correct - absolutely correct - that many citizens see democracy as something sprung, fully formed, with ratification of the Constitution, rather than as the process it is. In this sense, democracy is a noun and a verb, the latter implying not only activism, but change. Change is unsettling, and is not always an improvement upon the old. In this sense, I understand the MAGA impulse, while abhorring the prejudices and fear upon which it feeds.
Whatever I was as a teacher was because I stood at the feet of giants, starting with an ugly old ex-sculptor from Athens who gave, and lost, his life in the service of free inquiry. I think this is what I abhor most about the MAGA crowd and all their predecessors; the idea that education ought to be safe and comfortable when in fact, it is not truly education if it is either. Perhaps you've read Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. He saw this coming long before Donald Trump and his myrmidons came on the scene.
Sadly, it has become difficult, if not insurmountable, to make in-course adjustments to our Constitution, leaving us with an eighteenth and nineteenth century baked-in sclerotic document. Getting thirty eight states to change anything seems harder than finding a unicorn.
You'll perhaps forgive me for adding a bit about just how young we are. As I used to tell my students, I could have talked to a man who fought in the Civil War, and he could have talked to a man who fought in the Revolution. Politically we are yet children.
There was a time when slavery and racism were baked into the Constitution, supported by the Supreme Court and the Executive Branch, sanctified by the public, and even discussing it in Congress was prohibited by the infamous 'Gag Rule'. I'm not suggesting that we need another Civil War, but I do think that we are still young enough, and the hypothesis yet untried enough that all the possibilities are not yet visible.
I do think we are going to need another shock similar to the Civil War (although I certainly hope not as destructive) to bring us to some sort of collective sense. It may be that it will take another Trump presidency or something like it. His supporters don't really understand the damage he could do because they are still focused on his first term and all the good things they think he accomplished, but a second one will not be like the first, and his desperation to avoid another such humiliation as 2020 will lead him to try things he didn't know or dare to do the first time around. We are in uncharted territory here, and unknowns are always more fearful than reality. Democracy is never safely final, as it cannot be, but we have endured and survived some awful distortions of this experiment.
I'd like to think so, but one of the greatest truths of teaching, particularly at the elementary level as I did is that one never knows what kids will make of what you think is abundantly clear. But I appreciate the thought.
I still wish, as I have since he was first elevated to the Senate, that someone would throw Rand Paul off the Roebling Bridge. That little fuckwit *needs* termination since back when he was a "self licensed" opthamologist. We really are at the point where the only "good Republicans" are "pushing up daisies" as Harry Truman said way back in 1948.
Heh. And I thought that poor neighbor was forgotten. If I was on a jury having to judge him for beating the hell out of that whiny annoying Rand Paul, I would award him a medal.
It seems that Buck and Gallagher’s departure may finally give the Dems the leverage needed to force a vote on aid to Ukraine. MTG’s motion may have done them a big favor.
Such buffoonery in both houses by GOP radicals. Disgusting.
Herb With Trump opposing urgent military aid to Ukraine and puppet Johnson dancing on the House Raucus Committee’s hot coals, it won’t be until mid-April at the very earliest that some bipartisan initiative may gain traction to force a vote on the October request for urgent military aid to desperate Ukrainian military.
Vote Blue is not enough. WORK Blue matters. The ground game can skew things several percentage points that move us from lose to win. Them (the Democrats) is US! Go to a swing state and WORK to elect Democrats. I did that as long as I was able, working in NV for Obama and Hillary. At age 82, I'm sending money. Lots of swing states for Presidency and Senate, gotta be one close to each of us. NC, GA, OH, MI, WI, MT, NV, AZ, come to mind. Biden needs the Senate and the House to bull off his programs. Get off your butt and WORK to save Democracy! If you can't, send money of you can. My wife and I dropped $40K on the last round. Talk is cheap, and worthless. Democracy is not a spectator sport!
You wrote, ''This morning, conservative lawyer George Conway suggested that “we should stop defiling the memory of the party of Lincoln by referring to the current organization” as the Republican Party.''
Here's an idea let's have a poll to help George Conway. Here are some choices:
I like Party of Trump — the only reason is so Democrats could use it in their publicity. I envision bumper stickers all over the country : GET OFF THE POT AND VOTE FOR AMERICA!
I actually think #6 is the least useful because it is a word for an already existing thing. Then consider that thing is a genre of music that 1) is America's most popular cultural export of the last half-century, which 2) historically represents marginalized communities' victory outside of an established system through 3) the cultivation of a quick mind over a quick trigger and 4) the ultilization and synthesis of bits of historical lineage into a newly vital and "woke" present, ideally resulting in art of 5) raw personal honesty, confrontational social awareness, and great stylistic and thematic variety, with the potential for 6) more open souls via joyous bodily release. Absolutely none of which describes the organization we are attempting to rename.
I vote for #10 because it is the sound I make whenever I have to read about their daily shenanigans. I'm a sucker for otomatopeia!
I go with 10, because to add the word "party" gives you "urrp" which is associated with an episode of reverse peristalsis.
Per the Cleveland Clinic:
What is reverse peristalsis? When the wave-like muscle contractions of peristalsis move backward instead of forward, it's called retroperistalsis, antiperistalsis or reverse peristalsis. This is what happens when your vomiting reflex is triggered.
‘Sticking’ with the ’MAGATS Party’ works for me. Allows one to be creatively whimsical with the terminal TS. Like ‘... Team Scheiße’, or ‘T’s S... Party, etc.
I am not sure if this Business Insider story is true. But essentially Ukraine has been using drones and long-range missiles to target its oil and gas industry. "US officials are said to be concerned that the attacks could drive up oil prices and provoke retaliation. They want Ukraine to ease up, per the report."
Obviously, higher oil prices would be bad for Biden in the upcoming election. It pains me to say this, but with aid being stalled in Congress, I can't help but think Ukranians' response to the U.S. "concern" would be like their response to that Russian warship early on in the war: "Go f**k yourself."
Higher oil prices would be worth paying to be rid of both Putin and Dump. But since we already produce enough oil and gas in the US and Canada to supply ourselves, why should we have to pay higher prices anyway? Yes, energy is a global market, but are are such things as price controls. I say supply the Ukraine and damn the torpedoes; as for the other guy, Tuck Frump.
I am gobsmacked that Jackal Johnson has recessed the House until April 9th after its Perils of Pauline handling of the latest prospective government financial shutdown. So many artificial crises must be so psychologically exhausting that another more-than-two-week vacation is required.
Under Speaker Johnson the House has spent far more time in recess than in Washington. Part of this is due to the House Raucous Committee, which continually seeks to jab a stick into the wheels of government. Also, Johnson has difficulty getting his NYET instructions from Trump, who has been engaged in vacuuming money from the Republican National Committee for his legal bills while seeking the cash/bond for $464,000,000 by March 25th.
John has indicated his intention to invite Netanyahu to speak before the House (or, with Schumer’s assent, before a joint session of Congress.) Such a political meddling in the Middle East cauldron repeats what occurred with Netanyahu in 2015.
President Obama was on the cusp of concluding s six-nation agreement intended to short circuit Iran’s development of a nuclear capability. Netanyahu openly opposed this. The Republicans, in control of the House and Senate, invited Netanyahu to use this platform to publicly oppose a major initiative of the United States Government (and others).
[As a matter of diplomatic protocol, since Obama had not invited Prime Minister Netanyahu to the United States, he was not invited to the White House.] Might Netanyahu journey to Mar a Lago to genuflect before his favored presidential candidate?
MEANWHILE, the Russians have been carpet bombing key electric installations in Ukraine, brave Ukrainians are dying as much better equipped and supplied Russians are ravaging, AND Johnson mentions that the $61,000,000,000 October request for urgent Ukrainian military aid will be ‘considered’ after the latest House recess.
Personally, I consider traitorous the Trump/Johnson NYETS on providing vital support for Ukraine against ‘Greater Russia’ Putin.The thought of ‘President’ Trump cutting off all aid to Ukraine in support of his buddy Putin makes me puke.
After reading Jay Kuo's substack The Status Kuo, I am a bit concerned about Trump's Truth Social going public. He stands to garner a few billion dollars from the deal.
"But there’s a lifeline for Trump that could change everything. In fact, it’s far more than a lifeline; all of Trump’s personal financial problems may soon vanish, and he may become a real billionaire many times over, at least on paper, in one of the biggest grifts ever."
UPDATE: After reading Robert Hubbell's Today's Edition, I feel much better about this now. See "Trump's legal and money problems get worse" in the newsletter for Robert's explanation.
Except, as soon as Cheetolini sells any shares, the value will tank since the company has no actual value. It’s losing money massively, and without Cheetolini, it’s nothing.
He’s locked out from selling or using his shares as collateral for 6 months, but the board could waive that. However, if that happens and the other shareholders don’t sue him, they are morons since the value of their shares will evaporate.
George The link between ‘Truth Social’ and Trump is indicative of a giant Ponzi scheme. The artificial figure of perhaps $6 billion is foo foo dust. It is related to a massively money losing Trump media trumpet.
Trump ultimately is likely to end up with a massive amount of Trump stock toilet paper.
Wow! A really bad day for the POT (Party of Trump) A helpful piece of legislation swept past their slimy hands. Guess their 'Grand Imperial Wizard' will have another ketchup throwing tantrum. Come April 22, with only a one vote lead the poor maggots, uh sorry, magats, might be forced to witness some real legislation passing. Tough patooties, trump.
I wonder if Betsy DeVos helped him with this RNC pyramid model, because, you know -Amway. I must say I would enjoy it immensely if the Trump/Putin "MAGAtized" RNC paid Trump's legal bills and starved every other GOP campaign for donations. And yes, George Conway is correct, it should be called the MAGAPutins or something similar. Regardless of the name, it is a criminal organization working to attack the Republic (as a representative democracy), destroy vital institutions such as Social Security and public education, and burn the U.S. Constitution and Declaration of Independence.
Senators Budd, Lee, Cruz, and Paul -are all part of the MAGA movement -and Cruz also stood against certification of the 2020 election with 146 other MAGAtized extremists who should be considered for expulsion from Congress.
Regardless of the name, one of the last things they actually are is defenders of a republic.
Or genuinely conservative.
Or patriots
Or adherents to "law and order"
Or Christians
Or the "victims"
Or speakers of truth
Or a party Lincoln could have identified with in any way.
So very true. I suspect Lincoln might say "I thought you surrendered in 1865" And Eisenhower might say "I thought you surrendered in 1945."
Of course Darwin might take one look at Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene and recheck his notes about evolution.
Love the last sentence!
Thanks Lynn. (I’m here to help). 🤓
MTG- WHO does she think she is? And WHY? And WHEN and HOW did she become who she thinks she is? WHAT more can she and her cronies-in-crime do before they are
"put in their place."
HOW has she been allowed to do her detrimental "thing"
Is the big question, to me.
There are 'useful idiots’ and then there are 'outrageous useful idiots'. She does what she does because she is encouraged and rewarded for it. She distracts and people bite on the distractions, and if she distracts enough while the hidden dirty work proceeds apace, all the better. Look at all the footage there was of her in her stupid costume at the SOTU address. Look at the footage of Biden making a face at her getup on that occasion. All a waste of everyone’s time and attention, but the so called fourth estate can't get enough of it. So it, 'it' being the nihilistic behavior of an outrageous useful idiot, continues ad nauseam.
Please share: Voting Blue in November is now the only "choice" we have left.
She’s a black hole, Pam. All the light gets sucked in. No point in even trying.
Hey Georgia! Support Marcus Flowers to oust MTG!! https://marcusforgeorgia.com/
Ego is the most dangerous drug of all; and yet we all have one. Ego literally means "I", and it's there for good reason. R. L. Stevenson's point in "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde" is that Hyde is part of human nature; and there is an addictive appeal to exerting unaccountable power. There is a touch of it in my sneering at MTG, but few (if any) of us are total saints. Certainly her behavior is worthy of condemnation.
I become dangerous if I begin to tell myself that only my preferences, only my rights matter, that other people are only obstacles, tools, or toys. Or perhaps only those of my race, nation or cohort are worth to live or find their own way. Trump seems to have no brake on narcissism; he appears ready to maliciously cheat/betray anyone. Weird that he is admired for that, but that's far from new in the course of history. We as a species keep making that same mistake over and over, and as our species' power to do increases, it threatens to kill us all.
Evolution also selected our powers of reason and the better angels of our nature, love, reason, empathy, conscience, compassion, etc., the "angel" one shoulder and "devil" on the other. We collectively need to get smarter fast about which to follow.
Seriously, what is the point of Maggot Traitor Gangrene? She is doing NOTHING to work on the issues facing the people in her constituency, and is harming them and the rest of the country in the bargain. And WTH is Johnson doing recessing the House? He really doesn't grasp his job, either as a representative or as the Speaker, does he? (That isn't really a question.)
She wants to be "relevant". And have lots of reporters pay attention to her.
I think MTG says a lot about Georgia.
It's chance mutation after all. They can't all be gems.
I needed a good laugh this morning!
I don't know why people refer to Rep. Greene as anything but "MT Greene" (sound it out, and you'll get it.)
Heck, I just spell it right out for folks: Empty Greene. Completely empty of brains, empty of any ability to shut her yap, empty of any sense of decorum or dignity and yes, empty of any form of common sense.
Just like her Dear Leader Trump, in fact.
Thanks! Great point
Yup, George, they should just crawl back into the primordial slime.
They should break down into a few chemicals clinging to the wall of a deep ocean vent or maybe be going down a black hole in deep space.
Trump is a good example he really sucks (or, more accurately, he warps whatever space he occupies)
Takes the air right out of the room and fills it with something fetid.
Slime gone wrong. Very wrong.
The Freedom Caucus, if that's the word for it now, is determined to follow through on bringing down the "administrative state", it's all out now regardless of the chaos, and that just seems to be their gameplan. Anarchy, since there is no way other members of Congress can go along and maintain their political sanity, or survival.
Of course, the "Freedom Caucus" would be right out of a certain Orwell novel. I think CHAOS Caucus would be more fitting - or even more appropriate, KAOS, like the international organization of evil in "Get Smart" (the '60s TV comedy, for those of you under age 50).
Control vs. KAOS.
Sorry about that...
I wonder what their electorates are thinking right now. Are they as bad as their reps? Some of the random street comments from Trump supporters doesn't feel encouraging. But ...
A goodly number of their supporters just want to own the libs and have all the biases that these members show. Also a certain part of the population loves the idea of thumbing their noses at authority and being totally uncivil. Death star has given them carte blanche to act out and being in the face of everyone they perceive to be different.
Read an article about trumpers being interviewed about how they felt about trump's insulting the handicapped. "It's a political campaign thing." It's terrible" etc. Would you still vote for him? Yes.
Yes, Freedom for whom? It's freedom for Putin. Then MTG and DJT get the hoped for reward of basking in Daddy's approval.
1984 was the most ominous book i ever read. Age 16 or so, one night in a basement. Chilled me to the heart. (offset - the year my second child was born)
Please share: Voting Blue in November is now the only "choice" women have left.
Point taken but it's also the only choice that any freedom loving person has left.
"My Species Disappoints Me" is my favorite bumper sticker on my car!
My species awes and disappoints me, even scares me. There is so much to like, so many "gifts"; it's nuts the degree to which our species is it's own worst enemy.
I used to like people; now, I just want to get away from most of them. Perhaps our species is more palatable in small doses. "Zero population growth" was a stellar idea!
I think a lot of our big problems have been exacerbated by population growth, including immigration issues, climate change, and seeming disintegration of a sense of community. It not the only factor, but it complicates a lot.
That last sentence made me laugh out loud. Thank you! I needed that laugh.
Trump doesn’t think Republican candidates need cash from him. He thinks his mere endorsement is better than money.
Good one George! 💩😵💫🤗
Thanks for the chuckle. Well penned.
Valid point about Lincoln and Eisenhower.
J.L. - "or geuinely conservative" Why do we still call the GOP conservatives? And I don't think you need the modifier "genuinely".
They are repressive regressives. HCR reminded us yesterday about the 1850's. Sounds a lot like today's GOP.
Gary Loft ME NE FL CT MI IL CA, oooh, I like that ----repressive regressives.
alliteration, if I remember from high school English. I am a metaphor type person myself.
Or regressive repressers. How depressing!
"Repressive Regressives" is about perfect, Gary. I think certain ones may be called "Aggressive Repressive Regressives", or the ARRs! Pirates one and all!
The "GOP" should be censured for illiteration.
Good one, J L!
Or GOOP - Greatly Oppressive Old Party
I love it Doug. I've being trying to come up with something to go with the Repressive Regressives. The Pirate thing works great.
Please share: Voting Blue in November is now the only "choice" women have left.
HCR's letters remind us that Lincoln's republican party stood for investing in the infrastructure of society so that free men could build their lives upon a strong foundation that only a collective (the government) can build and maintain. The republican party of my lifetime (62 years) has always wanted to do the opposite. Let the corporations, already powerful rich white men, take over and usurp everyone else. Of course they admire Putin.
" The legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves---in their separate, and individual capacities.
In all that the people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought not to interfere." - Lincoln
I would not take "individually do as well for themselves" to mean "let the billionaires buy up everything, and pay whatever they ask for it". That's "Reganomics".
Perhaps, instead of buying megayachts, or spaceships, etc., the obscenely rich could invest in the country, as their predecessors did in "the good old days". Andrew Carnegie comes immediately to mind.
Carnegie was still a ruthless creep but I liked his libraries. The problem is even when the not so predatory rich do genuinely good works, they do so according to their vision/understanding which can be one-sided or out of touch. We benefit from philanthropy, and we can benefit from visionaries, who sometimes see what's needed before the crowd; but as a rule, the People are going to be the final authority on what the people need and where the people want to go. That's a democratic society. Somehow spaceflight was more exciting to me when we as a nation chose to go to the Moon and do the other things than watching preening billionaires make it their personal playground.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/10/us/elon-musk-charity.html?unlocked_article_code=1.fE0.TEQ4.60f0rPFRYltv&smid=url-share
Well, "conservative" can mean "prudent", as in a "conservative estimate". In that sense it acknowledges the pitfalls of hubris, which is to say it implies a degree of humility. I consider "the scientific method" to be conservative in a good way. "Conservation" was an early name for "environmental protection", which is conservative. Wantonly destroying resources and climate balance is not.
What is most familiar about repressiveness in the 1800s is the pompous pretext for imposition of a hierarchical society, with very rich males at the top. In this case, white males, but you will see similar scams across the globe, with some persons and cohorts spouting flowery rationalizations proclaiming the righteousness of bullying and ripping everybody else off.
In the 1850s, follow the money. In the 2020s, follow the money.
.... Yes; Always follow the money. Hi JL
Repressive, regressive, reactionaries.
Reactionary repressive regressives. The party of the three Rs.
They are Traitors
Or trustworthy!
It seems to me that trust is crucial to a free and open society. Not blind trust of course, but reasonable trust. No, the Nigerian Prince probably is not palnning to share millions of dollars with you if you just send some money, but we entrust things to others every day. Significant cheating poisons a social environment. We can adapt to it to some degree, but at some point the society will degenerate into despotism or chaos or both. We must all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately".
In a world where truth is blurred, ethics are lost, and intellect is rare, the marketplace of ideas falters. And, thus society collapses.
The truth we get to know can be somewhat elusive, but we can at least tell the truth, so far as we understand it. I think societies thrive on good faith, and tyranny is sustained by lies.
Amen, J L. I have often listed all these things as aspects of the party of death. Thank you for putting out an excellent plain list for us.
Though I think of it more as the Party of Selfishness, and that extreme, pathological selfishness results in deaths. Maybe even that of our whole species (the universe is perfectly capable of ending all of our stories unexpectedly, but likely won't any time soon). Knowledge without wisdom can be dangerous, let alone charting the future on damnable lies. Unbridled Selfishness + Unaccountable Power = Disaster
It's a selfishness that leads to death: of rights, of our democracy, of the planet, of genuine patriotism, of what Jesus taught, of any kind of human decency. We are headed more quickly than expected to making the planet unlivable. I find wisdom to be a fairly rare commodity. As for knowledge, someone will always figure a way to use it dangerously.
Wisdom does not seem to get much press these days. I'm not even sure how to define it, but I think that at least in part it has to do with with seeing extended consequence and an improved sense of what most matters.
which is why it is rare.
Exactly right!
Maybe they are the vermin trump speaks about.
The Latin root of "vermin" means "worm". Worms are attractive bait for many fishes. Worms can be used to lure an unpopular variety of fish known as "Suckers".
Sounds about right. I guess trump and his followers are the suckers. Love you c om men t.mp would be the vermin
You got that right!
"This morning, conservative lawyer George Conway suggested that “we should stop defiling the memory of the party of Lincoln by referring to the current organization” as the Republican Party."
Nonsense. Revisionist in the worst way - abdicating responsibility. It's been Republicans all the way down and as far back at least to Nixon, Reagan, Gingrich, et al. Direct and even blood heirs of the Confederacy - ever since opening their arms to the Dixiecrats and jumping into bed with the religious right. From William F. Buckley and George F. Will through Murdoch, Bannon, and Jones to Truth Social. From the Powell Memorandum through the Federalist Society and Politics of Faith to the Seven Mountain Mandate and Heritage Society Project 2025. Republican Party it is. Through and through. Warp and woof.
Thank you, it’s been for most of my adult life, I liked Ike and Everett Dirksen, the others have just been apologists for the worst of the worst. Even Will Rogers knew on November 26, 1932. “The money was all appropriated for the top in the hopes that it would trickle down to the needy. Mr. Hoover didn’t know that money trickled up. Give it to the people at the bottom and the people at the top will have it before night, anyhow. But it will have passed through the poor fellow's hands.” Mr Hoover may have believed that money trickled down, but no republican since ever bought that crap. My humble opinion for most of my long life.
Wow, excellent. Me too.
I'd never heard the Will Rogers quote.
I give you Mark Twain:" it's easier to fool people than convince them they've been fooled"
It infuriates me to be wrong when I know I’m right.
—Molière
To err is human, to repent divine; to persist devilish.
-- Benjamin Franklin
Kathryn Schulz "On Being Wrong"
"Being wrong is an inescapable part of being alive. And yet we go through life tacitly assuming (or loudly insisting) that we are right about nearly everything - from our political beliefs to our private memories, from our grasp of scientific fact to the merits of our favourite team. Being Wrong looks at why this conviction has such a powerful grip on us, what happens when this conviction is shaken, and how we interpret the moral, political and psychological significance of being wrong. Drawing on philosophies old and new and cutting-edge neuroscience, Schulz offers an exploration of the allure of certainty and the necessity of fallibility in four main areas: in religion (when the end of the world fails to be nigh); in politics (where were those WMD?); in memory (where are my keys?); and in love (when Mr or Ms Right becomes Mr or Ms Wrong)."
https://www.ted.com/talks/kathryn_schulz_on_being_wrong/transcript
The OSS psychological profile of Hitler described his use of the big lie:
His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.
Ted talks are great!
Love both these guys. Sad that we didn’t pay enough attention…
Well...they were both dead
But they live on in their writing, worth a read
Yes. Let the name continue to be used until it goes down in flames. Let it join the "No Knothings, the Federalists and the Whigs in the dust bin of American history. Republican now means "crooks and traitors". Let it die.
Hopefully, a new center right party will be formed that can provide a normal and natural balance to our political ecosystem. Such things exist in other democracies. A natural yin and yang. Hopefully it will be led by honest patriots. They won't get my vote, but they could be at least be legitimate participants in the electoral process.
Hopefully. We continue to have Hope. Hope for our nation, our people, our world. It’s an ancient emotion that must be accompanied with action. Voting, protesting, even obstructing the wrongs and crimes.
Poet Emily Dickinson’s observation:
“Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul-
And sings the tune without the words
And never stops at all.” There’s more to read:
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/42889/hope-is-the-thing-with-feathers-314
How long does it take for Voters to burn out, become so discouraged that they believe they have no voice. That’s one of the repubs’ best tactics: delay, obstruct, distract, lie: Brave New World isn’t just a novel.
Yes. I think (and hope) that the Dobbs decision will be the force behind a Blue Wave of outraged women (and men).
"How long does it take for Voters to burn out, become so discouraged that they believe they have no voice. That’s one of the repubs’ best tactics: delay, obstruct, distract, lie:"
It is a tactic of vote splitting ideologues across the spectrum. Including such as Jill Stein, RFK, Cornell West, No Labels et sl
Bill, I grew up supporting Democrats -- even Adlai Stevenson -- before I could walk. I began reading the Washington Post under Kennedy, saw my father weep as we imagined nukes raining down on us during the Cuban Missle crisis, loved LBJ when he looked me squarely in the eye to say "We shall overcome!", knew I could never vote for Tricky Dicky when he said "you won't have Nixon to kick around anymore", learned to detest Nixon when he assured us "I am not a crook", saw my father turn white as a sheet when I told him Ford had just pardoned Nixon, and then my father died just before Raygun removed Jimmy Carter's solar panels, and then the elder Bush failed to sign early climate change legislation, and Bill Clinton (a truly talented straight-faced liar) brought sleaze to the White House but governed better than Reagan, at least, and then Bush Junior lied us into Iraq, and then Obama.... Ah Obama! inspired me and gave me hope, but perhaps didn't realize how badly he had shocked and dismayed the bigots and racists and xenophobes and -- it appears -- the super-wealthy powers that be, and then, and then? God Help Us !!
Eisenhower was arguably a good choice to lead us into the mostly unavoidable Cold War, and there have been several honorable GOP governors and a couple of Senators in my lifetime who voted intelligently when it really counted, and Liz Cheney has given us all an important lesson in true patriotism, but the Republican Party is a goner, a memory, all that's left of Lincoln's good idea that really went off the rails to become unrecognizable, a danger to our country, to the human species and to all life on Earth.
At this late (-ish, I hope) stage of my life as a non-believer, I discover that Trump is the Devil incarnate and that no one can save us from ourselves but us.
David, your recap of our national historic spiral dive is spot on. And...this "non-believer" also has decided that there may actually be a devil (or more) on Earth. Not sure if I can come up with another explanation.
Wow!
Given Trump's history of slapping his name all over anything he "owns" I could see "Trumpublican" being the name. Or, since it's already an established brand, "MAGA". Whatever, so long as he's in charge, he'll be choosing the name.
How exactly is that going to happen?
Optimistically, the GQP will suffer such great losses that disgusted moderates will act. Political parties are not guaranteed eternal life.
Yes, the reelection and sanctification of the megadunce Reagan may have been the real turning point. Or even point of no return.
I could never understand how anyone in their right minds could support Reagan. Then again, it was US which went into Vietnam to lose and cost Vietnam over a million lives, and while I understood taking on Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, what of the falsely justified invasion Iraq which led to ISIS, and the wholesale invasion of Afghanistan, from which which US withdraw after 20 years of futility, handing the country back to the Taliban?
Reagan was an actor who knew how to perform a role and recite the lines he'd memorized (written by his admittedly clever handlers) with a certain smug conviction. He was a far classier shyster than Trump, but a shyster nonetheless.
Our problem is not that so many American voters are not in their "right" minds, but that they are way Right on certain issues the rest of us thought had been decided a long time ago: that of course rich people should pay progressively higher taxes than the rest of us; that government exists to help citizens by levelling the capitalist playing field enough that everyone benefits; that we really do have equal rights, however differently we may each look or talk or dress or make love to one another; that sometimes we might do well to emulate the ways other countries give their citizens pensions and healthcare and daycare and regular paid vacations, etcetera, etcetera ad nauseam.
We Americans are exceptional in many ways, including in our short-sighted stupidity. No, not all of us, but a lot.
Please share: Voting Blue in November is now the only "choice" women have left.
Enter The Handmaid's Tale. One of the most upsetting books I have read. What was even more upsetting were the women who were supporting this life style (holding down (hand holding) while a woman was basically being raped. Sounds like Schafler?
It has been the only choice forever!
Another good bumper sticker.
Part of levelling the capitalist playing field is taxation; the other essential part is regulation. And part of the effect of fairer taxation is being able to put teeth into regulation enforcement.
Agreed , many thanks!
Why are we even in the Middle East? oil? Suez Canal? Big ticket items though. That area is the perfect example what happens when religion? or pretend religion merges with government.
Vietnam? There are river cruises going through there with side tours to Thailand.
You don't go far enough back. Harry Truman had some pithy things to point out about Republicans. I heard him say some of these things in 1947 when I was nine. Lifted this one: “Republicans approve of the American farmer, but they are willing to help him go broke. They stand four-square for the American home--but not for housing. They are strong for labor--but they are stronger for restricting labor's rights. They favor minimum wage--the smaller the minimum wage the better. They endorse educational opportunity for all--but they won't spend money for teachers or for schools. They think modern medical care and hospitals are fine--for people who can afford them. They consider electrical power a great blessing--but only when the private power companies get their rake-off. They think American standard of living is a fine thing--so long as it doesn't spread to all the people. And they admire of Government of the United States so much that they would like to buy it.”
― Harry S. Truman
https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/203941.Harry_Truman
People ( well, my people anyway) listened to him back then and knew it was true. Can we get anyone to listen these days? Or is it just sound bites on a cell phone that matter?
What a Great link. TY for that, Carolyn. My personal fav:
"Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a Republican. But, I repeat myself." Harry S. Truman
I love it. It is so true of today. Politicians are rich, get a good pension, I'm going to guess healthcare. What do they care about the regular people?
Carolyn, thank You for that!
When I find a quotable quote such as your post, I copy the link to the post and send it to myself via email with the subject line "notes to myself -- subject line here" to help me find it again later. The link to the post is included in the link to the right of the name of the person who posted it.
What Truman said is still true today.
Wonderful. ThankYou!
My mother took me to hear him at a whistle stop in Taunton, Ma in 1947 when he was campaigning. I was 9 and excited beyond words.
Carolyn,
Long may you run!
Right Carolyn; Not enough has been or is commonly spoke of "Give 'em Hell Harry." Must be generational lapses; Are we not learning that 'all this' has happened before, or at least it all rhymes ?
lin. ; Exactly right! The repgs have been pro fascism at least since Reagan, although they realize you can’t admit that in polite society.
David , keeping quiet about the hidden fascism was the case until 45.
Now the Republicans have been given permission (encouragement) to say the quiet parts out loud. When you add to that the books and articles lifting the corner of the tent and shining a bright light on the elephant dung, it’s hard to ignore what has been revealed.
The good thing is that many of us have been rudely awakened. Starting with Nixon’s and Agnew’s dirty deeds and culminating in 45, leading HIS Republican Party, we realize that, while we thought that things were the same for both parties , the US oligarchs and Dixiecrats were remodeling the Grand Old Party in their image and it ain’t pretty. As is said after many disasters, we can’t unsee the carnage and we’re called upon to get off the couch and fight.
Mary; I love your reply to my comment . Thanks for the context.
David, thank you for your reply. It’s so encouraging to read a comment that acknowledges how often we ignore our gut feeling to keep quiet out of politeness.
Not quite. While I share your criticism of the GOP of yore, there is a clear distinction between the Ghosts of GOP Past and the Whitened Sepulchers of its MAGAtized Present.
As just one of many examples, Richard Nixon, who normalized relations with China, ushered in the EPA as well as wage and price controls with Sanders-esque zeal, would be considered a Bolshevik by the mobs supporting Despicable Don on Fifth Avenue and everywhere else
And he came this close 🤏🏻 to being convicted, but was convinced to resign rather than going to jail.
Nixon? Sanders like zeal? Hmmm...
But in an interesting move he enacted the EPA to mitigate the confusion of a myriad of state regulations. My guess it was to make it easier for businesses to comply, or not.
Abraham Lincoln was of course, the first Republican President. In his famous second Inaugural Address, he called on all Americans to call on "the better angels of our nature".
While it was at least possible, if somewhat impractical, to hear Republicans from the Reagan era speak in such lofty and aspirational tones, it is literally impossible to imagine the current Kool Aid drinking Party calling itself Republican to do so.
Even further back when the Republicans added states to increase their senate members and also allowed the troop withdrawals from southern states opening the Jim Crow reign of terror.
It inspired my latest article on Leadership Matters. 🤓
Re: the origins of Republican "alternative facts" and the entire right wing revisionist history from erecting national traitors as heritage heroes in every town square to banning books in every public library.
[An aside Yesterday I heard that master tailor (to presidents and star) Martin Greenfield had died. He'd learned to sew as a child in Auschwitz. My first thought was, how long would it take Ron DeSantis et al to add to the school curriculum that the Holocaust was a boon to Jews because the concentration camps provided opportunities to develop skills which Jews could later apply for their personal benefit? ("DeSantis, however, is continuing to defend Florida’s new curriculum, ... which includes the assertion for middle school instruction that “slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit."" https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/07/22/desantis-slavery-curriculum/ ]
OK back to the GOP replacing history with hagiography.
In 1907 American ex-pat Henry James published The American Scene, his observations on a sentimental journey home. In chapter XII, starting on page 365 (of the text linked below), James speaks of his visit to Richmond, VA - seat of the defeated Confederacy.
"This then the tragic ghost-haunted city, this the centre of the vast blood-drenched circle, one of the (370) most blood-drenched, for miles and miles around, in the dire catalogue aforesaid . . . to one's first dismay; a sort of intellectual bankruptcy, this latter, that one felt one really couldn't afford. There were no references-- . . . to the conception that, almost comic in itself, was yet so tragically to fail to work, that of a world rearranged, a State solidly and comfortably seated and tucked-in, in the interest of slave-produced Cotton . . . whereby was laid on the Southern genius the necessity of getting rid of these discords and substituting for (374) the ironic face of the world an entirely new harmony, or in other words a different scheme of criticism. Since nothing in the Slave-scheme could be said to conform--conform, that is, to the reality of things--it was the plan of Christendom and the wisdom of the ages that would have to be altered. History, the history of everything, would be rewritten ad usum Delphini--the Dauphin being in this case the budding Southern mind. This meant a general and a permanent quarantine; meant the eternal bowdlerization of books and journals; meant in fine all literature and all art on an expurgatory index. It meant, still further, an active and ardent propaganda; the reorganization of the school, the college, the university, in the interest of the new criticism."
https://www2.newpaltz.edu/~hathawar/americanscene2.html
Please share: Voting Blue in November is now the only "choice" women have left.
Thank you for sharing -and those observations are now magnified times 1000 (or Magafied).
Linda, you think what's happening now is a "last gasp" effort? the GOP is shredding itself over accomplishing its extremist goals. Most important, is enough of the "ex-GOp" and independent vote up for not seeing social support and other regularity functions of modern government take a dive?
Imagine! Three Party of MAGA House Reps are quitting early as many on both sides are, because of the dysfunction! Our own fabulous Dem Elissa Slotkin is quitting to run for Senator, and she would be fantastic.
Conway is pretty pathetic.
While we're at it, the "Save America" PAC could be named the "Save Trump" PAC.
True Steve. Although you have to appreciate the Save America PAC is for Saps.
Better than magats
Great responce, George. I like George Conway's name for the new trump party - that would make the acronym the POT-p
MAGA is the current-day acronym for KKK. Read Timothy Egan's book, "A Fever in the Heartland" about the rise of the KKK in the Midwest in the 1920's. When I saw the marchers at Charlottesville in 2017 on TV, I came out of my chair when I heard them shouting, "Jews will not replace us?" What? Where did that come from? That's Klan talk.
Chump made that clear on day one, our MSM blathered the “both sides” crap to muddy the waters. It’s time that, even though the hoods are off, we recognize that their hearts are as evil as they ever were.
I get TFFG's emails to see what he's doing. He is grifting the hell out of his base because (1) he doesn't have the money that he claims to have, and 2) because he can. Here's his pitch that just came in:
Keep your filthy hands off Trump Tower
President Trump
This email was sent by the organization that owns the logo shown.
www.donaldjtrump.com
From:
contact@win.donaldjtrump.com
To:
Richard
Sat, Mar 23 at 7:19 AM
Now is the time to help me SAVE AMERICA and chip in >
KEEP YOUR FILTHY HANDS OFF OF TRUMP TOWER!
This is a message from Donald J. Trump >
Richard, insane radical Democrat AG Letitia James wants to SEIZE my properties in New York.
THIS INCLUDES THE ICONIC TRUMP TOWER!
Democrats think that this will intimidate me.
They think that if they take my cash to stifle my campaign, that I’ll GIVE UP!
But worst of all? They think that YOU will abandon me, and that you will GIVE UP on our country.
Here’s one thing they don’t know: WE WILL NEVER SURRENDER!
Biden’s corrupt regime needs to get the message - right here, right now - that our patriotic movement CANNOT BE STOPPED!
So before the day is over, I’m calling on ONE MILLION Pro-Trump patriots to chip in and say, STOP THE WITCH HUNT AGAINST PRESIDENT TRUMP! >
STOP THE WITCH HUNT
Crooked Joe Biden has coordinated every step of this ELECTION INTERFERENCE.
He thinks using the courts will stop us from winning back the White House, BUT WITH YOUR SUPPORT TODAY, WE WILL PROVE HIM WRONG!
Peacefully stand with me now >
WE WILL MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!
Thank you,
Now is the time to CHIP IN and help me SAVE AMERICA >
Now is the time to CHIP IN and help me SAVE AMERICA >
Donald J. Trump
45th President of the United States
STOP THE WITCH HUNT
Heaven help us!
From that source... Verbal Diarrhea Springs Eternal...
He just got richer by the merger with truth Social, apparently. Offshore shell company. Who follows up to see where that money came from?
Orban would be the first funnel I’d check out if I were investigating. I hope someone’s with the capacity does find out!
Yes, heaven only knows to whom he is now indebted. All along I felt that because of Putin blackmailing Trump with Moscow hotel room photos and videos, Trump was Putin's pigeon. Trump's mendacity is such that I believe it would have caused Saddam Hussein to blush. What we need to fear, of course, is what he will do if given a chance.
I’d bet on Orbán
What classy begging, NOT. But he knows what opens their wallets. I’m your savior, they are really after you. I really loved the garbage sent to me by Jr. “ok, enough playing games, my dad and i need your help now. “ couldn’t believe the stupidity. He should let his dad be the family beggar…
Thanks for that. I once got snail-mail from the GOP: sending it back (I forget if I had to put a stamp on the return envelope) with appropriate commentary (to wit, "Go to Hell") stopped any further invasion of my mailbox by that god-forsaken organization.
Thanks, you just reminded me to clear my spam folder. Over 100 from Trump.
Yes, time to see what’s really in their hearts! Think we already know!
Indeed we do, if we are not "magatized>"
I like to get straight to the point. I call it The New American Nazi Party, just as the AfD in Germany is overtaking the Heimat Party as The New German Nazi Party. I was at a rally last Sunday in a city in Northern Germany where on signs people are more clearly naming the AfD, known for its anti-immigrant stance, as Nazis. In the film God & Country, which I recently saw they talk about the symbiotic relationship between Treacherous-treasonous-traitor-Trump and the White Nationalist Evangelicals. The question is asked, is this Christianity, and the film makes a compelling case that it is not, it is more like what the Nazis were and are. Here is a discussion with the director Dan Partland and the Producer Rob Reiner. https://youtu.be/Q8QasbXXNZc?si=VAKY1dv5kInRcKrp
"The question is asked, is this Christianity?" I'm a minister (Presbyterian) and I agree with the answer except much more forcefully. It's time for the Church to ask the question, "What would Jesus do?" The shortest verse in the Bible is two words, "Jesus wept." Jesus is weeping now. These blasphemous people and organizations need to be called out by religious leadership, esp. preachers from pulpits. As Roberto Duran said to Sugar Ray Leonard, "No mas! No mas!"
Robert, I’m the granddaughter of a Methodist minister who was also a Professor of Sociology at the University of Chicago. (U of Chicago has deep Baptist roots). I was raised Catholic. My grandparents and parents were active in the Civil Rights movement and considered their actions to be their Christian duty. My “duty” turned out to be protecting the environment, as in protecting ALL of God’s creation. For my efforts, I received death threats from so-called Christians who preferred the prosperity gospels; which as most of us know is not exactly the true version of Christian principles.
The lack of public outrage from Christian leaders about the hate filled rhetoric, and policies to keep immigrants out and help rich people get richer is pretty damning in my opinion. Thank you for speaking up here.
And could someone here please explain why the good people of Georgia elected MTG? In what Universe is she qualified to be a US Representative who took an oath to protect and uphold the constitution?
Yes. Religion is supposed to be about morality. Anyone who doesn't know that the First Amendment refers to freedom of religion should learn more about Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine. Separation of church and state. A wall between church and state. We are NOT a religious state.
Sheila, she isn’t qualified, in any sense of the word. As I recall, and this was a while ago, and she’s not my representative, she did originally have some opposition, but he dropped out of the race, and she was the only one left on the ballot, in a ruby red district in north Georgia.
The question really was rhetorical, Camille. I just wish there was a way to put her on the ropes like Boebert is. Boebert is unlikely to return to Congress. Good riddance. But when you lose decent conservatives like Mike Gallagher, and retain the idiot flame throwers, policies don’t get passed. And we pay those bozos pretty well… ugh!
Thank you, Shelia. I went to Vanderbilt Divinity School which had deep roots in the Methodist Church. Mercifully, like Chicago and the Baptists, we separated from them over 100 years ago. It sounds as if you were reared in a marvelous family and it also sounds as if you are keeping the family traditions alive. Thank you! I am hoping against hope that MTG is replaced in November. When the election is closer, I will write a letter to her newspaper begging the people to vote her out. I won't do any good, but I'll feel better for trying.
Steve Bannon’s trips overseas were not for sightseeing.
Bannon is another treacherous-treasonous-traitor!
An architect of Armageddon, American style
Love the alliteration!
I've been referring to them as magamorons, but haven't gotten much traction. Probably not politically correct. I have a real problem feeling either pity or sympathy for traitors.
That’s very descriptive, I would add deliberate, not innate. The latter are deserving of sympathy, the former of our disgust.
Or perhaps, David, in honor of that now famous TFFG supporter’s pic: “Magamorans”!
That too, Barbara.
I have been calling them maggots for years now, they are morons alright.
Dick, there's another good m-word for this GOP, ends in "ers".
Why arent those insurrectionists in the House not being held accountable? Where is the rule of law?
Or those married to Supreme Court ‘Justices’.
Hiw about fir their nomenclature, the "Mugaputins" Party
First, the best way to expel Rafael Cruz from the Senate is to support Colin Allred, the Democrat in the race and a terrific candidate.
Further thought: Republicans opposed to aid for Ukraine are Putin’s fifth-columnists, and need to be labeled as such.
Once again, we see the price being paid because Merrick Garksnd refused to prosecute the seditious members of Congress who participated in the insurrection. And we never hear Joe Biden mention this. I know what’s wrong with Garlsnd, because I follow Sarah Kendzior’s writings. But WTF is wrong with Biden? He should have called of these members of Congress to be indicted and expelled in his inaugural address!!!
Ted Budd was in the House and voted against certifying the Electoral College vote. The Trump MAGA party has come up with ways to attack American institutions that would never have been considered before.
Your last eight words are far too weak, George, for elements to be expelled immediately from the body politic...
Where to is primarily a sanitary matter.
Good point Peter. I suppose I could have said "explosion from Congress" -but I don't want any Congresspersons or legislative staff who actually believe in democracy to be hurt. Besides, I'm more justice, less extrajudicial activity sort of person. :)
Likewise, George. A Cromwellian solution is undesirable, but when all constitutional safeguards against blatant betrayal from within have broken down so badly that public safety is endangered, it surely becomes necessary to think and act "outside the box".
The Republic has been taken hostage (along with most of what used to be the Republican party) in a move by insiders far more effective than the January 6th shambles... and America seems not even to have noticed...
How sick can our countries get?
In what became the Confederate states, slaves will of course have been unaware of owners' decisions to dispose of their chattels as they thought fit.
Likewise, American citizens pursue their daily business blissfully unaware that they and their country have been "sold down the river".
How is this grotesque situation possible?
*
All my working life, I had such respect for the ablest jurists with whom I had dealings. But when a state of laws has degenerated into a state of lawyers, pure otherworldly abstraction takes hold and, in the end, even fools can see that Lex asinus est -- the law is an ass.
In such a State, public safety is endangered, citizens' rights and freedoms are at risk. The very existence of citizenship is in the balance, and the prognosis is dire.
The enemy within the gates knows very well how autocrats -- kings by divine right or dictators -- act in such instances. Beheadings. The Night of the Long Knives.
Is America really bound in chains of her own making?
Is there really no recourse against betrayal from within the system?
Is Americans' "Can Do" spirit really dead? Or has it, too, been hijacked?
That is hard to believe...
Peter, you definitely have your finger on the pulse of events. And, we should be very much concerned. I just finished reading Adam Gopnik's review of Timothy W. Ryback's book about Hitler's rise to power in a democracy, entitled Takeover: Hitler's Final Rise to Power." The review is in the latest edition of "The New Yorker." The takeaway? Hitler didn't grab power; he was given it. Trump's supporters are fools to think that he would be loyal to them. What will Trump do with immigrants here if he comes to power? The Final Solution? After all, their blood is poisoned. Obviously, we need to be more serious now than ever before. It isn't just Trump, but also his stupid enablers.
Yes, the system has not evolved with the threats. If it had, Trump would have been removed and addressed in the first impeachment -as well as his co-conspirators and accessories after the fact.
Our system is like truth, lagging while the threats run amok…
Buried inside the remains of the former Fourth Estate.
Great comment, Peter.
Thank you, but it is such an unhappy business, trying to speak the truth, as I perceive it.
And now, I've just been talking with a Canadian friend... about the great things found in America. And some of the horrors, like going into small town grocery stores in black districts of upstate New York or Pennsylvania, and seeing that what was being sold was produced by the same firms that sold to whites , but -- going by his description -- half price and half way between that up-market fare and pet food.
And, once again, here we have what was noticed by a trained observer, one who spoke, too, of seeing in those places poor folk worn down by lives of stress, cruel exploitation, exhaustion. And comparing with conditions in Canada, where public healthcare and social security make life so much more bearable even for the under-privileged. (Some very sharp observations, too, on national complacency and the downside of Canadian policies...)
South Carolina beach communities, then time travel on secondary roads, moving just a few miles inland... and a century back... to shacks and barefoot kids playing in the dust.
That "Am-I-my-brother's-keeper" cruelty and indifference. And, he feared, many, many who'd be voting for Trump who despises and hates them. Anything, anything to make a break with a status quo that cares nothing for lives on the wrong side of the tracks, whether in the States, in Hebron or in Gaza.
I, who do not share the political views of this friend or his stark pessimism, despite the undeniable quality of his observations and his fellow-feeling for suffering humans, am bound to take account of that pessimism and of the dark places to which people's despair may lead them and us.
Thanks, Peter. Your writing is exquisite, your sensibility deep and mature. What an expression!: "Am-I-my-brother's-keeper" cruelty and indifference." and "a status quo that cares nothing for lives on the wrong side of the tracks..." Bellissimo! I had that sensation driving across the deep South on back roads a number of years ago. Reminded me of the poorest parts of Nigeria (where I lived for 2 years). Why can we not do better at sharing our blessings?
Hijacked, I think.
Come on, Ally, you and others here have the kind of spirit that corrodes chains!
Indeed
Truer than I ever wanted to acknowledge
It's so obvious the former Republican Party has become the Save Trumps Ass party. Anyone have a good acronym?
1) get dumpty re-elected so he doesn't go to jail
2) pay the orange cocksplat legal bills to keep the uninformed from seeing convictions before they crawl out of their holes and vote
3) maybe flip congress if we have time
Isn't that steering of funding away from downstream ballots just "asking for it" come November? A bump up for Dems. Can't hurt!
Indeed Frank -and I will gladly take anything that offsets voter suppression and gerrymandering.
George Are the MAGAPutins related to the MAGApukins?
Perhaps 1st cousins?
Kissin' cousins.
Yes, but not watching Deliverance again.
And Trumputins
They are Traitors
PutaMagats
Neal Katyl suggested a couple of years ago to call the party lead by TFG Trumplican Party.
I am convinced all who read @HeatherCoxRichardson ‘s LFAA could come up with an array of better names.
Personally, I prefer “inmates”.
But we -- even Ukrainians fighting for their lives, dying, even foreigners like me -- are all these mobsters' prisoners.
Time to rise up and make our jail break.
These people need to be put where they belong.
There is no doubt, when people are in jail for minor drug or property offenses, and people who have attacked our system while acting to the benefit of murderous adversaries like Putin are free on appeal, or bond, or just completely ignoring the justice system. *
*except for Navarro -because that's just too darn funny not to mention here.
"Dixiecrats" is available as far as I know. It pretty much fits; many of them would like to go farther back but to 1948 would satisfy most of them.
Friendly correction: 1848.
Point taken but, I think a lot of them are too fond of indoor plumbing and electricity to want to go further back than Strom Thurmond...
Good point but I'm under the impression that they're not really what you'd call deep thinkers.
Ooooh George-that’s it!
It makes you wonder if there are any more Republicans who will resign, effective April 9 in order to change the majority in the House.
We can always hope - two more and Hakeem Jeffries is the New House Speaker.
I've taken a good, deep breath and I'm holding it.
Me, too; until I turn blue! Wait, I was 🌊🌊🌊 already!
Anne-Louise, as usual you sum up my precise feeling - in your off-the-wall way!
Holding....hoping...holding!
Not too long I hope
If MTG gets her way Johnson will be voted out and following the practice of past Republican House Speaker's, resign and leave.
In any case if someone else leaves and Jeffries takes over it will save Johnson from trying to herd cats.
"In any case if someone else leaves . . . it will save Johnson from trying to herd cats."
But is he? Trying?
Johnson always says of his pig-mess 'this is what democracy looks like.' At first I thought he was just lying. Now I think it's PR for Johnson et al's push for corporate-clerical fascism.
Cats have never been stupid, crazy, or vindictive. Wait, not sure about that last one.
Cats are rarely vindictive, although I have known the rare exception, Priscilla, who died late last year was vindictive - but she's the only one I had who was vindictive.
That would be nice
or one to change party?
Today, the 24th, they only have a 1 person lead in the House. Just need one more to bale.
Yay!
And it will only take one vote. Kind of let folks see how governance works
I feel an abject shame at what the U.S. is NOT doing. I had hoped that Speaker Johnson was keeping his powder dry to get the budget bill through. But no, a recess for more than two weeks. Ukraine is being abandoned. Yes, the United States has made mistakes for what she did do militarily. This doing nothing to push back this ghastly invasion feels far worse.
😢
If Mikey Mouse is vacated, moderate Democrats and Republicans can form a coalition to keep him in power provided that he usher through Ukraine aid, pronto. Perhaps the discharge petition will work, if the members proposing it can get the House of Reprehensibles back into session. These Putin puppies need the be 'House' broken.
Chump’s goal is to break everything. Sam Rayburn famously said that any jackass can kick down a barn. He is living proof.
Excellent turn of phrase, Ned.... 'House broken' is spot on!!!
Thank you, Ally. Now 'me olde head' can barely fit through the door! 🤭
Why do any of them stay when they now don’t have any financial support from the RNC? Or don’t they understand that yet? What a total and utter fiasco they have become. I still can’t believe the RNC takeover was allowed to happen, and so easily. It’s chilling, really.. absolutely shocking.
Many of them are in such safe gerrymandered districts they don't have to worry about money for campaigning.
Well, in Wisconsin at least, this is thankfully no longer the case. Any Republicans, not just the non-extremist variety, are now well and truly fucked.. by their own RNC. They’re vulnerable. It’s still an uphill battle, we’re still in a fight for our lives with billionaire MSM conglomerates (what is MSNBC *thinking* by hiring that woman?). But any campaign — think about the campaigns just waged against Warren and Baldwin, too, not to mention those tight congressional contests all over the country — will require massive fund raising and self funding. Everything else is going to Trump. It’s the biggest grift we’ve ever seen. Hopefully we’re seeing the first signs of mutiny afoot.
Thanks, JaneDough - I have a new morning meditation now.
I just messaged Rep. Sessions (TX) and suggested that if he, too, is considering resigning his seat from this dis-functional House, he first pressure Speaker Johnson (or whoever is Speaker after April 9) to bring Ukraine funding to a vote.
Hopefully, the thought of resigning takes hold . . .
I also messaged Ted Cruz that he should consider resigning his honorable seat in the Senate to run for a seat in the dis-functional House, where his brazen disregard for governance would be de rigueur.
Living in small-town East Texas, I am driven to lash out at times...
🤞🤞
In a similar vein, there are a number of Republicans who have lost or will lose thier seats in primaries. If they decided to vote independently they could help make Jeffries speaker very soon. They could at least turn the tide in the house against MAGA.
We can only hope more will resign and get shut of this nonsense in the Republican Dominated House..Keep at it Teddy Cruz, Matt Gaetz and the loveliest clown, Marjorie Taylor Green.
There must be a few sane Republicans in the house who could be lured away by the Biden Administration by offering them choice but not critical positions in his Administration (the "deep state", ahem!). Nothing wrong with the Dems seizing the house in this manner and it would get the few 'good' Republicans still standing in the House to a much healthier environment in so many ways.
Hope so. The real Republicans are getting fed up.
Good news:
The Senate passed a $1.2 trillion federal spending bill early Saturday morning – but not before missing a midnight deadline which triggered a brief partial government shutdown.
The spending package easily cleared the upper chamber in a 74-24 vote.
Were the crazy parts Ryan and others put in passed??
No. Had they passed, with the House in recess and unable to vote, there would have been a shutdown according to what Heather wrote above.
And Gail wins the Correct Answer of the Night Award! :-)
😂 Thanks. I’m right twice a day.
I laughed out loud.
I dreaded this.
Like most commenting here, I keep up on the news. Like most, too, I very much value Heather’s takes on things as she near-daily puts out her “Letters from an American.”
But today’s too much combines the dreadful. First, the total lunacy from the idiot Republicans in their clown show chaos relacing what had been the U.S. Congress. Marjorie Taylor Greene a "leader" there? Such a despicable illiterate, only gaming to thrust her back-of-the-woods slack-jawed twang and
boorishness ever onto center stage.
Now, too – can it be? – ISIS in a mass terror attack on Putin's Russia, a country itself terrorized by a mass murderer?
Well, Putin does what all the most vulgar always do – reduce all life to group loathing. Now this has a hate-filled group hating him, too.
So much group hatred. So much grouped loathing. And the schools? Can American schools get rid of their hate-filled preachers, tribal demagogues, paranoid censors, numbering-relentless standardized testers? Can we join others in the world for higher human standards -- for humanities and essays, for seeing individuals, neighboring characters in so many of their nuances, complexities, communities?
You know, Phil, I keep seeing you beat this drum for the humanities in schools and politics. My heart is with you, and I admire your consistency. I'm usually not the voice of pessimism here, but as someone who actually possesses a Bachelor's Degree in one of the humanities (dramatic arts) as of a few years ago, I have absolutely no idea how this would possibly solve anything. I am willing to engage and am hoping you or someone else can change my mind on this, but...
Firstly, what do you mean by the humanities? That is *very* broad. And when you say schools, do you mean middle school, high school, university, all of the above? If you mean history and civics in middle & high school, then sure. That's basic information that any developing mind should know and fits well in an academic environment with a good teacher to connect it to the present. However, last I checked those are still required subjects in American schools practically everywhere. The most popular AP exams are Composition, History, and US Government; literally millions of students take these each year.
If you mean arts and philosophy, we diverge in our philosophy. Yes, yes, yes, arts are necessary to nourish the soul, open our minds, and connect with our common humanity. I'm with you. I love art. That is why I have an arts degree. And the process of getting that degree solidified what I have felt since before I attempted it: that culture dies in academia. Absolutely dies. There is nothing that wrings the life out of any piece of culture as having to approach it in the context of an assignment, complete with pop quizzes corrected by some professor (read: failed artist) that thinks they know more about the work than the creator ever did. It's every author or artist's worst nightmare. I would bet double my life savings without blinking that way more kids have been turned off from reading than turned on to reading by the existence of English classes. From the word go, reading becomes something you need to put yourself through to please the higher-ups, rather than pleasurable or rewarding. Way more kids - even smart ones - hate school than love it. It's an unpaid job that keeps you away from playing with your friends, and anything that time is spent on in there will dollars to donuts become put in the box in the brain marked "drudgery." And now you want *more* culture to be ruined this way, and in a more thorough manner... with ESSAYS??? Please tell me I'm off base.
Sidebar: God I hated essays. Hated, hated, hated them. They teach you nothing except how to be as pretentious, self-regarding, and uninspired as the person grading them. A few years of those made ME feel like I hated humanities. I sincerely regret my degree for this reason. Not financial ones, but for how much the process sapped my joy for one of the most joyful things in life. Essays are motherf---ing evil little bastards. Which leads me to...
Art of all types MUST allow itself to be encountered on its own terms with an enthusiastic and willing audience to thrive. The greatest barriers to the humanities reaching their rightful place at the center of our society are not a devaluation in scholastic environments, but economic barriers to the average person experiencing a wide variety of art in *that art form's ideal place of mutual experience,* followed by an authentic conversation with other enthusiasts of the form. (For a book, that would be cozied up in a library corner or your bed at home, taking all the time you need.) LOWER THE DAMN PRICES for theater, movie, and concert tickets, give screenings and bookings to a greater variety of work, and watch the audiences grow for a greater variety of work. Make museums more accessible in terms of location and admittance, and watch the crowds come.
When people can afford to try something new, they will tend to try it. When they approach it on their own terms, that is when they are most open to receive it. When they have received something exciting, they will want to share it with a friend. That is how the humanities spread. Not in essay form, in flesh-and-blood human form.
EVEN THAT BEING SAID, while many impressionable minds in this country are crying out for humanities to nourish them if only given the right space, a metric ton of people in this country have never and will never be interested in partaking. They just aren't curious or empathetic or creative enough to want to be nourished in that way, and any attempt to make them engage on that level will get you branded a fancypants. Humanities are an elite pastime to them; they just want to make money and be entertained. They aren't unempathetic and uncurious because they didn't get taught enough humanities; they don't see the point to humanities because they are unempathetic and uncurious. No amount of inspiring teachers will make that any different, and pretending that there was a time in recent history when these types of people were less a factor in our body politic is - as best I can tell - a fantasy.
Humanities belong at the center of our society. They won't get there by scholastic rigor, but by popular access. You know, democratizing them. Only then could I forsee them helping our democracy more directly.
Will, you seem to have experienced the Humanities via the 'Dead White Guys' rout. Where do you think your considerable powers of communication came from? Who is it that entertains the masses? Writes the speeches? What do you think is the impetus for Rock, Punk, Funk, Hip-Hop, or Rap? Everything starts with art. All science, political thought, psychology, started with a creative spark. I see your art in your posts. I'm sorry your past educators tried to beat it out of you. I'm glad they failed.
Thanks, Steve. This means a lot.
If it is any comfort, the UCs (at least Irvine) moved quite sharply away from the "Dead White Guys route" in recent years with regards to humanities, to a focus on "underrepresented and global voices" in order to "affect positive change." Yay! Unfortunately they are teaching these vitally diverse (and occasionally not dead) voices in the same soul-quelching way that they were the Dead White Guys, apparently unable to realize it is not the works taught that are deadening the field per se, but the entire academic approach regardless of the work at hand. (Plus, some of the Dead White Guys actually hold up. Go figure.) No one expects the computer science geeks to not actually code, or the chemistry students to not use the lab, but the art students are expected to use all their time analyzing the context for other art, rather than creating their own. It makes sense that education gives you necessary appreciation of what came before, but the sort of person who loves an art form enough to want to spend their life on it is almost always the same person who will seek out those great works themselves, and seek out the other people to connect over them. You could see people come alive each time we actually got a chance to *discuss* our passions, and the deadness that would set in when we realized this was going to be just another fodder for bibliography. There was also a particular shared look everyone developed for when a professor would admonish us how we "must find a way to get out and see more current art," like yeah, I would love to, but you keep sucking up every ounce of my time and money and energy with whatever this is instead. Maddening disingenuousness is the name of the game.
In short, there is no amount of structured, rigorous, disciplined study that will actually substitute for actually doing something.
"analyzing rather than creating" BINGO!
Will:
Allow me to point out that you have just written and published AN ESSAY!
And a pretty darned challenging one, at that.
I do question some of your epistemology. Do you have some convincing evidence that those you cast aside as "unempathetic and uncurious" are doomed never to be inspired by a good teacher? I am sure that all of us have heard stories to the contrary.
If I were asked to offer a remedy to our present malaise, I would recommend that everyone read Lewis Carroll's two "Alice" stories to their children. That, and maximize their exposure to people of varying origins.
Vince S
Well, I think of it more as a rant than an essay, but that is probably semantics.
To be clear, I dont think there are types of people who can be grouped together as *incapable* of appreciating *any* cultural efforts of quality. But there are all types of people in this world, and many people just don't see the point in art. Some are perfectly nice people in other aspects, but they just don't get it. Some are that way with science, or business, or cooking. I don't think I need a peer-previewed longitudinal study for something that seems so self-obvious, and I view the idea that anyone can be reached and inspired to their better angels by the right person at the right moment to be a progressive fantasy. How I would love it to be true, though.
Will, you are one of the best "ranters" in this forum. Thank you. Great thinking, great writing. I don't always agree with every detail, but it's elucidating and enjoyable.
Rant on!
Rant, essay, and a powerful expression of a complex set of dilemmas I view as an expose. On a feeling level, my life as a lover of learning began when I stopped going to school. As a what-iffer, I continually imagine how school buildings could be facilitated as spaces aimed to assist in the organizing of experiences students elect to have -- always structuring the school's assets (space, mentoring, technology, meeting places and shelter, health care and social services) to serve students' successes. Yes, adaptive, unpredictable, chaotic (or chaordic), and also what seems to be the circumstances we humans are in now, whether we like it or not. We're not ready for that fantasy and we're not ready for our current realities, or are we?
Nice, Joan: "my life as a lover of learning began when I stopped going to school."
My most vital friend was a poet (in Russian) and later an essayist (in English), Joseph Brodsky, who quit school at 15.
Thanks, Will. Bored to death of high school, I accelerated and started college at 16. Apart from math, and gah, how I hated math, I felt self taught K-12. The stretching of my thoughts occurred in a small liberal arts college. Thankfully before distribution requirements became a thing. WF in elementary functions. Brilliant rant today. Don’t get me started on children’s athletics, where parents think the little darlings future will depend on their success in travel ball.
". . . distribution requirements": ah, Gail, what a death trip.
So much of what could be alive instead got relegated to departments, all mutually isolated from each other, all void of humanities, all dead to personal speech.
I’m pretty sure Will knew he was writing an essay…. And a good teacher’s ability to inspire empathy and curiosity is real.
Emily, I have seen some of the very best teachers be totally unable to reach some of the most broken children. It is heartbreaking. A lot of people really don’t know and many don’t want to see what happens to children in our world. Empathy is born of our very first human interactions. Just like our ability to hear, it can be nearly impossible to develop those neural pathways if the window of opportunity passes.
“As “Born for Love” reveals, recent changes in technology, child-rearing practices, education, and lifestyles are starting to rob children of necessary human contact and deep relationships—the essential foundation for empathy and a caring, healthy society. Sounding an important warning bell, “Born for Love” offers practical ideas for combating the negative influences of modern life and fostering positive social change to benefit us all.” Born for Love was coauthored by Bruce Perry
I went to a little public country elementary school. If the caring teachers had not introduced us to classical music, chorus and band, I may never had developed passion for these musical delights.
Art was mostly allowing us to express our own ideas and perhaps an introduction to great art.
In English class we were taught the basics and then encouraged to express ourselves. We had to recite poems in front of our small class and participate in public speaking. We may have had to speak in front of our classmates but we may never have learned that skill.
I heartily disagree with you. Humanities should be
Part of school.
Ann, I think you meant to respond to me, rather than Christy? If so, rest assured I think humanities such as you describe should *absolutely* be a part of school, full stop. When you describe what the presence of art and music meant to you in your elementary school, how you were "allowed to express your own ideas," "developed passion for delights," and an "introduction to great art," that is exactly what arts and letters should be doing for developing minds, why they are so essential to being a healthy human being in spirit, and exactly how it should be approached. "Reading is fun, try these books of poems!" or "draw us a picture, show us what is in your head!" Great!
My gripe - and boy do I have gripes - primarily rests on how humanities are approached in higher education and university, where the essence of the subject - the enjoyment and nourishment and beckoning to expression you described - is completely forgotten in an avalanche of term papers featuring forced, joyless posturing and self-regarding meta-analysis.
There is a chasm between "The museum is a place of wonder!" and "Now give me 2000 words on Friday in MLA style regarding post-Impressionism in the context of historical upheaval (in the exact way this book I made you read had in mind)" and within that chasm the point of having humanities in our lives gets lost entirely.
Ann I 💯💯💯💯agree with you. I think you are disagreeing with another comment, but I’m not sure which one. If it’s Will, my sense is that he is more opposed to the experience he had then the general need to teach “humanities”, which basically encompasses everything except for science and math. Imagine a world without history, literature, sociology, theology, philosophy let alone the spirit enhancing arts. They don’t call them “human”ities for nothing!! 🤩❤️ 🤗
I loved school, maybe because it was an alternative to my home. Opened doors to different worlds. Not a bad thing…. When I hear people say they hate school, I wonder what they love. Some have problems in school that I never did, I weep for them.
Jeri, this could have been me writing this…although not the “home alternative” you had; my parents were “working class” who valued education and the teachers in our small town. Most of my school friends came from the same background, although with varying degrees of problems. I feel badly for the many for whom school was at best, a negative experience.
Same for many probably, my parents were caring but flawed. They always put education first, thinking that it would give us opportunities they didn’t have. My Dad’s brother dropped out in elementary (their Dad was killed when they were 4 and 5). He went back in high school, graduated, and became a judge for many years. He was the family hero and role model. But we were the poor folks, so we dreamed…
I agree, Jeri! I loved school because it was a challenge to heard new ideas and do new activities. I’m still taking classes and learning new things in my mid ‘70s. All people should quest for knowledge! It keeps you young!
Yep, did continuing Ed for decades after I needed it. I didn’t realize how hard school is for some, especially those for whom “home” is anything but. Testing for learning disabilities, emotional problems and myriad physical problems taught me plenty. Some have no place where they can get what school did for me. Prison is often the road most traveled for many. I once asked high schoolers in a counseling group what they learned from their family of origin. The answers were shocking.
I so appreciate folks with empathy and who try to understand others. Thank you. Being fair is what we need as much as anything, and it’s amazing to me how hard that is for so many people.
Thank you, I learned so much from stressed teens. One even wrote on FB that I seemed to have a soft spot for their struggles. Made me feel that no effort is wasted.
👏🏼👏🏼 And then they get called dumb and stupid. As if they didn’t feel inadequate enough to begin with. And then they try to express an idea (cause they really aren’t stupid! And they do have good ideas!) but a well educated and very articulate person with what they think is a better idea can talk circles around them. And we wonder why people are frustrated and angry. When we talk about inequality we have to account for the inequality of being born into a home that is lacking in the same fertile ground for everyone. Leveling the quality of education and economic opportunities is part of it. Nurse parent partnerships to new parents are very effective. Teaching brain science 101 to everyone at the earliest ages. Mentorship like big brothers or sisters.
Nurse/partnerships sounds like a great idea. I was born into a home that had little fertile ground, but had parents who told us such existed. And that education would lead down that road. Brain science 101, hope that includes keeping young brains away from lead in pipes, paint, etc. I still hear of such, boggles my old mind.
Beautiful, Jeri: "I wonder what they love."
Wonder what they define as love. Once in another life, I thought I'd like to ask that question to some inmates in a prison. Probably would have made a volume or two
Those questions have been asked and written about
Haven’t they all.
Most states have requirements to teach civics and/or government but very few states require of full year of it, which to me is just crazy. I also think that schools should start kids on a second language beginning at a very young age and continuing all the way through high school. But...
The bigger issue, taking a step back from what the schools do or don't require, is the blatant anti-education (aside from teaching what's useful for a job) and anti-intellectual stance that conservatives have been dug in on for decades now. It's done a lot of damage and I don't see a clear path to solving the problem.
Will, I always enjoy your essays/rants. So thought-provoking.I’m a boomer so a bit older.
My fave teacher was Mrs.Carlson,high school English lit. She made me love reading and writing. I also love to dance.So…what did I study? My degrees were science-related(nutrition and public health) as you have “to make a living.” Oh, and I thought I was going to save the world.That obviously didn’t happen! Life twists and turns and I honestly don’t have regrets. But I did return to ballet in my 50’s and it’s been joyful.Although I wonder how joyful it is for some of the younger dancers pushed to perform at a pre-professional level.It certainly wasn’t like that back in the day…including the expense.🩰
Agree. The focus on competition in order to fill the instructor’s wallet was abhorrent to me as my daughter was coming along. Finding a school that didn’t concentrate on dance competitions wasn’t easy. Glad you’ve returned to something you love!
Will, for a hater of the essay you do an amazing interpretation. Yes, the PROCESS of educating has been subsumed to teaching a bunch of facts. Those facts are separated from any implementation or use, represented as necessary to know. Yes, deadly to curiosity, dulling the mind who seeks to UNDERSTAND, and killing the pleasure of learning. Yet, you and I survived, still WONDERING. Imagine what it would be like if more people were asking questions instead of their starved minds taking up violence because they knew they had the facts.
Thoroughly thought provoking. Thanks
many thanks for your essay ! I’ll be re-reading it. my first thoughts : you’ve put into words what I’ve often thought. Especially about academia and tiresome overthinking.
Sounds like you had some pretty crappy teachers and writing assignments. Clearly you like to write. It doesn't have to be an exercise in killing experience and pinning it to a display board with academic jargon, but some teachers do seem to prefer that.
There are better teachers out there, so not everyone will hate writing essays, even if it is not possible to convince everyone to love it. And despite the worst efforts of your teachers, you still developed--or retained--a capacity for critical thought, an appreciation of history, and, I'd venture, even some sense of what aesthetic criticism can achieve if it can somehow rise above the grift of academic, social and monetary capital. As long as the academy is chained to a business-first economy, and students go in expecting to learn how to get a good job rather than how to think, these tensions will remain: the production of "work" for the sake of the production of "work" vs thinking through political, cultural, and social problems at whatever pace is needed to keep one's own biases in clear view while looking at what others have to say; churning out career-bound graduates who have had their allegiances duly narrowed to capital and big business vs teaching adults to question what they are told, even if it is the professor speaking; killing creativity (so inefficient!) vs cultivating it.
Etc.
Our culture does not value history. It teaches us that the individual is responsible for every single circumstance of their lives and can overcome anything at all--so why should we have to learn from the mistakes of all those people who lived before us? "Critical thought" is a term of derision. Pushing back on received narratives earns the sobriquet of "snowflake". Hell, California is the epicenter of digital libertarian futurism, the cult of "disruption" for profit, and the bizarre belief that billionaire STEM researchers will soon cure death. Fastest way to kill a planet: breed immortal consumption machines.
I went to the Bay Area Cal; living atop Silicon Valley for 20 years was its own education in egoistic denial and utter disregard for consequence. These subcultures are only too happy to facilitate far right misinformation and the rise of fascist strongmen--as long as it is profitable and they still get to break whatever they want.
There has to be a way to teach some other sets of values. We cannot pull them out of thin air; their seeds exist in the vast cultural records of human history, as well as in a methodical and critical consideration of what we have found out about deeper time: how do we reckon our relationship to the rest of life on Earth? Science and technology can provide the raw materials, the growing record of what has transpired here, but it cannot provide the ethical, aesthetic or philosophical judgment we need so badly to understand how we might survive.
Humanities education in the US can suck, sure. It can--and has, if not consistently--also done much better. If we cannot get it to serve life instead of the capitalist death drive, we don't stand a chance.
Sorry for the days-late reply, Eric, but I think this is a provocative and thoughtful comment and you deserve a reply.
When you say "Sounds like you had some pretty crappy teachers and writing assignments. Clearly you like to write"... well, nope to both, I'm afraid. The professors were ostensibly outstanding; Irvine was a top-ten program in the nation (or very close) when I went there. It's highly likely the problem is me here: I've always hated writing, and only vaguely like it if I can do it to organize and/or spill out my thoughts in an informal setting as if it were a rambling conversation, such as here (and even then not all that often). Yet I don't think it's very reasonable to expect everything in an academic or work setting to be something I like. That would be a little immature.
My gripe is that endless essaying and assignment-ing is an inherently distancing endeavor to apply to something like art, culture, or philosophy. These things are invaluable to the human experience because they connect human beings together on an emotional and aesthetic level that is ideally quite personal. I think rigor and standards and curriculars are anathema to experiencing the true value of these subjects. I think the fact that they can't be justified in a metric of money or practical progress (like medicine or engineering) or accumulated expertise (like history or geography) gives a certain insecurity to the people who teach it. They attempt to prove its seriousness by treating it in a self-serious and disciplined way, but that defeats the purpose entirely. The purpose is joy and resonance and emotion, not rigor. Heck, even someone who does criticism for a living knows the main point of that career is to guide an audience to what they might appreciate. Memorizing legal cases can make you a better lawyer, but memorizing IMDB will not make you a better filmmaker, or even one at all.
I actually wish they had taught us more with just getting a job in mind, rather than trying to teach critical thinking and well-roundedness. Critical thinking I already had. Well-roundedness I can get from the library. What I asked for was practical skills and experience in a creative career. Being able to bullshit your way to exactly the 2000 word count provided absolutely none of that.
This got long really quickly. Which doesn't surprise me, but.. well. Read if you wish:
So the academic route was not for you, then. There is nothing wrong with that, especially if critical thought comes naturally to you. I'd also argue that top 10 does not necessarily equal great teaching; I went to Berkeley and found some really awesome teachers. And some real stinkers who, I have to assume, impressed the administration with their research or writing or... something that was clearly not teaching.
Neither my experience nor yours are universal. I was exactly where I wanted to be, insofar as I wanted to learn to read as precisely as possible many of the writers I had already been reading for years. And to understand them and better experience what they were on about. Despite the fact that I already wrote reasonably well (and liked it, so essays were not as painful for me as they were for you) and that I had begun to see through my Fundamentalist upbringing by the time I was 15 or so without any help at all, seeking continued practice in reading and writing was one of the best things I did for myself for both my creative and critical practices. I'd go back in a heartbeat.
That said, I did study Art History on and off, but even after taking a seminar with TJ Clarke, one of the best in the field, I decided I would rather make art than analyze it--and for some of the reasons you cite: creating things is a much more direct aesthetic experience, and thus more powerfully compelling than analyzing others' creations. For me, anyway. I don't know that this is necessarily the case for Clarke, say, who recently wrote a book in a somewhat experimental academic style about his experience of viewing two Poussin paintings and being so drawn in by them that he felt compelled to go back to the museum(s?) to see them again and again. Instead of painting a picture or writing a song in response, he wrote a book. Not what I would have done. It's an interesting exercise in aesthetic analysis that allows itself to pause over an experience that remains refractory to that analysis. And it is one of the approximately 105 books I am partway through, so I cannot yet say what his conclusions are.
Be all that as it may, I would strongly caution against appealing solely to emotion and experience. To Godwin this thread--but are we not here because we have already been Godwined by our American fascists?--the German Nazis had a vigorous aesthetic program that aimed to stir deep emotions in the German populace where it was at the time: trying to understand its own origins and character, with direct reference to contemporary interpretations of classical Rome and Greece and to its own literary and philosophical traditions. In large part, they were reacting to repeated military humiliations stretching back to the French Revolution, and to the difficulties of creating a nation out of a polyglot of states, cultures, and linguistic dialects. Germany had been a nation state for not yet 50 years at the end of WW I.
German Nazi aesthetics were restrictive, of course, but their method was meant to provoke strong emotional reactions without reflection: with all else they did, it was a rousing success that lasted long enough to nearly destroy Europe altogether. Although our historical situation is different, it seems pretty clear to me that reactive emotion is a central currency of authoritarian regimes: Evangelical Christianity does the exact same thing: don't think about it. Just feel. The truth of your convictions can be measured by their strength, not by their reasonableness. Human reason, for Evangelicals, is Satanic foolishness. God wants conviction (and submission), not critical analysis.
Ultimately, there has to be a balance between analysis and experience, between logic and emotion. After the destruction of World War II, Western European academics and intellectuals launched a critique against a hegemonic (white, Christian, heteromormative) logocentrism--ie, analyzing things literally to death. It leaked over to the US to a degree, but some US academics still dismiss it as a kind of regression. Maybe some of them teach or have taught at Irvine?
I don't dismiss it; what work I have done has been part of that critique. Experience and emotion are as necessary as is the reflective ability to judge the reactions that rise up in us in response to them. But without the latter, we risk lapsing into reactivity, resentment, and violence. Or thus has been the tendency in what we call Western culture, including here in the US.
There are certainly many ways to get there. That one way did not work for you does not mean it cannot possibly work for anyone else. And it certainly doesn't mean we should stop analyzing tout court. The academic criticism of Enlightenment values has proceeded on very precise terms, while acknowledging where the limits of that precision lie: not all experience is amenable to language or reason.
I think we need a third way, if you will, one that is not exactly singular but can engender multiple modes of understanding without falling into reactivity. It may be that opposing emotion and logic is our first mistake, but it would take some time to articulate why that might be, and this is already long enough.
If you or anyone else read this whole thing, you have my deep thanks. Truly.
Let's go to the missing ingredient in teaching essays, humanities, Will.
That's what you also refer to as audience.
First, the audience in the room. I'd like to see everyone in the room read each other's first essays (copies for all), discuss, and rewrite. New versions quote others in the room, directly, indirectly, as to how their experiences enlighten, frame one's own.
I'd like all first essays to be introductory of oneself, how one learned to inhabit the necessaries: food, clothing, shelter. We all inherit these willy-nilly as parents and community give them to us, and then we also adjust, defying our betters, questioning the styles first given, to varying degrees moving styles from our peers. Modifying our styles in food, in clothing, and as for shelter, citing styles in indoor design (our rooms) outdoor landscapes (where we spend time), and transportation types.
Essaying, Will, can focus on how we learn from others, personally. Name others. Credit them. Cite others in the room. Then expand the naming, to include novels, films, songs, live theater, memoir, photographs. Larger specificity. Tighter focus on shared themes.
Remember, Will. All this for some time stays in the room. For re-writing, discussion.
Eventually all the essays go as a group to another room -- in another part of the campus, another city, or a neighboring culture, where English may be a second language. Those in the other group read all the essays. Discuss them. Then write new essays of their own citing, celebrating individuals and changes in persons from the group introducing themselves.
Teachers never test. Only help edit, for mechanics, for connections more deft.
I call this "Essaying Differences."
Keep all writing alive, referring to live people. Humanities aiding in, linked to that.
You've said things here, Will, vouching for things I hope for. The only places I'd recommend changes in your writing are when your sentences have no active verbs, but only labeling: copulatives such as "They aren't" this or "They aren't" that.
Labeling kills. Sinks back to grouping, abstracting.
But so many other things you say here radiate, reach out to human people, human themes, individual experience.
Thank you for the thoughtful reply, Phil. Sorry mine is a few days late. I hope you didn't think I was being too harsh the first time around... it wasn't directed at you per se.
I think you are thinking of humanities in a broader sense than I am: more an introduction of a personal, human element into any given line of study rather than an organized line of study into itself. I will admit that I find your "Essaying Differences" proposal intriguing. Now, it is completely foreign to any conception I have to essaying, sounding like a bit of a cross between group therapy slash debate prep slash exchange program, and I am not sure how the repeated addition of the act of writing would aid the process more than simply a moderated conversation, but that is probably just my own personal predilection coming into play. Either way, intriguing.
I feel I can defend my use of the lack of active verbs near the end because I purposefully used them to describe passive people. Make no mistake, I do not find any given demographic of people to be more doomed to passivity than another, simply an acknowledgement that many people go through life relatively passively. Still, noted!
One way I have of seeing our trajectory, our sometimes progress, our ongoing self-trials is through the 12-step experience, where first one has to hit bottom i.e.
go no lower, then admit to a certain powerlessness. The non-god oriented form which arose in the '80s simply stated the truth of being stuck and ready to be open and learning especially one's part in everything, one's connection with society, making amends and recognizing one's self-worth.
Seems to me a lot of that is already going on just not coordinated in that way.
Maybe we need to start
by figuring out a name for the group, for the process...
The American 12-Step, a new dance ...
Keep it real.
OK, Robin.
Hitting bottom puts it well enough. Or maybe other words to describe how we became aware of ourselves being in some trap.
Naming influences.
Then, too, also naming routes out of the trap -- naming peers who could, can feel similarly.
Have begun working on it. The language is so so important. Right in my wheelhouse.
Phil, i very much appreciate your description of the ''despicable illiterate'' Maggot Traitor Goon Greene. I hate and despise that witch hag almost as much as i do Donald TUMP. I am almost embarrassed to admit i live in Georgia because of her hateful, boorish, ignorant. and arrogant attitude. Her Congressional district borders the county i live in 30 miles to the north of my residence, and the illiterates that vote for her are indeed, back-of-the-woods redneck hicks just like she is. Most of the people that live in my area are the same kind of redneck hicks as the ones that vote for her.
I heard there were at least 100 reporters waiting for her on the steps of congress when she left the building. Imagine if not a single reporter were there for her performance. The media needs to STOP giving her oxygen. Once she realizes nobody cares what she has to say she will become irrelevant.
Read an article about her, can’t recall where but trying to find it again. She is a complete fabrication. She’s an attention seeker, a wannabe famous for being famous. Has never been one of the people. Comes from a wealthy family. And yet, you are right. She will be re-elected. I travel in her district to visit family, and her signs are disgusting, and seem to be in every yard. I cannot connect what is going on in peoples’ minds to the reality of her and her ilk.
Thank you, Lynn. I am a bit surprised to hear that she comes from a wealthy family. I did read she was raised in the most racist town in Georgia, Cumming, GA.
I also cannot connect what is going on the people's minds to the reality of her. Same goes with DJT, in my opinion, he is worse than the notorious Al Capone. DJT is almost as horrible as Adolf Hitler was.
Give him time... I'm sure he's still trying to out-do old Adolf.
I understand your stewing in spleen, John.
I want to find the apt words of rage because that woman is not just who she is, but also front for all the billionaires who went out of their way to kill the best of American schools. They robbed the schools of humanities as part of their need to get Americans anesthetized, blinded to their vaster agendas of thievery. A goon from the Georgia woods will do. Will do by her white trash vulgarity to cover for the infinitely worse elite vulgarity.
I wrote my doctoral dissertation, "Appalachia and Detroit" (1977), with full appreciation of the frontier spirit, full acquaintance with the "humor of the Old Southwest," which ran from Davy Crockett, Mike Fink, and Sut Lovingood to Twain and Faulkner. Vital, this vernacular.
But they in their day engaged the conceits, pretenses, charades of the powerful. Not today. Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Gazpacho, Matt Gaetz, James Comer, Gosar, Stefanik, the orange fat one, and all the dehumanized rest of them only comfort the comfortable, their antics key to distracting us from the good work of a few good public figures trying really to help the millions damaged by the elite predators.
Will I be kicked off Substack again for using the phrase "poor white trash"? How is that worse than "red neck hicks "? Or has the standard changed? Or maybe reality finally hit.
Why don't we stop using all the slurs? They are lazy
habits of mind which obscure what they supposedly reveal and obstruct useful anslysis.
Thx. If we elevate the conversation, perhaps we also name the issue rather than simply sling mud. They are racists, haters, folks who would hate others no matter their socio-financial status. They lack empathy, decency, honesty, truth, compassion, or morality as their Fuerher Trump does. Narcissist s? Sociopaths? There is a mental illness that has swept large swaths of our country from the brainwashing and normalizing of ugly behavior, thought, and action that has been encouraged by the party formerly known as Republican. Even if we win this next election, one of my deepest concerns is how we will find healing for the incredible number of people deluded and invited into derangement over these years. The brainwashing is complete.
Brilliant and empathetic post, Jen!
I do not consider myself as having, ''Lazy habits of mind'' I do not respect any of those right wing fascists that are hell bent on destroying our nation and trying to force their phony Christian Nationalist crap on all of us. DJT should have been imprisoned 3 years ago along with all of his corrupt minions. MTG is dumb as a rock and not qualified for anything. She is arrogant, hateful, and utterly useless.
Bravo, lin! Slurs weaken our point of view!
". . . useful analysis," John?
Do you refer to the wonk which universities teach now in order to protect the neutered clamoring for safety in tribal, trigger-warnings-needed, group identities?
You like the anodyne, John? You like elites dehumanized as part of the far-right game plan since the Powell memo of 1971?
How much "analysis" might attract you, John, if it's all void of the personal, the human, such as Diane Ravitch chronicled corporate schemers doing to all levels of American education ("The Language Police," 2003)?
My mistake -- it was "lin" not John to whom I was replying (on "useful analysis").
Sorry, again, John, that I wrote to "lin" on this mistakenly using your name for "lin's."
These people that worship and vote for those corrupt and arrogant Fascists and Authoritarians like MTG and Donald TUMP deserve to be insulted as far as i am concerned. They do not deserve any respect whatsoever. Are we supposed to like these people? DJT and that loudmouthed MTG are corrupt and are traitors to our nation. They are out to destroy the United States, are we supposed to respect them?? They will take away all of our freedom and our safety net and many will die because of these treasonous traitors. They incited the insurrection and riots on JAN 6 2021 and caused 5 deaths. I am not going to bow down to those Fascist creeps. I will call them what i want to call them and i do not care what someone else says. If they kick me off here, it won't be the first time i have been kicked off of a site like this. I do not care. I will save my fee they charge me every month.
John T Phillips, I don't have a problem with your descriptive words. So many of us, including myself, have been justifiably outraged and fearful for almost a decade and so I understand. We have to vent somehow, so we don't lose our sanity too. And I cannot imagine having to live immersed everyday, as you do, with these blathering, violent lunatics outnumbering the sane folks. Bless you, John.
Years of research have shown most human violence occurs because of the feeling of being disrespected. I struggle perhaps more than most bringing respect to someone like tffg. I’m just stating common knowledge in the study of violence. I’m not claiming to be able to execute what I understand to be true. There is a difference between not feeling respect towards someone versus showing them disrespect. Between countries it’s called diplomacy.
Also if all children were to be respected in their formative years we would see far more peace in the world.
Just because I feel justified in seeing someone as deplorable doesn’t mean I’m going to make the world better if I treat them that way. Law and order works. You do the crime you pay the fine. It’s a consequence. It’s justice. Once an adult has spent a childhood being disrespected it can be very hard for them to break free of those chains.
This is an interesting description:
“After all, "white" is the only racial group that needs a modifier for it to become a slur. There's no "black trash" or "Hispanic trash" or "Native American trash," presumably, because for most of American history, those people were assumed by those in power to be poor, uneducated and criminal.
White trash, as described by Wray, is an oxymoron. Black trash, by that thinking, is almost redundant. He says that white trash "is a term that really has white supremacy baked into it, because it's kind of like it's understood that if you're not white, you're trash."”
The expression “poor white trash” implies that black folks are trash.
It's actually Southern poor white trash but I forgot the Southern part.
In the US, we now have "black" people in every level of society. I never heard any reference to black trash.
White trash is a derogatory racial and class-related slur used in American English to refer to poor white people, especially in the rural areas of the southern United States. The label signifies a social class inside the white population and especially a degraded standard of living.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org › wiki....
And...
The term has been adopted for people living on the fringes of the social order, who are seen as dangerous because they may be criminal, unpredictable, and without respect for political, legal, or moral authority.[4] While the term is mostly used pejoratively by urban and middle-class whites as a class signifier,[5] some white entertainers self-identify as "white trash", considering it a badge of honor, and celebrate the stereotypes and social marginalization of lower-class whiteness.[1][6][...
Now if I wanted to talk about the billionaires in a derogatory manner, it would be ok because they can buy their way out of trouble, but poor white trash are usually trapped in poverty. It's the behavior that is criticized, for example
racism.
One thing everyone can count on is that I’ve never voted for a Perdue or Trump and never will! If I lived in the Rome area, I’d be really embarrassed to know MTG represents me!
How many times is it, now?
The do-nothing repubs made budget brinkmanship routine. At first people got alarmed when they held us all hostage, and that let them extort a better deal. But fatigue is setting in - not just in the legislature; the public isn't all that impressed either! You can't keep playing the same trick and expect everyone to play along and pretend it's original forever.
I'm sick of this. It's a dumb game, and I don't want to play with repubs any more. VOTE BLUE 2024!!
And remember how the last minute budget passing affected the U.S. credit rating before? It hurts us and is a Republican ploy for no good reason.
Very curious about ISIS attacks against Moscow. Why have they done this?
How did Moscow get attacked by a foreign group in their own capital? They have strict gun laws and stricter immigration laws.
Wagner?
I think any society is vulnerable to random attacks.
Jane,
That is good of theory as any. Revenge for the murder of their leader. They would have access to the weapons.
I have heard that some supposedly in the know suspect that the attack was staged by Russia, much like the 1999 apartment bombings that gave Putin carte blanche -- more like carte rouge -- to pursue the second Chechen War.
🤢
Personally, I am hoping it is a vengeance jihad against Russia for what Russia did to Muslims in Syria up to (50,000 killed); Afghanistan (at least 900,000 killed), and Chechnya (roughly 300,000). Sure hope so; been waiting two years for this second, asymmetric front.
🤞
For her part, U.S. has killed roughly 150,000 Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan (but still too many; that datum likely under-stated).
I’m thinking your second thought makes the most sense. It was something I wondered about too. Russia was pretty bad to Afghanistan. And right now Russia is busy trying to take over Ukraine and has lost a lot of military strength so they are vulnerable.
Thank you, Brandy, for taking the time to lay out your thinking.
By that reasoning the USA “deserved” 9/11 then? Violent Islamist Jihadists are working world wide to terrorize us. It’s a major scary problem. Their end game (they say) is to establish Islamist Theocracies everywhere. This is also the intention of Hamas.
No, the intention of Hamas is narrower: eliminationist anti-semitism. I will repeat what I replied to another fan of Dr Richardson in a moment. Please know that these people are in the minority. As we are seeing in Ukraine, it may take a while for the decent majority to wake up and defeat these darker forces; but the good guys almost always do. We may find ourselves in such a time these dark days. Yes, one is reasonable to have fear, but let us stick together so we can remain confident that ours is the quiet unity of enduring strength.
THE CITATION https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Leviticus+19%3A18&version=KJV
"Like I.S.I.S. and American settlers on the West Bank whom I have seen interviewed on television, these homicidal hypocrites use religion as a cover story for doing what they want to do: injure, even kill, people and break things, notwithstanding many strict strictures in Judaism, Xianity, and Islam not to do such things. If there is divine retribution, those people, someday, will leave us to go somewhere a lot hotter than their heads are now. My fear is that there is no divine justice and these enemies of the love J.C. himself exemplified [-- as a rabbi, a Xian, and the second most important prophet in Islam --] will bring Hell to us here, now."
P.S., Annie, be assured, s.v.p., that I am not a complete nut-job -- partially for sure, but not quite complete; I am a stark, raving agnostic. 🤭🫣😉
I like your perspective. I might mention this is ISIS-K and what little I read from one of Heather’s sources on the the Winslow Center it appears their goal is more narrow as well. They are even an enemy of the Taliban and wish for a “pure” Afghanistan with no minorities or alternate religious viewpoints. Somewhat like the white Christian nationalists here. Still puzzled about their attack on Moscow.
WOWerful insight, Brandy. I did not know these facts you cite. Thank you for opening 'me little mind a wee-bit'. This tune is for you . . . .
EDIT: your puzzlement is my hope.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVx8L7a3MuE
An often-reliable source has suggested that it's an inside job by Putin's gang, designed to rally support for the war against Ukraine.
Unlikely. This incident is going to weaken Putin's standing as a guardian of the Russian people. At the very least, it's an embarrassment coming on the heals of the sham Russian election.
I doubt this. ISIS took credit and so far the US seems to think this is likely the case.
Talia While we can not be sure, such occurred about a decade ago, with outsiders blamed for an deadly inside job.
Suggest folks read the commentary by Nadine Brzezinski https://nadinbrzezinski.medium.com/ - she really is connected with the "other Russia". One needs to be aware of its only too real existence.
Read Timothy Snyder on this.
I did read his letter tonight yet he just gave a chronology of events and didn’t posit why ISIS acted. Reading a CNN report it appears there have been other attempts against Russia by ISIS in March that had been thwarted.
Speculation about the why of terrorist acts is surely most inappropriate, although sometimes their purpose will be evident.
One gets the impression that Americans and most Westerners have no idea of the extraordinary diversity of the Russian population across the country's vast territory, of what this implies or how the Kremlin has dealt with the problem of keeping sometimes huge minorities in line. Especially at a time as fraught as now.
I don’t think speculation on why terrorist group act is inappropriate. And people here realize the diversity of Russian culture. I suspect our intelligence spends a fair amount of time trying to understand motives to help predict what group might terrorize and when. In fact reports state our intelligence tried to warn Putin of this attack and he dismissed it which I find fascinating. His own intelligence seems not up to snuff. This reporting is one of the things that makes me think it wasn’t an inside job.
Brandy, I lost your other comment relating to this when I tried to reply to it, agreeing that one should always try to understand an enemy's motives but a little confused beyond that.
On seeing the news of the latest attack on a Moscow venue, I thought back at once to earlier atrocities, horribly, brutally mishandled by the Russian security services. I just wrote "mishandled", but anything that puts fear into the general population bolsters the regime.
After those, the Chechen boss, Kadyrov, was given a free hand... and used and abused it to maximum effect, Putin's purpose being peace, quiet and total control over all Caucasian territories and the country's Muslim minority, while silencing or physically eliminating critics with nuisance value and potential political rivals.
I shall stick my neck out and state categorically that both the October 7th atrocity and 9/11 were deliberately designed as trigger mechanisms to set off chain reactions. In other words, both appeared to the victims to be gratuitous assaults by fanatics, but both were in reality strategic actions, the attack on Israel being a far deadlier trap in that America was not under any compulsion to undertake such acts as occupying Afghanistan for decades or invading Iraq, whereas the geographical nature of Gaza and the formidable tunnel network built under the conurbation meant that there was no way in which even a more clinical approach to punishing Hamas and rescuing hostages could avoid causing great physical damage to the city and harm to the civilian population.
In this case, however, the enemy knew and understood Netanyahu and sidekicks, while the latter despised Hamas and grossly underestimated an able and totally ruthless enemy pursuing long-term global aims, prepared even to sacrifice both its current fighters -- at a cost -- and the martyred Gaza population.
Why go on about all this? Because the strategic purpose of both atrocities is evident, even if Americans still do not seem to have grasped the fact or woken up to what it revealed of flagrant imbalances that still make the US and the West vulnerable to dangerous threats both internal and external.
Returning, then, to the assault on a huge Moscow concert hall, the form of this closely resembled previous attacks in Russia and the Bataclan atrocity in Paris in November 2015.
[At the moment when that happened, I was attending a meeting in Germany and sitting next to the organizer, who told us what was happening. I turned to him at once and said, "The attackers come from Brussels". Not even intuition, familiarity with the city where I was living.]
Despite the clear adherence to the same pattern, despite all the indications that this was not, like the bombing of apartment buildings used as a pretext for the second Chechen war, an inside job, the complex hatreds and rivalries within Russia and, in particular, Chechnya and neighboring republics are, to put it mildly, confusing to outside observers, but it would surely be surprising if the attackers, like those who attacked the Bataclan music hall, did not have a local support network.
Finally, the Israeli government received plenty of advance warnings over a long period of time, and not long before the October 7th attack, and these were ignored. Likewise the current horror. In Russia today, it is hard to assess what is going on, but anything that raises the level of terror and paranoia within the population may be regarded by the regime as useful. They can surely be counted on to find ways of using this in the total war against Ukraine.
Meanwhile, the Little Greene Gals and Men occupy Congress on behalf of "President" DT and his mentor in Moscow quite as effectively as their predecessors occupied Crimea in 2014 and far more effectively than the January 6th mob. Curzio Malaparte would have relished the technique of this so far successful coup.
Chaos is clearly useful to a dictator. Yet I still believe this was ISIS-K. Yes, Russia will try to use this to justify its war in Ukraine. They wouldn’t want the people to believe their safety and security isn’t that great. Frankly I don’t think most of the Russian people are that stupid as to buy everything Putin says. Our intelligence was right and eventually even our warning will get through to enough Russian people to cause more damage to the integrity of Putin. I suspect these attacks are separate each with their own motives. HAMAS is more clear. ISIS-K’s not so much. But clearly they saw an opening while Russia is busy with Ukraine.
Russia still has a large military presence in Syria and other parts of the Middle East. They are friends and trading partners with Iran. The Russians are interfering with Muslim countries in Africa. I'm sure they have even more reasons that I am unaware of.
The CIA and intelligence services from all over the world have infiltrated Russia. Of course, it is likely, the GRU and FSB are here in the US in larger numbers than most of us know about.
We shouldn't be surprised if an attack like this happens here. We all need to be diligent.
Recently, several large grow houses of pot in ME have been discovered that are run by Chinese nationals. I doubt that ME is the only state they have their operations.
We have 11 neighbors within a quarter of a mile and I can only see one of their houses from our property.
ProPublica has published some recent reporting on pot farms and the Chinese nationals involved, in this case, in Oklahoma -
https://www.propublica.org/article/oklahoma-marijuana-china-diplomat-visits
Putin calling on the world to express outrage.
Waiting for the explanation from ISIS. But this group is known to operate in Afghanistan. Before we spent 20 years meddling there, Russia did the same. They wasted the country and slaughtered many. Perhaps karma has arrived? Not sure...
Isis-k is into mass casualty events. They hate everyone. Fog of war.
Do the assailants even know?
I've just turned 79, and I can vividly remember, around the time of Freedom summer, thinking that we were not going to survive the Civil Rights struggle. Then during the Cuban missile crisis thinking that I probably wouldn't live to see my twenty first birthday. I watched following Brown v Board how so many of us couldn't accept the simple truth of humanity. And then we plunged into Vietnam and I spent four years of my life in the army, including that awful year of 1968, not sure how the country would hold together. We barely got out of that one intact, perhaps saved only by three extraordinary men going to the moon surrounded by our profound will to put them there. Then there were the Pentagon Papers and Watergate and the disastrous collapse of trust in the government. And so on.
You know, I often think I've spent my whole life in a storm. I spent over 40 years teaching American history and attempting to give my students some sense of the extraordinary story of our founding and the reasons for it, all the while watching that extraordinary promise frittered away by men and women with small souls, biased hearts, limited vision, stunted morality, and increasing partisanship.
So now, watching this current mess, I guess I'm a little less horrified than I ought to be because I've become so used to such people calling themselves Americans and thinking that they are a legitimate part of this grand experiment when in fact they have utterly failed to understand who we were designed to be. Yes, that design was flawed from the start, primarily by slavery, but the dream was there in the minds of those (admittedly all white males) who endured that long, hot summer in that closed-windowed building and created something another American would one day call "the last best hope of earth".
I still believe, with Lincoln, in the great task remaining before us, but lord, sometimes it is awfully damned hard.
Yes. When the draft was ended, I recall thinking this will change our country forever. It has always surprised me that this big socioeconomic change in the 1970s isn't cited more by historians as a factor in the remaking of patriotism that has brought us to where we are today.
Damn straight, Mighty Quinn😀
As a retired history/civics teacher myself, I tend to frame the current within the longer lens of history. (It’s one of the things I love about Letters From an American: HCR’s insights are so often presented in this context.) Our nation’s history can be viewed through numerous lenses, of course: race, class, gender, labor v business, war, territorial acquisition, politics, power, money… and different cause-effect chains become evident when this kind of analysis is applied. So, what’s an approach to illuminate the current threat? I think a useful lens is demagoguery, i.e., “political activity that gains support by appealing to the desires and prejudices of ordinary people rather than by using rational argument.” Our democracy has been evolving since its inception and the challenge has been how to expand democracy to empower the marginalized in the face of entrenched, reactionary power. To me, that frames our current dilemma. There are simply a LOT of Americans who reject the notion of democracy if it is inclusive. They will support (worship?) the demagogue who uses race, religion, gender, and ideals based on “tradition” to create an in-group/out-group tribalism that attracts them. This explains why poor white men would fight to uphold slavery. And it explains the appeal of Trump as he seems to speak for an aggrieved demographic whose world view feels besieged by “wokeness.” Across American history, each era’s demagogues have surged and then faded, but as James Quinn outlined, in his lifetime alone, the struggle has been relentless. Do I mean to suggest that democracy will always win out? Absolutely not. What history teaches us is that there is constant struggle between the reactionary and the progressive. Far from endorsing complacency, this understanding confirms the efficacy of civic vigor. I hope we’re up for it this time around.
About halfway through my teaching career I had one of those moments which, if I read it right, gave me an insight into how to present our history in terms kids could understand and use. I took the scientific method as taught in their science classes and applied it to history. As we've all (I hope!) been taught, there are several stages to that method, beginning with posing a question, gathering data pertinent to it, forming a hypothesis, testing that hypothesis, modifying it to accept new or contradictory data in order to form a theory, and so on. So I took as the question that which motivated the Founders - could the citizens of a state or nation together rule themselves justly. They, or at least some of them, primarily Madison, collected the data they had from their understanding of history, and the Constitution was their hypothesis. They knew that time and circumstance would certainly make modifications to that hypothesis necessary so they included a method of doing so. As you note in your own way, we've been testing it ever since. I don't think we've quite gotten to the theory stage - there are just too many variables, and our increasing diversity, technology, and connection to the rest of the world have only added to them.
The concept was a bit simplistic, but it seemed to work with enough of my students so that I continued to use it for the remainder of my career.
For myself, I think the essential problem is that too many of us have never thought of this nation as an ongoing hypothesis, but rather as something already written in stone mirroring their own conception of it. Having been formally trained in anthropology with a particular interest in human origins, I think the whole process mirrors that other great theory in human development, Darwin's concept of decent with modification, Both, being at the very core of human existence, have always been the source of intense controversy. Indeed I often think of the story of the bishop's wife who, when confronted with Darwin's idea that we arose from earlier forms of life (apes!), noted to her husband, "My dear, let us hope it is not true; but if it is true, let us hope it will not become generally known."
Her response came to me with particular force with the rise of the MAGA crew who certainly hope this Constitutional hypothesis isn't true and are doing everything they can to make sure it is not either true or generally known.
I'll bet you were a wonderful teacher! As my teaching skills evolved, I too moved from teaching history as a narrative to something more thematic, which helped my students connect dots across time and see patterns that made the whole endeavor much more meaningful to them. You are correct - absolutely correct - that many citizens see democracy as something sprung, fully formed, with ratification of the Constitution, rather than as the process it is. In this sense, democracy is a noun and a verb, the latter implying not only activism, but change. Change is unsettling, and is not always an improvement upon the old. In this sense, I understand the MAGA impulse, while abhorring the prejudices and fear upon which it feeds.
Whatever I was as a teacher was because I stood at the feet of giants, starting with an ugly old ex-sculptor from Athens who gave, and lost, his life in the service of free inquiry. I think this is what I abhor most about the MAGA crowd and all their predecessors; the idea that education ought to be safe and comfortable when in fact, it is not truly education if it is either. Perhaps you've read Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. He saw this coming long before Donald Trump and his myrmidons came on the scene.
Sadly, it has become difficult, if not insurmountable, to make in-course adjustments to our Constitution, leaving us with an eighteenth and nineteenth century baked-in sclerotic document. Getting thirty eight states to change anything seems harder than finding a unicorn.
You'll perhaps forgive me for adding a bit about just how young we are. As I used to tell my students, I could have talked to a man who fought in the Civil War, and he could have talked to a man who fought in the Revolution. Politically we are yet children.
Well said. My wife, listening to “The Charleston”, just said, wasn’t this thirty years before we were born?
If we live to a “normal” life expectancy (2035-2040), what wonders have we experienced and will have experienced?
There was a time when slavery and racism were baked into the Constitution, supported by the Supreme Court and the Executive Branch, sanctified by the public, and even discussing it in Congress was prohibited by the infamous 'Gag Rule'. I'm not suggesting that we need another Civil War, but I do think that we are still young enough, and the hypothesis yet untried enough that all the possibilities are not yet visible.
I do think we are going to need another shock similar to the Civil War (although I certainly hope not as destructive) to bring us to some sort of collective sense. It may be that it will take another Trump presidency or something like it. His supporters don't really understand the damage he could do because they are still focused on his first term and all the good things they think he accomplished, but a second one will not be like the first, and his desperation to avoid another such humiliation as 2020 will lead him to try things he didn't know or dare to do the first time around. We are in uncharted territory here, and unknowns are always more fearful than reality. Democracy is never safely final, as it cannot be, but we have endured and survived some awful distortions of this experiment.
I believe most of your students will stand for a better America. Thank you!
I'd like to think so, but one of the greatest truths of teaching, particularly at the elementary level as I did is that one never knows what kids will make of what you think is abundantly clear. But I appreciate the thought.
Thank you James Quinn
I still wish, as I have since he was first elevated to the Senate, that someone would throw Rand Paul off the Roebling Bridge. That little fuckwit *needs* termination since back when he was a "self licensed" opthamologist. We really are at the point where the only "good Republicans" are "pushing up daisies" as Harry Truman said way back in 1948.
He is among the slimiest.
Just wish his neighbor had been more thorough....
Heh. And I thought that poor neighbor was forgotten. If I was on a jury having to judge him for beating the hell out of that whiny annoying Rand Paul, I would award him a medal.
And take him out for drinks
Yes!
It seems that Buck and Gallagher’s departure may finally give the Dems the leverage needed to force a vote on aid to Ukraine. MTG’s motion may have done them a big favor.
Such buffoonery in both houses by GOP radicals. Disgusting.
Herb With Trump opposing urgent military aid to Ukraine and puppet Johnson dancing on the House Raucus Committee’s hot coals, it won’t be until mid-April at the very earliest that some bipartisan initiative may gain traction to force a vote on the October request for urgent military aid to desperate Ukrainian military.
Vote Blue is not enough. WORK Blue matters. The ground game can skew things several percentage points that move us from lose to win. Them (the Democrats) is US! Go to a swing state and WORK to elect Democrats. I did that as long as I was able, working in NV for Obama and Hillary. At age 82, I'm sending money. Lots of swing states for Presidency and Senate, gotta be one close to each of us. NC, GA, OH, MI, WI, MT, NV, AZ, come to mind. Biden needs the Senate and the House to bull off his programs. Get off your butt and WORK to save Democracy! If you can't, send money of you can. My wife and I dropped $40K on the last round. Talk is cheap, and worthless. Democracy is not a spectator sport!
Thank you, Heather.
You wrote, ''This morning, conservative lawyer George Conway suggested that “we should stop defiling the memory of the party of Lincoln by referring to the current organization” as the Republican Party.''
Here's an idea let's have a poll to help George Conway. Here are some choices:
1. Authoritarian Nationalist Party (ANP)
2. Centralist Republican Authority (CRA)
3. Patriotic Governance Party (PGP)
4. Liberty Control Party (LCP)
5. New Republican Order (NRO)
6. Republican Autocracy Party (RAP):
7. Conservative Authoritarian Movement (CAM)
8. Dominant Republican Initiative (DRI)
9. Nationalist Republican Vanguard (NRV)
10. United Republican Regime (URR)
Please vote for one or make up your own.
I chose #6 because it's acronym rhymes with crap.
Speak up. Speak out. Vote. Pray.
I like Party of Trump — the only reason is so Democrats could use it in their publicity. I envision bumper stickers all over the country : GET OFF THE POT AND VOTE FOR AMERICA!
LOVE THIS!!! Thx, Claudia, for the giggle!
Trump Ultra-Right Demagogues (TURD)
Excellent!
How about the League of Aggrieved White Men?
I like your number 1 name for them, (Authoritarian Nationalist Party) I have one more to suggest: Fascist Nazi Party or (FNP)
Which also means Fox News Propaganda!
I actually think #6 is the least useful because it is a word for an already existing thing. Then consider that thing is a genre of music that 1) is America's most popular cultural export of the last half-century, which 2) historically represents marginalized communities' victory outside of an established system through 3) the cultivation of a quick mind over a quick trigger and 4) the ultilization and synthesis of bits of historical lineage into a newly vital and "woke" present, ideally resulting in art of 5) raw personal honesty, confrontational social awareness, and great stylistic and thematic variety, with the potential for 6) more open souls via joyous bodily release. Absolutely none of which describes the organization we are attempting to rename.
I vote for #10 because it is the sound I make whenever I have to read about their daily shenanigans. I'm a sucker for otomatopeia!
Ah, Will, we think alike. the onomatopoeia never occurred to me.
I vote for #2 with the addition of Party at the end.
the Centralist Republican Authority Party
CRAP
Centralist Republican Authority Party would make it official.
Very good!
Any name with "Conservative" in it is a misnomer or an oxymoron.
Name me anything this current group of maganazis has done that is conservative.
Repressive Regressives is my addition to the list, but most of them are definitely Fascists.
I go with 10, because to add the word "party" gives you "urrp" which is associated with an episode of reverse peristalsis.
Per the Cleveland Clinic:
What is reverse peristalsis? When the wave-like muscle contractions of peristalsis move backward instead of forward, it's called retroperistalsis, antiperistalsis or reverse peristalsis. This is what happens when your vomiting reflex is triggered.
Michael, these are all amazing names, but simple as I am, I prefer Nazi-clear, concise, and dead-on accurate. New American Nazi , perhaps?
Indiana Jones hated NAZIS so I'm with you on that. :)
BDL - Brain Dead Lemmings
iDJiTs - Idiots
NOP - Nitwits Only Party
Michael Corthell, Freedom Killers Party, Tyrant Dictators Party, or F the People Party.
‘Sticking’ with the ’MAGATS Party’ works for me. Allows one to be creatively whimsical with the terminal TS. Like ‘... Team Scheiße’, or ‘T’s S... Party, etc.
Has clarity and, ah, movement to it.
I bid NO TRUMP!
Clever... ;)
(It's been decades since I played bridge! Slow on the conventions here.)
I am not sure if this Business Insider story is true. But essentially Ukraine has been using drones and long-range missiles to target its oil and gas industry. "US officials are said to be concerned that the attacks could drive up oil prices and provoke retaliation. They want Ukraine to ease up, per the report."
Obviously, higher oil prices would be bad for Biden in the upcoming election. It pains me to say this, but with aid being stalled in Congress, I can't help but think Ukranians' response to the U.S. "concern" would be like their response to that Russian warship early on in the war: "Go f**k yourself."
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukraine-finally-found-a-way-to-make-russia-suffer-the-us-seems-to-want-it-to-stop/ar-BB1klwj2?
Not sure how much cred Business Insider has. But gotta love the Ukraine’s chutzpah!
I would say "not very much" cred for Business Insider.
Higher oil prices would be worth paying to be rid of both Putin and Dump. But since we already produce enough oil and gas in the US and Canada to supply ourselves, why should we have to pay higher prices anyway? Yes, energy is a global market, but are are such things as price controls. I say supply the Ukraine and damn the torpedoes; as for the other guy, Tuck Frump.
I am gobsmacked that Jackal Johnson has recessed the House until April 9th after its Perils of Pauline handling of the latest prospective government financial shutdown. So many artificial crises must be so psychologically exhausting that another more-than-two-week vacation is required.
Under Speaker Johnson the House has spent far more time in recess than in Washington. Part of this is due to the House Raucous Committee, which continually seeks to jab a stick into the wheels of government. Also, Johnson has difficulty getting his NYET instructions from Trump, who has been engaged in vacuuming money from the Republican National Committee for his legal bills while seeking the cash/bond for $464,000,000 by March 25th.
John has indicated his intention to invite Netanyahu to speak before the House (or, with Schumer’s assent, before a joint session of Congress.) Such a political meddling in the Middle East cauldron repeats what occurred with Netanyahu in 2015.
President Obama was on the cusp of concluding s six-nation agreement intended to short circuit Iran’s development of a nuclear capability. Netanyahu openly opposed this. The Republicans, in control of the House and Senate, invited Netanyahu to use this platform to publicly oppose a major initiative of the United States Government (and others).
[As a matter of diplomatic protocol, since Obama had not invited Prime Minister Netanyahu to the United States, he was not invited to the White House.] Might Netanyahu journey to Mar a Lago to genuflect before his favored presidential candidate?
MEANWHILE, the Russians have been carpet bombing key electric installations in Ukraine, brave Ukrainians are dying as much better equipped and supplied Russians are ravaging, AND Johnson mentions that the $61,000,000,000 October request for urgent Ukrainian military aid will be ‘considered’ after the latest House recess.
Personally, I consider traitorous the Trump/Johnson NYETS on providing vital support for Ukraine against ‘Greater Russia’ Putin.The thought of ‘President’ Trump cutting off all aid to Ukraine in support of his buddy Putin makes me puke.
Keith Wheelock, not a better alliteration ---- Jackal Johnson. Thank you!
John Fugelsang's "Trump's flaccid little Johnson" is my favorite.
Thank you for this.
The RNC is now the hardware store that Tony and the boys did a "bust out" on in The Sopranos.
Subject: Mystery Science Theatre 3000: Here Comes The Circus (The Day The Earth Froze Short)
https://youtu.be/dYmcD5YPGR0?si=JxkDEUNRHp7DF8u9
Like watching a train wreck in slow motion
Really like a slow-moving lava flow. Devastation is certain and unstoppable, but people keep going about their business.
Their will be great cheers when the final blow comes to Donald Trump.
After reading Jay Kuo's substack The Status Kuo, I am a bit concerned about Trump's Truth Social going public. He stands to garner a few billion dollars from the deal.
"But there’s a lifeline for Trump that could change everything. In fact, it’s far more than a lifeline; all of Trump’s personal financial problems may soon vanish, and he may become a real billionaire many times over, at least on paper, in one of the biggest grifts ever."
https://statuskuo.substack.com/p/the-publicly-traded-presidential
UPDATE: After reading Robert Hubbell's Today's Edition, I feel much better about this now. See "Trump's legal and money problems get worse" in the newsletter for Robert's explanation.
https://roberthubbell.substack.com/p/on-an-eventful-day-less-is-more/
Except, as soon as Cheetolini sells any shares, the value will tank since the company has no actual value. It’s losing money massively, and without Cheetolini, it’s nothing.
He’s locked out from selling or using his shares as collateral for 6 months, but the board could waive that. However, if that happens and the other shareholders don’t sue him, they are morons since the value of their shares will evaporate.
George The link between ‘Truth Social’ and Trump is indicative of a giant Ponzi scheme. The artificial figure of perhaps $6 billion is foo foo dust. It is related to a massively money losing Trump media trumpet.
Trump ultimately is likely to end up with a massive amount of Trump stock toilet paper.
Better he keeps that in his bathroom than classified docs!
foo foo dust? Too cute. Thanks for the laugh, Keith!
Thank you, George! Plus, I just read Robert Hubbell's analysis of Truth Social going public. His opinion aligns with yours. I feel much better now!
Robert Hubbell always talks me down from the ledge.
Me, too, Alexandra. I was so glad he read Jay Kuo's post!
Maybe he will stand in the path of a lava flow just to show, well, you know, like looking at an eclipse directly.
Wow! A really bad day for the POT (Party of Trump) A helpful piece of legislation swept past their slimy hands. Guess their 'Grand Imperial Wizard' will have another ketchup throwing tantrum. Come April 22, with only a one vote lead the poor maggots, uh sorry, magats, might be forced to witness some real legislation passing. Tough patooties, trump.