WHAT ROUGH BEAST? America sits of the edge

Everyone has critics, that's a given, thus irrelevant and uncompelling as rebuttal. If you were to do some searches on these two, or better, read more of them, you'll find they sit at the top of their fields and both deserve the esteem that they have garnered over their professional lifetimes. Really? Well, if you find yourself spotting inconsistencies, ommissions, faulty logic, or sophmoric scholarship in Dworkin's piece here (or anywhere), then you ought to start thinking of seeking an appointment to a circuit court and then the SC, because that is the level this fellow is at. Reread his piece, but do it carefully this time. You'll find that he presents any contradicting argument which might be raised at each step of the way, and addresses them with full respect and care. Legal scholarship does not get better than this fellow.

Didion must be evaluated in a different manner. She is, like Tom Wolfe to whom she is frequently compared, a commentator on social and political matters (and a novelist). You could argue that Wolfe's "The Right Stuff" tells us nothing of value - nothing real - about the early space program, or that his wonderful essays reveal nothing about their diverse subjects, but you'd be a fool if you did. You could argue that Didion's "Political Fictions" or her many essays on politics and campaigns are without merit because they are not scholarly, but you'd be in duncecap land again - the depth of research she does for everything she writes is immediately apparent. Please. I read Dworkin whenever I bump into his work not merely because he is such a fine legal essayist, but because of the balance and care in his analyses. I read Didion because there is no better model for political writing and because she is so goddamned smart. This is the key point, george. You'll understand by now, I trust, that I'm fond of you and have respect for your various areas of expertise and for you willingness to engage debate to some level of complexity. But your response to these two (three actually, including the Staussian) represent a too typical resistance - a solid wall, really - against a whole class of possible ideas. I began this thread with a warning against precisely this tendency. Learning is impossibile in the presence of an unyielding world-view. When work and ideas of the calibre of these three is passed off so glibly as you have done, it does define you, george. If you get the notion that sometimes I or Tartarin or others would like to slap you hard across the temple with a large freshly caught salmon, this is why.

I won't, here, go into the matter of secularism vs faith, because it is a different topic but also because my past discussions with you on the matter have met the same problem...you refuse to accept or acknowledge nuanced differences which might place your thesis in jeopardy.

waking up, will read.......after coffee

Don't spill any on paper and call 9-1-1, they hate that.

Brand X

I spilled on my keyboard the other day........and the keyboard died. I didn't call 911, but I did get so annoyed and verbal that my kids had to come ask me to behave myself. A new keyboard was the only cure.

Tartarin That's an astute observation. And of course, supporters agree that each of these (and more...Kyoto, Treaty of the Seas, UN resolution 242, etc etc) ARE deserving of comtempt. As this last colorful week on a2k has demonstrated, we have no small difficulty in this matter. One set of opinions holds that nothing can go terribly wrong in that enlightened paradigm of liberty, justice, and democracy - the American polity - and another set holds that manners/process violations are untoward and unhelpful. Though I have some strong sympathies with this last opinion, the dialogue with george here suggests the jars of warpaint in the pantry ought to perhaps be brough out into the kitchen. (Dworkin)

Where I differ with Dworkin, Blatham (and have with others in these discussions for a long time) is in the dating of change in the character of our society. I think the change had happened well before my return at the end of the '70's.

The generous, internationalist America with traces of humility that were part of my growing up twenty years earlier was by that time already under fire from the right, in spite of the fact that the Cold War was over (yes, before Reagan -- see intelligence documents and our knowledge that the USSR had buckled). Carter was far from wrong about "malaise." He might even say "anger" now, in retrospect.

When I delve into this (and I sure would like some help in doing so), I come up with handfuls of symptoms. In another thread this morning (where I just got shot down for no reason I can understand), I expressed and interest in exploring the impact of the change in status of corporations at the end of the 19th century to "personhood." It wasn't exactly a legal change, but it did give corporations the power to affect elections (among other things), power which has increased and which leaves all of us -- libs and cons -- feeling disenfranchised, disempowered. How's that for a source of outrage and contempt!

I also got raked over the coals in Abuzz for suggesting that much of the kindly, funny, superficial "rebellion" of the '60's (you know.... US!) developed within it a strong and frequently expressed (in movies, songs, posters, bumper stickers, literature, etc. etc.) contempt for the "unliberated," "the unevolved" who could well have developed some outrage in reaction to that arrogance.

I don't think we're going to get to the bottom of this unless each side is willing to do some delving into their own past, find where they were when they got so mad, so contemptuous, so outraged.

If I had to ask George one serious question, I'd ask him whether he considers himself thoughtful of others, and, if he does, how he could not want to apologize daily for the group he represents here -- apologize for their constant taunting, in the media, of people who disagree with them, of democratic procedures, of dissent of any kind.

Tartarin

I'm not sure Dworkin wouldn't follow you down that trail, but his focus is on constitutional law and particularly in it's ramifications for citizens' rights, and he normally addresses large legal questions as they arise - unlike the purpose that a historian would have.

These questions (historical) are SO bloody complex and multi-faceted and I find myself settling in one area one day and another on the following day. But YES, I agree that the shift in legal(?) status of corporate entities is likely a key in this. Damn....too too much to learn and understand.

Your comment on the sixties is interesting. Just yesterday, I remarked to Lola on the irony that our generation is the one now in charge and it is behaving in a manner 180 degrees from what I might have predicted. I think clearly there is a reactionism in this (Bush's quotes about 'the sixties' are idiotically uninformed and knee-jerk cliches, for example) and that's not a new thought - feminism, sexual openness, decline (we thought) of faith as authority, etc. represented deep cultural changes. I've made the argument (not well enough) elsewhere that the control of sexual behavior is ubiquitous in human societies and that the function of this is maintenance of existing power structures. It surely is not a coincidence that wealthy and powerful families are consistently our political representatives. There was a wonderful cartoon in the New Yorker some years ago, with a boy in short pants and private school uniform was standing next to his father's large chair in an elaborate study...the son had just asked a question and the father had replied, "New money, son, is just money that has somehow gotten away from us."

Bush the cheerleader was never part of the '60's -- didn't go to Vietnam and couldn't stand the protesters.

I come from a family which was part of the "elitist, powerful, went to the right schools, born to lead" group but which also had a history of rebellion, anti-slavery, women's rights fighters, etc. And there was an "understanding" that one was born into public service as a duty, a natural outcome of upbringing and schooling (and the colleges, like Wellesley, Smith, etc., are known for/pride themselves on, educating women for political office.) And I can understand that being seen as elitism and snobbism. But the public service part of it could not be categorized in that way, particularly if one looks at the individuals and what they contributed (not me, kiddo, I'm mostly out for number one!).

As per george's request and for the benefit of anyone who doubts the current threat to our political system, I'm copying a post I made on the US UN and Iraq threat to Sofia. Then I'll get busy on more, much more information.

I suspect Sofia, george and Timber as well as many other reasonable, respectful conservatives on this board have rarely been exposed to the fanatical religious element of which I refer. You may know of them, but you very easily dismiss the danger as insignificant. I'll give you some references here and a short quotation which includes a few statistics.





http://www.publiceye.org/magazine/v13n1/PE_V13_N1.pdf

These figures come from an article in The Public Eye Newsletter in 1999, so the numbers are old. But the numbers have not decreased over the last four years, but rather have multiplied. And the idea that Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson or Ralph Reed are no longer powerful is simply an illusion created in order to decrease the alarm factor that resulted when they addressed the Republican Convention in 1992, exposing the American public to the fanatical ideas they promote.

It seems that many people who come from home situations in which they were not exposed to these fanatical types find it hard to take this warning seriously. Even many of my Democratic friends say, "poo poo" when I first begin talking to them. It's hard to believe that such madness could be taking control of our government. But it's true.

And here is another reference to look at:

"The Rise of the Religious Right in the Republican Party," on a web site produced by TheocracyWatch, a project of the Center for Religion, Ethics, and Social Policy at Cornell University.

_________________

They do acknowledge it and they don't. I mean you can read about it and connect the dots easily enough. And writers like Dworkin, Didion and others have repeatedly drawn us a picture. But I think they're not up front about it, because if they were, as with the war in Iraq, they would never win an election. And I agree wholeheartedly that the Democrats have been almost as guilty as the Republicans in this in that they have been sleeping at the wheel for a long time. The event that turned the tide in 92, IMHO, was the speeches delivered by Pat Robertson and (who was the other, Jerry Falwell? -- senior moment). Remember the media picking up on the "mean spiritedness" of the Republians and their candidate at the time (George Bush the elder)? Maybe it's because I notice these events......and I'm not saying it's the only factor, but I am firmly convinced that Clinton would never have won in 92 without the help of the fanatical Christian Right.

And if they had been left to their own devises, they would still be winning for the Democrats..........enter the neocons, Karl Rove and Ralph Reed and look where they are today. Worry Worry Worry

I've just started cutting and pasting the tributes to Mamaj to send to her family, now that everyone seems to have had a say. A sad business. I wish she were here.

Lola -- At the risk of repeating myself (oh no never), my concern has to do with "respectable conservatives" overlooking the absolutism which is keeping their party in power right now. Because it's not the religiosity or attitudes towards taxes or militarism that we're talking about here. What we're talking about is a change in the system. An erasure of the Constitution. A new kind of government. A belief in absolutes, in one group taking and holding power. That's the motor which, whether conservatives like it or not, is driving their party and setting up a very scary future for all of us... Either/or. Them/us. God/Satan. Right/Wrong. And, from your quote: "One correct view."

It might be helpful to check through some primary sources (speeches, etc.) to demonstrate this.

I'm working on that very thing right now, Tartarin. Thanks.

Blatham has repeatedly urged me to read some of the writings of Richard Hofstadter, a former Columbia Professor and the author of "Anti Intellectualism in American Life" 1963, saying that Hofstadter particularly well illustrates some of his concerns for current trends in American political and social life. So I did a Google and found a relatively short article from a 1964 edition of Harper's whose title suggested Blatham's repeated concerns. It is titled "The Paranoid Style in American Politics". Assuming that the paranoid bit may have something to do with the larger "Anti Intellectualism" thing, I read it.

Impressions. Good prose style, clear and engaging. Overall well-balanced and good scholarship, but with a point of view that explains (to me) the attractions he presents to Blatham and others. He opens with the following lucid statement of his basic proposition;

"American politics has often been an arena for angry minds. In recent years we have seen angry minds at work mainly among extreme right-wingers, who have now demonstrated in the Goldwater movement how much political leverage can be got out of the animosities and passions of a small minority. But behind this I believe there is a style of mind that is far from new and that is not necessarily right-wing. I call it the paranoid style simply because no other word adequately evokes the sense of heated exaggeration, suspiciousness, and conspiratorial fantasy that I have in mind. …"

george,

Just because we're paranoid, does not prove or even indicate necessarily that our fears are unjustified. :wink:

Judge my warning about the danger on it's own merit and don't assume automatically that I'm simply a "secular modernist" (to be distinguished from a secular post-modernist) with no ability to distinguish outrageous paranoid ideation from a real danger. Give me a little benefit of the doubt.

There's a vast difference between paranoia and cynicism. To get into one's brain through these forums and broadly pronounce that any one of us is paranoid or cynical is a stretch of the imagination I can't begin to describe. Perceiving danger in foreign affairs just involved reading both sides and deciding who is kidding who. To swallow half the stuff on these poltical forums, I'd have to be popping what Limbaugh was popping.

Lola,

Good point, and I will heed your warning, listen, and do my research.

Shoot, Lola -- I wasn't trying to pass the buck (well, truthfully, I was trying not to seem to pass the buck!! -- intermittent puppy crises make me unreliable at this point), but that will be most helpful.

George: Why not pick up on some of the specific examples Lola (for example) has given and show how they are paranoid, unjustified. Or, take my example of the culture of contempt practiced by Limbaugh and tell me whether you go along with Limbaugh, or whether you think he's a bad standard bearer for your cause. Your exegesis of Hofstadter is interesting but maintains a careful distance from the subject at hand: whether you are one of those who is feeding and watering the beast which slouches towards Bethlehem or whether you prefer to deny that such a beast exists. We labor to show you the beast's spoor: you equivocate. If you believe the beast doesn't exist, why are you here?

george

Only you could read that wonderful essay and conclude that Hofstadter has everythin right except who is the subject.

Apropos of nothing whatsoever raised in this thread, but I'm dying to know.... The following happened night before last.

I turned on my radio as I hit the sack, got the midnight BBC World News. Headline: Clinton pulls off a coup, persuades drug companies to significantly lower their prices for AIDS drugs, specifically in Africa. Super-headline treatment of this story followed, in the news analysis, "front page" in-depth coverage. One hour later, same headline, same follow-up. Sounded like MAJOR breakthrough.

Nothing in Google the next morning. Nothing in the NYTimes or on NPR. Nothing anywhere. I wait. Just now, 40 hours later, I google it again and, yes, there has been weighty coverage (Financial Times, Sunday Times, IHT, a string of big city African and Asian papers, and one Washington Post citation) but no apparent widespread coverage on the networks here or in, say the Sacramento Bee or the Chicago Tribune. Not that I can find. After hearing the excitement with which the BBC announced it, and now finding that other European papers are making a big deal of it, one has to wonder....

Anyone else followed this story?

Tart

I caught a mention on PBS I think....but here's a piece http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/24/health/24AIDS.html