Finally finished all the legal work necessary for probate, and today I’m heading back to the doctor’s to discuss the results of my blood panels. My Vitamin D level was very low — granted, I haven’t been outside that much since we made the move, spending much of my time working on the new house and watching the boys (and of course, dealing with lawyers all over the east coast); and because Tanner is allergic to fish, I’ve been eating far less of it than I used too — but I have to say I was surprised by that news.
Hopefully the appointment today will shed more light on what’s happening.
That’s your morning update. Prayers for the hostages in Sydney, and a bacon-wrapped funeral for the Islamist gunman.
Update:
Long overdue thanks to RI Red
Patrick C
SDN
and palaeomerus
Low Vitamin D very common. Under 10 is dangerously low, under about 30 needs replacement but less of an issue. You can supplement without a script, many options out there. Wellesse makes an easy to absorb liquid supplement. Fat soluble vitamins can complete with each other to be absorbed, so A,D,E best not taken together if you are taking other supplements, though the differences usually not great unless you are doing inadvisable megadosing.
Good Luck!
Glad to hear, like Aerosmith, you’re back in the saddle again.
I may be unusually curious, but trying to find out how “armed” this Sydney jihadi wannabe is has been very difficult, as almost no reports say anything other than “armed”. I think it significant if he is armed with handgun, assault rifle, pump/semi-auto shotgun, etc, as each would indicate a different level of planning or support. As usual the MSM is bloody useless with these details. Australia, as you know, has very stringent gun control, where access to anything other than bolt action rifle or side by side shotgun is very difficult.
Police storm building, siege over. Meet the terrorist. Now the moaning from the usual suspect’s corners begins.
Get well Jeff. My wife and I both take additional D-3 each day.
Martin Place mentioned in Sept. story on large scale terrorist raid across Australia.
SW, What I heard is the raghead had a shotgun and claimed he had planted two bombs in the building.
I would think the bomb threat was more effective in controlling the hostages than a shotgun.
Also, I’m already sick of the term “lone wolf”. I’d be much more comfortable with, say, “lone pig”, or perhaps “lone skunk”.
Nothin’ much “lone” about any member of the Borg, as they’s all one.
My doc has me taking extra D – Examine.com seems a good resource about supplements in general – they provide references to studies and note potential interactions.
I’m on 10,000 IUs of D-3; I’ve also resumed taking cod liver oil during the winters. Because Tanner is allergic to nuts / fish, I’ve changed my own diet dramatically. Going to have to start going the extra mile to prepare separate dinners.
I also have high estrogen levels, so in addition to the juicing I’ve been doing I’m adding DIM as a supplement. I am also adding green tea extract and a probiotic Lactobacillis (?), along with Maca.
What I’d never been told — for ten years — is that heart palpitations, racing heart, heart skipping a beat, stomach issues, and mood swings can all be attributed to the combination of high estrogen and low Vitamin D (I was at 25). In fact, I don’t believe I’ve ever had my hormones tested. I feel, finally, validated: I got so tired of having every ailment I felt attributed to generalized anxiety disorder that I practically gave up hope and had stopped trying to convince people that there were actual PHYSICAL problems contributing to those feelings. Nearly every one of my anxiety symptoms can be tied to the two deficiencies discovered in the full blood panel, according to my doctor.
I’ve been PMSing for some time now, evidently. And that, along with the heart issues, have contributed to my anxiousness. It was almost a catch-22.
Lee, I’ve just heard from a witness, not from the authorities that he had a shotgun and a machete (not prizes for guessing what that was for). If his weapon was a shotgun, of the double barrel variety, I would hazard a guess that he was of the lone (insert noun here) persuasion. Frustrating not having these details earlier.
Caterwauling coming: ACLU demands release of photos of shattered bodies of Americans who jumped from the upper floors of the World Trade Center.
Oh, wait . . .
. . . musta been a mix-up. Thought the “A” in “ACLU” referred to “American”.
High estrogens may be from various dietary sources. Be careful what you supplement with.
I hate it when a doc dismisses your symptoms as “anxiety” or (as happened to me) “stress.”
sunshine is not to be taken for granted i am learning
Yep, and SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) is real. Ya gots ta have the sunshine, either directly or by capsule. Vitamin D is our friend.
I’m supplementing with green tea and broccoli, along with Maca, for estrogen.
For Vitamin D it’s a gel cap and some cod liver oil, plus an adjustment to my diet.
My other tests all looked perfect. I’ll likely resume power lifting soon (still making a place for equipment), and replace my regular pasta with pasta made from quinoa.
I’ve also started adding chia seeds to pomegranate juice, and flax seed and hemp heart as salad toppings.
The juice I make out of kale, parsley, cucumber, asparagus, celery, yellow bell pepper, broccoli, chard, wheat grass, spirulina, carrots, beets, and ginger.
I hope doesn’t count as oversupplementing.
The French have discovered that a taste for spicy food seems to correlate with high testosterone and other alpha-male traits.
Take that with a grain of powdered cayenne pepper.
cayenne pepper, jalapenos, sriracha, chipotle peppers, chili powder, habanero
all of these things are cheap and plentiful
not unlike bush family whores who want to be president
but with a spicy kick
we’re precisely 4 months give or take from April 15th btw
For SAD you can also use a light-therapy lamp, the really blue-spectrum heavy ones are the easiest to use, since you don’t have to stare directly into them but rather put use them on the periphery while you do something else.
Hey Jeff: there’s a comment over at David’s place that you might find interesting.
I proffered a summary but thought you might want a crack at it, too.
the blue ones are super expensive like over dollars one hundred
my co-worker d said i could borrow his one – he got it with points from his credit card
but if you do it too late in the day you can have trouble sleeping
so next step is me and d is gonna do bulletproof coffee at beatrix before work next week
yep yep i am titay
nee
yum
A daily glass of (whole) milk and a couple hours outside every day is good for everyone/every age. Dad.
Just sayin’.
>The Anti-Gnostic
December 16, 2014 at 2:08 am GMT
This is what happens when your whole life is a manic episode.
We are living in really sick times. Mentally ill people want the whole rest of the planet to validate their illness, and the megaphone holders are mentally ill as well so they go along with it.<
link
>Let us take note: if the greengrocer had been instructed to display the slogan “I am afraid and therefore unquestioningly obedient,” he would not be nearly as indifferent to its semantics, even though the statement would reflect the truth. The greengrocer would be embarrassed and ashamed to put such an unequivocal statement of his own degradation in the shop window, and quite naturally so, for he is a human being and thus has a sense of his own dignity. To overcome this complication, his expression of loyalty must take the form of a sign which, at least on its textual surface, indicates a level of disinterested conviction. It must allow the greengrocer to say, “What’s wrong with the workers of the world uniting?” Thus the sign helps the greengrocer to conceal from himself the low foundations of his obedience, at the same time concealing the low foundations of power. It hides them behind the facade of something high. And that something is ideology.
Ideology is a specious way of relating to the world. It offers human beings the illusion of an identity, of dignity, and of morality while making it easier for them to part with them. As the repository of something suprapersonal and objective, it enables people to deceive their conscience and conceal their true position and their inglorious modus vivendi, both from the world and from themselves. It is a very pragmatic but, at the same time, an apparently dignified way of legitimizing what is above, below, and on either side. It is directed toward people and toward God. It is a veil behind which human beings can hide their own fallen existence, their trivialization, and their adaptation to the status quo. It is an excuse that everyone can use, from the greengrocer, who conceals his fear of losing his job behind an alleged interest in the unification of the workers of the world, to the highest functionary, whose interest in staying in power can be cloaked in phrases about service to the working class. The primary excusatory function of ideology, therefore, is to provide people, both as victims and pillars of the post-totalitarian system, with the illusion that the system is in harmony with the human order and the order of the universe.
<
havel
hi johny orange
>BETWEEN the aims of the post-totalitarian system and the aims of life there is a yawning abyss: while life, in its essence, moves toward plurality, diversity, independent self-constitution, and self organization, in short, toward the fulfillment of its own freedom, the post-totalitarian system demands conformity, uniformity, and discipline. While life ever strives to create new and improbable structures, the post-totalitarian system contrives to force life into its most probable states. The aims of the system reveal its most essential characteristic to be introversion, a movement toward being ever more completely and unreservedly itself, which means that the radius of its influence is continually widening as well. This system serves people only to the extent necessary to ensure that people will serve it. Anything beyond this, that is to say, anything which leads people to overstep their predetermined roles is regarded by the system as an attack upon itself. And in this respect it is correct: every instance of such transgression is a genuine denial of the system. It can be said, therefore, that the inner aim of the post-totalitarian system is not mere preservation of power in the hands of a ruling clique, as appears to be the case at first sight. Rather, the social phenomenon of self-preservation is subordinated to something higher, to a kind of blind automatism which drives the system. No matter what position individuals hold in the hierarchy of power, they are not considered by the system to be worth anything in themselves, but only as things intended to fuel and serve this automatism. For this reason, an individual’s desire for power is admissible only in so far as its direction coincides with the direction of the automatism of the system.<
havel
Milk starting giving me stomach issues, but I’m no stranger to outside. In fact, I work out outside, for the most part. So I’m not sure if this Vitamin D problem is seasonal or not, frankly.
Casting Crowns – Until The Whole World Hears
In which Mark Levin goes OUTLAW!…
>In which Mark Levin goes OUTLAW!…<
he gets a stuffed armadillo for it with whiskey!
>The post-totalitarian system touches people at every step, but it does so with its ideological gloves on. This is why life in the system is so thoroughly permeated with hypocrisy and lies: government by bureaucracy is called popular government; the working class is enslaved in the name of the working class; the complete degradation of the individual is presented as his ultimate liberation; depriving people of information is called making it available; the use of power to manipulate is called the public control of power, and the arbitrary abuse of power is called observing the legal code; the repression of culture is called its development; the expansion of imperial influence is presented as support for the oppressed; the lack of free expression becomes the highest form of freedom; farcical elections become the highest form of democracy; banning independent thought becomes the most scientific of world views; military occupation becomes fraternal assistance. Because the regime is captive to its own lies, it must falsify everything. It falsifies the past. It falsifies the present, and it falsifies the future. It falsifies statistics. It pretends not to possess an omnipotent and unprincipled police apparatus. It pretends to respect human rights. It pretends to persecute no one. It pretends to fear nothing. It pretends to pretend nothing.
Individuals need not believe all these mystifications, but they must behave as though they did, or they must at least tolerate them in silence, or get along well with those who work with them. For this reason, however, they must live within a lie. They need not accept the lie. It is enough for them to have accepted their life with it and in it. For by this very fact, individuals confirm the system, fulfill the system, make the system, are the system.<
havel
buck up pw
Casting Crowns – Thrive
Sí, se puede!
havel if of interest
>WE HAVE seen that the real meaning of the greengrocer’s slogan has nothing to do with what the text of the slogan actually says. Even so, this real meaning is quite clear and generally comprehensible because the code is so familiar: the greengrocer declares his loyalty (and he can do no other if his declaration is to be accepted) in the only way the regime is capable of hearing; that is, by accepting the prescribed ritual, by accepting appearances as reality, by accepting the given rules of the game. In doing so, however, he has himself become a player in the game, thus making it possible for the game to go on, for it to exist in the first place.
If ideology was originally a bridge between the system and the individual as an individual, then the moment he steps on to this bridge it becomes at the same time a bridge between the system and the individual as a component of the system. That is, if ideology originally facilitated (by acting outwardly) the constitution of power by serving as a psychological excuse, then from the moment that excuse is accepted, it constitutes power inwardly, becoming an active component of that power. It begins to function as the principal instrument of ritual communication within the system of power.
The whole power structure (and we have already discussed its physical articulation) could not exist at all if there were not a certain metaphysical order binding all its components together, interconnecting them and subordinating them to a uniform method of accountability, supplying the combined operation of all these components with rules of the game, that is, with certain regulations, limitations, and legalities. This metaphysical order is fundamental to, and standard throughout, the entire power structure; it integrates its communication system and makes possible the internal exchange and transfer of information and instructions. It is rather like a collection of traffic signals and directional signs, giving the process shape and structure. This metaphysical order guarantees the inner coherence of the totalitarian power structure. It is the glue holding it together, its binding principle, the instrument of its discipline. Without this glue the structure as a totalitarian structure would vanish; it would disintegrate into individual atoms chaotically colliding with one another in their unregulated particular interests and inclinations. The entire pyramid of totalitarian power, deprived of the element that binds it together, would collapse in upon itself, as it were, in a kind of material implosion.
As the interpretation of reality by the power structure, ideology is always subordinated ultimately to the interests of the structure. Therefore, it has a natural tendency to disengage itself from reality, to create a world of appearances, to become ritual. In societies where there is public competition for power and therefore public control of that power, there also exists quite naturally public control of the way that power legitimates itself ideologically. Consequently, in such conditions there are always certain correctives that effectively prevent ideology from abandoning reality altogether. Under totalitarianism, however, these correctives disappear, and thus there is nothing to prevent ideology from becoming more and more removed from reality, gradually turning into what it has already become in the post-totalitarian system: a world of appearances, a mere ritual, a formalized language deprived of semantic contact with reality and transformed into a system of ritual signs that replace reality with pseudo-reality.
Yet, as we have seen, ideology becomes at the same time an increasingly important component of power, a pillar providing it with both excusatory legitimacy and an inner coherence. As this aspect grows in importance, and as it gradually loses touch with reality, it acquires a peculiar but very real strength. It becomes reality itself, albeit a reality altogether self-contained, one that on certain levels (chiefly inside the power structure) may have even greater weight than reality as such. Increasingly, the virtuosity of the ritual becomes more important than the reality hidden behind it. The significance of phenomena no longer derives from the phenomena themselves, but from their locus as concepts in the ideological context. Reality does not shape theory, but rather the reverse. Thus power gradually draws closer to ideology than it does to reality; it draws its strength from theory and becomes entirely dependent on it. This inevitably leads, of course, to a paradoxical result: rather than theory, or rather ideology, serving power, power begins to serve ideology. It is as though ideology had appropriated power from power, as though it had become dictator itself. It then appears that theory itself, ritual itself, ideology itself, makes decisions that affect people, and not the other way around.
If ideology is the principal guarantee of the inner consistency of power, it becomes at the same time an increasingly important guarantee of its continuity. Whereas succession to power in classical dictatorship is always a rather complicated affair (the pretenders having nothing to give their claims reasonable legitimacy, thereby forcing them always to resort to confrontations of naked power), in the post-totalitarian system power is passed on from person to person, from clique to clique, and from generation to generation in an essentially more regular fashion. In the selection of pretenders, a new “king-maker” takes part: it is ritual legitimation, the ability to rely on ritual, to fulfill it and use it, to allow oneself, as it were, to be borne aloft by it. Naturally, power struggles exist in the post-totalitarian system as well, and most of them are far more brutal than in an open society, for the struggle is not open, regulated by democratic rules, and subject to public control, but hidden behind the scenes. (It is difficult to recall a single instance in which the First Secretary of a ruling Communist Party has been replaced without the various military and security forces being placed at least on alert.) This struggle, however, can never (as it can in classical dictatorships) threaten the very essence of the system and its continuity. At most it will shake up the power structure, which will recover quickly precisely because the binding substance—ideology—remains undisturbed. No matter who is replaced by whom, succession is only possible against the backdrop and within the framework of a common ritual. It can never take place by denying that ritual.
Because of this dictatorship of the ritual, however, power becomes clearly anonymous. Individuals are almost dissolved in the ritual. They allow themselves to be swept along by it and frequently it seems as though ritual alone carries people from obscurity into the light of power. Is it not characteristic of the post-totalitarian system that, on all levels of the power hierarchy, individuals are increasingly being pushed aside by faceless people, puppets, those uniformed flunkeys of the rituals and routines of power?
The automatic operation of a power structure thus dehumanized and made anonymous is a feature of the fundamental automatism of this system. It would seem that it is precisely the diktats of this automatism which select people lacking individual will for the power structure, that it is precisely the diktat of the empty phrase which summons to power people who use empty phrases as the best guarantee that the automatism of the post-totalitarian system will continue.
Western Sovietologists often exaggerate the role of individuals in the post-totalitarian system and overlook the fact that the ruling figures, despite the immense power they possess through the centralized structure of power, are often no more than blind executors of the system’s own internal laws-laws they themselves never can, and never do, reflect upon. In any case, experience has taught us again and again that this automatism is far more powerful than the will of any individual; and should someone possess a more independent will, he must conceal it behind a ritually anonymous mask in order to have an opportunity to enter the power hierarchy at all. And when the individual finally gains a place there and tries to make his will felt within it, that automatism, with its enormous inertia, will triumph sooner or later, and either the individual will be ejected by the power structure like a foreign organism, or he will be compelled to resign his individuality gradually, once again blending with the automatism and becoming its servant, almost indistinguishable from those who preceded him and those who will follow. (Let us recall, for instance, the development of Husák or Gomukka.) The necessity of continually hiding behind and relating to ritual means that even the more enlightened members of the power structure are often obsessed with ideology. They are never able to plunge straight to the bottom of naked reality, and they always confuse it, in the final analysis, with ideological pseudo-reality. (In my opinion, one of the reasons the Dub?ek leadership lost control of the situation in 1968 was precisely because, in extreme situations and in final questions, its members were never capable of extricating themselves completely from the world of appearances.)
It can be said, therefore, that ideology, as that instrument of internal communication which assures the power structure of inner cohesion is, in the post-totalitarian system, some thing that transcends the physical aspects of power, something that dominates it to a considerable degree and, therefore, tends to assure its continuity as well. It is one of the pillars of the system’s external stability. This pillar, however, is built on a very unstable foundation. It is built on lies. It works only as long as people are willing to live within the lie.<
>It becomes reality itself, albeit a reality altogether self-contained, one that on certain levels (chiefly inside the power structure) may have even greater weight than reality as such. Increasingly, the virtuosity of the ritual becomes more important than the reality hidden behind it. <
hi frat boy rapists!!11!!
i h8t communists
>THE PROFOUND crisis of human identity brought on by living within a lie, a crisis which in turn makes such a life possible, certainly possesses a moral dimension as well; it appears, among other things, as a deep moral crisis in society. A person who has been seduced by the consumer value system, whose identity is dissolved in an amalgam of the accouterments of mass civilization, and who has no roots in the order of being, no sense of responsibility for anything higher than his own personal survival, is a demoralized person. The system depends on this demoralization, deepens it, is in fact a projection of it into society.
Living within the truth, as humanity’s revolt against an enforced position, is, on the contrary, an attempt to regain control over one’s own sense of responsibility. In other words, it is clearly a moral act, not only because one must pay so dearly for it, but principally because it is not self-serving: the risk may bring rewards in the form of a general amelioration in the situation, or it may not. In this regard, as I stated previously, it is an all-or-nothing gamble, and it is difficult to imagine a reasonable person embarking on such a course merely because he reckons that sacrifice today will bring rewards tomorrow, be it only in the form of general gratitude. (By the way, the representatives of power invariably come to terms with those who live within the truth by persistently ascribing utilitarian motivations to them-a lust for power or fame or wealth-and thus they try, at least, to implicate them in their own world, the world of general demoralization.)
If living within the truth in the post-totalitarian system becomes the chief breeding ground for independent, alternative political ideas, then all considerations about the nature and future prospects of these ideas must necessarily reflect this moral dimension as a political phenomenon. (And if the revolutionary Marxist belief about morality as a product of the “superstructure” inhibits any of our friends from realizing the full significance of this dimension and, in one way or another, from including it in their view of the world, it is to their own detriment: an anxious fidelity to the postulates of that world view prevents them from properly understanding the mechanisms of their own political influence, thus paradoxically making them precisely what they, as Marxists, so often suspect others of being—victims of “false consciousness.”) The very special political significance of morality in the post-totalitarian system is a phenomenon that is at the very least unusual in modern political history, a phenomenon that might well have-as I shall soon attempt to show—far-reaching consequences.
<
havel
fake indian and cankle news
>thus paradoxically making them precisely what they, as Marxists, so often suspect others of being—victims of “false consciousness.”) <
sorry for the thread hijack
>IN SOCIETIES under the post-totalitarian system, all political life in the traditional sense has been eliminated. People have no opportunity to express themselves politically in public, let alone to organize politically. The gap that results is filled by ideological ritual. In such a situation, people’s interest in political matters naturally dwindles and independent political thought, insofar as it exists at all, is seen by the majority as unrealistic, farfetched, a kind of self-indulgent game, hopelessly distant from their everyday concerns; something admirable, perhaps, but quite pointless, because it is on the one hand entirely utopian and on the other hand extraordinarily dangerous, in view of the unusual vigor with which any move in that direction is persecuted by the regime.
Yet even in such societies, individuals and groups of people exist who do not abandon politics as a vocation and who, in one way or another, strive to think independently, to express themselves and in some cases even to organize politically, because that is a part of their attempt to live within the truth.
The fact that these people exist and work is in itself immensely important and worthwhile. Even in the worst of times, they maintain the continuity of political thought. If some genuine political impulse emerges from this or that “pre-political” confrontation and is properly articulated early enough, thus increasing its chances of relative success, then this is frequently due to these isolated generals without an army who, because they have maintained the continuity of political thought in the face of enormous difficulties, can at the right moment enrich the new impulse with the fruits of their own political thinking. Once again, there is ample evidence for this process in Czechoslovakia. Almost all those who were political prisoners in the early 1970s, who had apparently been made to suffer in vain because of their quixotic efforts to work politically among an utterly apathetic and demoralized society, belong today-inevitably-among the most active Chartists. In Charter 77, the moral legacy of their earlier sacrifices is valued, and they have enriched this movement with their experience and that element of political thinking.
And yet it seems to me that the thought and activity of those friends who have never given up direct political work and who are always ready to assume direct political responsibility very often suffer from one chronic fault: an insufficient understanding of the historical uniqueness of the post-totalitarian system as a social and political reality. They have little understanding of the specific nature of power that is typical for this system and therefore they overestimate the importance of direct political work in the traditional sense. Moreover, they fail to appreciate the political significance of those “pre-political” events and processes that provide the living humus from which genuine political change usually springs. As political actors—or, rather, as people with political ambitions—they frequently try to pick up where natural political life left off. They maintain models of behavior that may have been appropriate in more normal political circumstances and thus, without really being aware of it, they bring an outmoded way of thinking, old habits, conceptions, categories, and notions to bear on circumstances that are quite new and radically different, without first giving adequate thought to the meaning and substance of such things in the new circumstances, to what politics as such means now, to what sort of thing can have political impact and potential, and in what way- Because such people have been excluded from the structures of power and are no longer able to influence those structures directly (and because they remain faithful to traditional notions of politics established in more or less democratic societies or in classical dictatorships) they frequently, in a sense, lose touch with reality. Why make compromises with reality, they say, when none of our proposals will ever be accepted anyway? Thus they find themselves in a world of genuinely utopian thinking.<
>IN SOCIETIES under the post-totalitarian system, all political life in the traditional sense has been eliminated. People have no opportunity to express themselves politically in public, let alone to organize politically. The gap that results is filled by ideological ritual. In such a situation, people’s interest in political matters naturally dwindles and independent political thought, insofar as it exists at all, is seen by the majority as unrealistic, farfetched, a kind of self-indulgent game, hopelessly distant from their everyday concerns; something admirable, perhaps, but quite pointless, because it is on the one hand entirely utopian and on the other hand extraordinarily dangerous, in view of the unusual vigor with which any move in that direction is persecuted by the regime.
Yet even in such societies, individuals and groups of people exist who do not abandon politics as a vocation and who, in one way or another, strive to think independently, to express themselves and in some cases even to organize politically, because that is a part of their attempt to live within the truth.
The fact that these people exist and work is in itself immensely important and worthwhile. Even in the worst of times, they maintain the continuity of political thought. If some genuine political impulse emerges from this or that “pre-political” confrontation and is properly articulated early enough, thus increasing its chances of relative success, then this is frequently due to these isolated generals without an army who, because they have maintained the continuity of political thought in the face of enormous difficulties, can at the right moment enrich the new impulse with the fruits of their own political thinking. Once again, there is ample evidence for this process in Czechoslovakia. Almost all those who were political prisoners in the early 1970s, who had apparently been made to suffer in vain because of their quixotic efforts to work politically among an utterly apathetic and demoralized society, belong today-inevitably-among the most active Chartists. In Charter 77, the moral legacy of their earlier sacrifices is valued, and they have enriched this movement with their experience and that element of political thinking.
And yet it seems to me that the thought and activity of those friends who have never given up direct political work and who are always ready to assume direct political responsibility very often suffer from one chronic fault: an insufficient understanding of the historical uniqueness of the post-totalitarian system as a social and political reality. They have little understanding of the specific nature of power that is typical for this system and therefore they overestimate the importance of direct political work in the traditional sense. Moreover, they fail to appreciate the political significance of those “pre-political” events and processes that provide the living humus from which genuine political change usually springs. As political actors—or, rather, as people with political ambitions—they frequently try to pick up where natural political life left off. They maintain models of behavior that may have been appropriate in more normal political circumstances and thus, without really being aware of it, they bring an outmoded way of thinking, old habits, conceptions, categories, and notions to bear on circumstances that are quite new and radically different, without first giving adequate thought to the meaning and substance of such things in the new circumstances, to what politics as such means now, to what sort of thing can have political impact and potential, and in what way- Because such people have been excluded from the structures of power and are no longer able to influence those structures directly (and because they remain faithful to traditional notions of politics established in more or less democratic societies or in classical dictatorships) they frequently, in a sense, lose touch with reality. Why make compromises with reality, they say, when none of our proposals will ever be accepted anyway? Thus they find themselves in a world of genuinely utopian thinking.
havel
>IN SOCIETIES under the post-totalitarian system, all political life in the traditional sense has been eliminated. People have no opportunity to express themselves politically in public, let alone to organize politically<
hi irs or the baracky or valgal!
x
I know others complain, but I have come to think of you as the overnight host, broadcasting from the wilderness and keeping the airwaves warm.
Political thought vs. political philosophy: was Leo Strauss a Conservative?
Interested serr8d? While I’d judge the question “was ___ a Conservative?” as ill-formed, the reason for that judgment is readily available and far more worthy the time.
I’ve concluded our leaders are really quite insane.
Item #1: 65% of Children Live in Households on Federal Aid Programs
Item#2: Top Republican leaders in the House and Senate are gearing up to push legislation in the next Congress that would increase the number of foreign guest-workers even in industries that do not need them
Item #3: The U.S. State Department announced this week that the first major contingent of Syrian refugees, 9,000 of them, have been hand-selected by the United Nations for resettlement into communities across the United States
Oh, and has anyone looked at this thing lately? Beyond the point of return.
Thanks, sdferr, I’ll delve into that. Especially the audio files, handy for travelling.
“Was” I used in the time tense, Strauss being passed on. “Conservative” might well remain as a file cabinet, catching all manner of folders and sub-folders, until it’s full and unusable.
Was, is, either tense isn’t a problem — as I think I see you see. The trouble arises with “conservative”. In this sense, I tend to think it’s kind of like the question “is [this bird here] a mollusk or an arthropod?”
Dear Santa,
*
As ever,
-gP
Still, …
You have my wishes for a speedy closure to your condition, and one that doesn’t have any dire longterm implications, Jeff.
I have heard Vitamin D deficiency can be very unpleasant. You may have to invest in a sunlamp, or something like that.
Some say vitamin D supplementation is a waste of money because a deficiency is usually the result and not the cause of some physiological disorders. But I say, if D has health benefits, isn’t it reasonable to address a deficiency while the cause is being treated?
Jeff, I ended up on Vitamin D supplements after pancreatitis in 08. Something changed on how I absorb fat soluble.
Jeff, if you need vitamin D then drink some milk and do some yard work. Something productive like holding a chair down with your butt and helping the world with it’s war, beverage surplus crisis. I dunno burn some sausage on a hibachi while you’re out there. Wave to folks. Loudly curse at any extra planetary bodies that you don’t care for like that creepy good for nothing Cruinthe thing. Wear a propeller beenie hooked up to a tiny wind-mill generator and use it to sloooowwwwllly charge a personal electronics device like a smart phone or electronic-fart-sound-box or possible power a tiny drink stirrer.
it’s should have been its. It’s a Possessive not contraction of an impersonal pronoun and verb.
Dear Santa
Please use your alleged supernatural might to strand our misguided president on a distant plant with lots of modern amenities where he can be comfortable and yet not set us back by decades.
Thanks, man.
palaeomerus
Should have been planet not plant. Unless it is a planet that is also a giant plant.
Is Biden a planet?
>Is Biden a planet?<
nah plugs is like pluto
[newrouter:] sorry for the thread hijack
[McGehee:] I know others complain, but I have come to think of you as the overnight host, broadcasting from the wilderness and keeping the airwaves warm.
He’s our Art Bell, he is.
i apologize for my poor etiquette. i’m the victim of the uss proggtardia. lifeboats? we don’t need no stinking lifeboats. hands up don’t drown!
but, if i may, i want to go back to havel. his critique of his communist “ruining class” has echos with the jebster’s hat toss today. the havel commies said “workers of the world unite”. a stupid statement because
“workers of the world” are individuals. much like “black lives matter”, what if you disagree with the premise and say : America gone crazy: College president forced to apologize for saying “all lives matter”
so at this point i would like to thank our vitamin d deficient host for his
work on showing how language is used to enslave peeps.
the 1970’s of my youth are interesting today because you can see how the statists shift their attention when confronted by a force that aims to destroy them and does. i hope that the “good” prevail but the “evil”seems to shift effortlessly into a 1973 maverick and drive away.
look at ghw bush: the soviet empire falls and his 1st reaction is to keep it together?
I am given to understand that Art Bell was not the only idiosyncratic overnight radio host out there.
Besides, we haven’t had that “Coast to Coast” kind of material here since nishi.
I remember how devoted old 41 was to “stability.” Just the sort of battle cry our latter-day Establicans could warble over fine brandy and expensive cigars.
“nah plugs is like pluto”
I was thinking Baby Huey myself…
Okay, your our Archie Bell, then.
You’re, of course.
Then again.
Oh yes it does.
Dear Santa, take 14.