Great stuff here, and typical of today’s “liberal,” who engages in a kind of political conspicuous consumption: “of course I’ll sign your petition giving illegals my support, especially if it means the racist Teabaggers will howl with nativist hatreds! That’s how I lay claim to nobility! But asking me to house one? Dude — did I not just already do my part by signing the petition? Geez. You ungrateful bastard.”
I’d offer up the video for my old Hot Air Vent here normally, but I put it on Twitter yesterday, given the bolo-tie / Mexican invasion / Zionazi revisitation we’re currently experiencing, and not a whole lot of people seemed to give a shit (though thank you, Glenn! Looks like it’s just me and you now, buddy!)
Too bad. I coulda been a contender. And “Johnny Cash Don’t Wear Flip-flops” almost definitely would be a hit as a country song, should someone have the desire to write it and cut it and throw it up on iTunes.
Oh, well. Your loss, world.
(h/t Mark Levin, via TRC)
I’d forgotten about the Hot Air video. Hilarious and pointed.
Typical reactions. Sure, I’m fine with anything. As long as it doesn’t put me out or cost me anything.
We might modify that “as long as it doesn’t put me out or cost me anything” mc4ever59, to read in Tocqueville’s sense of “rightly understood” to say:
Thus the Americans are content to disregard thinking comprehensively of their interests, and in the bargain lose their Republic.
That’s excellent, sdferr. And dead on correct.
It seems many of our fellow citizens seem to believe that they have insulated themselves from such things as consequences and reality.
But consequences cannot be avoided, and reality will not be ignored.
In a way, it’s hilarious to revert to a remark of the stereotypical stoner-tripper of the ’60s-’70s in the grip of his presumed hallucination to find something true (hear the voice of Tommy Chong): “Oh ~ Wow, man. It’s all connected.”
Heh, yeah it’s funny, but also a little frightening and sad to think that Tommy Chong is more tuned in than many citizens today.
Tommy is my stand-in for the Americans Tocqueville described as natural Cartesians without any philosophical background at all or people in complete ignorance of actual philosophical endeavor. I think Tocqueville means that as a kind of compliment (since he’s a Frenchman) and not entirely as a snide remark, but I’m not completely assured on that score.
In any case, Tommy’s (made-up) remark was known to Descartes in 1630, and known to Plato in 390 BC (see Parmenides). The remaining question, of course, being “how is it all connected?”.
Like Jack Benny again: “we’re thinking — we’re thinking”
What never fails to amaze me is that we live in an age in which we should be the most informed and educated people to have ever lived.
Satellite TV, multiple channels of round the clock news, the internet, on and on. Surrounded by multiple platforms of ready to access information of all kinds.
And yet many people I meet are stunningly ignorant of what happens around them.
It’s hard to go in for the proposition “in an age”, at least it is for my part. I haven’t been persuaded that “History” rules, in other words, and that what is truly distinctive about any people at any time is necessarily the “time itself” in which they happen to live. I just don’t think the world works that way.
Instead I tend to lean toward an account which maintains that no matter what “era” we choose to examine, we will find human beings in their aggregates more or less the same as human beings in any other aggregates in other “eras”. So, nature rules, to put it simply. And that within this “nature” all manner of differences are found, i.e. those who are motivated by their desires for gain, or sex or honor or cuddling up with the truth. It’s a thing, and each will find his way to his erotic object. Among these, the learners to learning.
You’ve given me pause, and something to think about, sdferr; your thoughts are very interesting. I’m big on understanding ‘human nature’- it can explain many confusing things. To add to my chagrin in my post is the willful ignorance of so many.
They refuse to even consider possibilities or view points that threaten or are outside of their own views. There is often a child like obstinate and angry reaction towards even trying to get them to consider the other side of things.
If you cannot reason with the other side, even on mutually beneficial things, then all that is left is conflict.
If you cannot reason with the other side, even on mutually beneficial things, then all that is left is conflict.
That’s possibly where Machiavelli’s subtler thoughts enter in, providing some sorts of alternatives by means of calculating, manipulative inducements in political things. In a sense, the plain resort to manipulative heart-string plucking by the democrat-progressives is just such a thing. And this cannot be successfully accomplished by them unless they have a very good grasp of some underlying condition which will enable their success. (See Alinsky’s recommendations, for instance).
The tangle arises in the ends. Machiavelli’s ends are, I believe, pretty ordinary from a normative moral standpoint. Alinsky’s, on the other hand, are what we term nihilisitic. Deadly, in other words, which is why they must be concealed from the rubes.
Here is one such manipulative inducement uttered just now by the campaigning Turk, Erdogan: *** In ever-escalating remarks, Turkey’s prime minister on Saturday blames Israel for the failure of the 72-hour truce with Hamas on Friday, saying the Jewish state would “drown in blood.”
“Israel did not obey the truce declared yesterday, their lust for blood will not end,” Recep Tayyip Erdogan said at an election campaign rally in Turkey’s Bal?kesir province, according to Hurriyet Daily News. ***
So he calls to hatred, and who knows but that he will not find many adherents to that? They may choose. They may choose wisely or foolishly, but it is surely theirs to do.
Your ‘heart string plucking’ comment is a good example of missed opportunities, sdferr. When, for example, the left screams about ‘compassion’ in the illegal immigration debate, where are those on the right to throw it back in their faces?
As in, where is the left’s compassion for American children and their families? Compassion for the illegals? Who cares how many die on the trek through the desert- as long as their top donors demands for cheap labor are met?
And having dispensed with the childish, mindless emotional screeching, get right back on point.
The health and safety of American citizens; the rule of law; the right and duty of a sovereign nation to control and protect it’s borders, and on and on.
Instead, we get the likes of Boehner and company; don’t rock the boat, it could hurt ‘the party’ in November.
where are those on the right
The political right (so-called) mc4ever59, has learned and used other tricks of the trade in their quest for power.
I make an example of myself: when Marco Rubio first came on the scene, his rhetoric was very powerful, inducing me to believe that he not only understood but would act upon the unique idea of the American political compact. Turns out, I was fooled. He doesn’t, and he won’t. And I think we’ve seen over the years that such carefully crafted lip-service has been and continues to be a successful manipulation on the part of the Republican establishment. We’re Charlie Brown field-goal kicking to Lucy’s football-pull.
In some measure, learning this lesson has been long awaited, hard to accomplish, difficult to quit. Yet we do see some change. We’re seeing ever more people awakening to the deception, and in consequence contemplating either on the one hand, a takeover of the Republican party and completely reforming it (which Mark Levin still advocates, but which I don’t think possible at this point myself, yet which I don’t know for a fact) or, on the other hand, setting out independently to form a new party entirely, one which can be created ab initio to work the will of those who would make it (which latter alternative I believe would be more likely to succeed, but again cannot know as a fact — but do know as a tremendously daunting undertaking in itself).
This, IMO, is the crux of the matter, sdferr.
I believe we must change the dynamic. That is, the left calls the tune, we dance to it. I have no trust in, or use for, the vast majority in politics or the media who claim to be ‘on our side’. The Rubios and O’Reilly’s of the world are part of the theater; playing ‘the game’ for self serving ends.
If we could find a way to break through and get the likes of Gowdy, Sessions, Levin and our own Jeff consistently on the main stage to do battle with the left, I believe a lot of eyes would be opened.
Vague, I know. But to me, our last best chance to stop the inevitable conflict in the streets and possible loss of the republic.
Ideology as sport.
“Your team is losing.”
“But it’s my team, and besides, in this game one can claim to be winning by means of interpretive contortions, selective ignorance, and citing the prophetic dicta from the likes of Bill Maher, Jon Stewart, et. al.“
To repeat myself: the tangle arises in the ends. This, I intend, in the alternative to a “down in the weeds” of policy approach to every political question. The battle must be joined on these most fundamental grounds. The trouble with the most fundamental grounds, however, is simply that these are the most difficult to grasp and from which to demonstrate that above referenced Tommy Chong fake remark is so: “it’s all connected”. Rubes have no time for such stuff. Rubes want instantaneous tits and ass. Or bloodlust and destruction.
Surrounded by multiple platforms of ready to access information of all kinds. And yet many people I meet are stunningly ignorant of what happens around them.
Almost everyone knows what you mean when you speak of Orwell. But the man with the clearer picture of our dystopian future was definitely Huxley.