Beware the Library

I entered through transparent doors, believing if I could only see the proxima and the laptop then all would be fine. First return trip: no power cord for Proxima. Second return trip: Cord from Proxima to Laptop doesn't fit. Third Return trip: New Proxima doesn't read laptop. Final Defeat: Proxima finally reads laptop, but laptop doesn't recognize USB device. All I wanted to show: images of the divine and the sublime. Obviously, my abyss. The gods of the slowly-being-demolished-mall-that-passes-as-a-college are angry and festering in the library. Thank God that a trustworthy paladin works in the library (he commiserated and said, "you know this is a good week for evil")--he also brings my mighty fine beer--Go Double Bastard Ale! When I returned home: no ice, and yes that makes for a warm magaritta or vodka and orange juice.

Tomorrow: Is it just me, or is Iraq the perfect Hobbesian universe?
Also Tomorrow: My friend from Trinidad brings back mighty fine 15 year-old rum, and no I don't feel like a pedophile.

Teachin' Murder

Multicultural Literature
Day one of discussion. The class has been assigned the "Tell-Tale Heart." Realities faced: I teach in a mall; I teach in a mall being demolished; students don't read; at times, students don't even show up with the book. My revenge? I assign Sophocles' Antigone.

American Literature II
This is a team-taught class, and my "teammate" is ArtBoy. ArtBoy doesn't like Rennaissance painting. Too many images of Baby Jesus. He's going to do most of the talking today on the divine in sublime art. I'll talk Tuesday about Rivera's Marisol--New York subways, apocalypse, and gulf clubs. I'll be happy.

Why Mr. Hobbes, That is a Thinkery!

Maybe not a furnace, maybe not people as charcoal, but it appears I am teaching my young wards that angels are about to engage in an all-out war with God (Marisol), dead children come back for visits (Beloved) and that those we kill haunt us (Neon Vernacular). I feel Mr. Hobbes breathing on my neck and whispering,

"If this superstitious fear of Spirits were taken away, and with it, Prognostiques from Dreams, false Prophecies, and many other things depending thereon, by which, crafty ambitions persons abuse the simple people, men would be much more fitted than they are for civill Obedience."

Wait, Mr. Hobbes, wait. I promise these youths will learn how to further the good of the Common-wealth . . . by "taking-out" God, not killing children, and listening to the voices that have a claim on us.

Tomorrow: What Mr. Hobbes Might Say about the WWII analogy as a tactic to fight terrorism throughout the world.

Why More Rhetoric Will Save the Day, Islamic Fascists For 500 Jack, And Why Liberal America May Be Defeated By Losing the War in Iraq

"Bush used the term earlier this month in talking about the arrest of suspected terrorists in Britain, and spoke of "Islamic fascists" in a later speech in Green Bay, Wis. Spokesman Tony Snow has used variations on the phrase at White House press briefings.
Sen. Rick Santorum (news, bio, voting record), R-Pa., in a tough re-election fight, drew parallels on Monday between World War II and the current war against "Islamic fascism," saying they both require fighting a common foe in multiple countries. It's a phrase Santorum has been using for months."
By TOM RAUM, Associated Press Writer

Rumsfeld alluded to critics of the Bush administration's war policies in terms associated with the failure to stop Nazism in the 1930s, "a time when a certain amount of cynicism and moral confusion set in among the Western democracies."
By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer

Yet in the National Strategy for Victory in Iraq, here is the language:

"OUR ENEMIES AND THEIR GOALS
The enemy in Iraq is a combination of rejectionists, Saddamists, and terrorists affiliated with or inspired by Al Qaida. These three groups share a common opposition to the elected Iraqi government and to the presence of Coalition forces, but otherwise have separate and to some extent incompatible goals.
Rejectionists are the largest group. They are largely Sunni Arabs who have not embraced the shift from Saddam Hussein's Iraq to a democratically governed state. Not all Sunni Arabs fall into this category. But those that do are against a new Iraq in which they are no longer the privileged elite. Most of these rejectionists opposed the new constitution, but many in their ranks are recognizing that opting out of the democratic process has hurt their interests.
We judge that over time many in this group will increasingly support a democratic Iraq provided that the federal government protects minority rights and the legitimate interests of all communities.
Saddamists and former regime loyalists harbor dreams of reestablishing a Ba'athist dictatorship and have played a lead role in fomenting wider sentiment against the Iraqi government and the Coalition.
We judge that few from this group can be won over to support a democratic Iraq, but that this group can be marginalized to the point where it can and will be defeated by Iraqi forces.
Terrorists affiliated with or inspired by Al Qaida make up the smallest enemy group but are the most lethal and pose the most immediate threat because (1) they are responsible for the most dramatic atrocities, which kill the most people and function as a recruiting tool for further terrorism and (2) they espouse the extreme goals of Osama Bin Laden -- chaos in Iraq which will allow them to establish a base for toppling Iraq's neighbors and launching attacks outside the region and against the U.S. homeland.
The terrorists have identified Iraq as central to their global aspirations. For that reason, terrorists and extremists from all parts of the Middle East and North Africa have found their way to Iraq and made common cause with indigenous religious extremists and former members of Saddam's regime. This group cannot be won over and must be defeated -- killed or captured -- through sustained counterterrorism operations.
There are other elements that threaten the democratic process in Iraq, including criminals and Shi'a religious extremists, but we judge that such elements can be handled by Iraqi forces alone and/or assimilated into the political process in the short term. "

No, no "fascists" there. But possibly I have it all wrong, possibly quoting Churchill's "a bit like feeding a crocodile, hoping it would eat you last" is a very effecitve, direct tactic to combat this: "Violence across Iraq has spiked in recent days, with more than 200 people killed since Sunday in clashes, bombings or shootings - despite U.S. and Iraqi officials' claims that a new security operation in the capital has lowered Sunni-Shiite killings there, which had risen in June and July."
By REBECCA SANTANA Associated Press Writer

Will We Choose To Win in Iraq?

Ah . . . thoughts about Iraq . . . that is domestic-political thoughts about Iraq. Another aritcle about the war in Iraq, and another article that makes it clear that for those on the right and the left it's not about an actual plan to win the war overseas, it's about winning an ideological war at home. Please tell William Stuntz that defeating the Mahdi army is not about defeating liberal Democrats. Sigh. And eerie. It appears that the will of the American Colossus is enough to "get the job done." Cuts down on thinking.

The Apocalypse is at Hand . . . Please

Half-hour to go before I meet my Multicultural Literature class. For Thursday they are to read Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart" which I'm following with Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find." I want them to understand my personal views on murder. How does this apply to the American Colossus? When this gargantua muses on what's going on inside people's homes or on backwoods roads, I want him to have one word rattling in his brain: murder. By September 19 we will be discussing "A Rose For Emily." Yes . . . .

I foolishly began the morning watching Washington Journal and hearing caller after caller turn Katrina into a battleground for conservatives and liberals. My guess is that both sides have agreed that as long as they are repetitive and shrill then the status quo they so love will remain in place.

Plenty of stress in my back. Why? Because I know my little charges will again demonstrate the bathos of American Education--and yet, somewhere in this lot, may be the next American Colossus. What to do . . . .

Renewal in Iraq . . . Lovely word . . . Re-new-al.

Cool. Just click on the title to this entry and you'll be taken to the site where all will be expalined. I recommend the "National Strategy for Victory in Iraq" link. A Knight of the city told me such a plan existed, and now I've found it. Possibly someone should let Mr. Kirstol know this. Now to get to readin'.

Tuesday: First installment of "Teachin' in the Leviathan." This will be a Tuesday and Thursday journal of my engagin' with young barbarians and makin' them learn to trust the darkness . . .
love the darkness, because anyone of them might grow up to be the American Colossus, and then wont' that be sweet, I mean I'll be set, probably make me Secretary of Defense. Better get workin' on my plan to liberate Crete from it's Attic oppressors. FREEEEEEDOMMMMMM!

Blogging the Bible . . . Yes.

Along with Marc Zvi Brettler's book "How To Read the Bible" this should help me navigate the rapturous world of Hebraic sacrifice that bears some resemblance to the transcendent world of Hellenic sacrifice. Oh yeah!

And Yuh Thought Governing By Divine Right Was A Thin' Of The Past

MIAMI - U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris (news, bio, voting record) told a religious journal that separation of church and state is "a lie" and God and the nation's founding fathers did not intend the country be "a nation of secular laws." The Republican candidate for U.S. Senate also said that if Christians are not elected, politicians will "legislate sin," including abortion and gay marriage.
Harris made the comments — which she clarified Saturday — in the Florida Baptist Witness, the weekly journal of the Florida Baptist State Convention, which interviewed political candidates and asked them about religion and their positions on issues.
Separation of church and state is "a lie we have been told," Harris said in the interview, published Thursday, saying separating religion and politics is "wrong because God is the one who chooses our rulers."
"If you're not electing Christians, then in essence you are going to legislate sin," Harris said.

And here's an excerpt from the full interview in Florida Baptist Witness:
"The Bible says we are to be salt and light. And salt and light means not just in the church and not just as a teacher or as a pastor or a banker or a lawyer, but in government and we have to have elected officials in government and we have to have the faithful in government and over time, that lie we have been told, the separation of church and state, people have internalized, thinking that they needed to avoid politics and that is so wrong because God is the one who chooses our rulers. And if we are the ones not actively involved in electing those godly men and women and if people aren’t involved in helping godly men in getting elected than we’re going to have a nation of secular laws. That’s not what our founding fathers intended and that’s certainly isn’t what God intended."

U.S. Constitution
Article VI
This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding.
Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Thanks to C-Span and the Associated Press

What The American Colossus May Read Upon Waking From Uneasy Dreams

From The Brookings Institution:
"Hubris, the ancient Greeks taught, is followed by Nemesis; overbearing presumption always finds the goddess of divine retribution and vengeance baying at its heels. Washington is learning that painful lesson again today -- and Iraqi civilians and American troops are paying the price for the pride that drove the United States to try to implant democracy on the cheap in the heart of the Arab world."
Daniel L. Byman, Nonresident Senior Fellow, Saban Center for Middle East Policy

From the Heritage Foundation:
"Washington should remember that the British, welcomed as liberators in Baghdad in 1917 after defeating the Ottoman Empire, were the target of the "Great Iraqi Revolution" three years later. That uprising took the British more than four months to quell, at the cost of 450 British dead and 1,250 wounded, and was followed by repeated tribal and nationalist uprisings until 1936. Britain established the trappings of democracy--a constitution, parliament, king, and council of ministers--but British meddling, Iraqi political corruption, and the government's inability to meet basic needs discredited democracy in the eyes of many Iraqis. Iraq's army eventually terminated Iraq's democratic experiment, staging 15 coups between 1936 and 1968, when Saddam Hussein's Baath Party finally seized power."
Democracy, Federalism, and Realism in Postwar Iraq by James A. PhillipsExecutive Memorandum #873

From the Liberty Fund:
"To this very ingenious reasoning, and these refined distinctions between natural and social rights, the people may possibly object, that in delivering themselves passively over to the unrestrained rule of others on the plea of controling their inordinate inclinations and passions, they deliver themselves over to men, who, as men, and partaking of the same nature as themselves, are as liable to be governed by the same principles and errors; and to men who, by the great superiority of their station, having no common interest with themselves which might lead them to preserve a salutary check over their vices, must be inclined to abuse in the grossest manner their trust. To proceed with Mr. Burke’s argument—should the rich and opulent in the nation plead their right to the predominant sway in society, from its being a necessary circumstance to guard their wealth from the gripe of poverty, the men in an inferior state of fortune might argue, that should they give way to this plea in all its extent, their moderate possessions would be exposed to the burden of unequal taxes; for the rich, when possessed of the whole authority of the state, would be sure to take the first care of themselves, if they should not be tempted to secure an exoneration of all burthens, by dividing the spoils of the public; and that the abuse of such high trusts must necessarily arise, because to act by selfish considerations, is in the very constitution of our nature.
To such pleas, so plausibly urged on all sides, I know of no rational objection; nor can I think of any expedient to remove the well grounded apprehensions of the different interests which compose a commonwealth, than a fair and equal representation of the whole people;—a circumstance which appears very peculiarly necessary in a mixed form of government, where the democratic part of the constitution will ever be in danger of being overborne by the energy attending on its higher constituent parts. "
From Catharine Macaulay, Observations on the Reflections of the Right Hon. Edmund Burke, on the Revolution in France (1790).

Emily on Dreams And the First Text For The American Colossus To Read

531

We dream - it is good we are dreaming -
It would hurt us - were we awake -
But since it is playing - kill us,
And we are playing - shriek -

What harm? Men die - externally -
It is a truth - of Blood -
But we - are dying in Drama -
And Drama - is never dead -

Cautious - We jar each other -
And either - open the eyes -
Lest the Phantasm - prove the Mistake -
And the livid Surprise

Cool us to Shafts of Granite -
With just an Age - and Name -
And perhaps a phrase in Egyptian -
It's prudenter - to dream -

Hobbes as Heraclitus Equals Borges And What Does This Mean For The American Colossus?

Well, before the Vodka Gazpacho recipe let's drink some coffee (Sumatra Blue Batak--ah the deliciousness of dirt and flowers) and savor a bit of Hobbes:
"For the continuall change of mans body, destroyes in time the parts which in sense were moved: So that distance of time, and of place, hath one and the same effect in us. For as at a great distance of place, that which wee look at, appears dimme, and without distincution of the smaller parts; and as Voyces grow weak, and inarticulate: so also after great distance of time, our imagination of the Past is weak; and wee lose (for example) of Cities wee have seen, many particular streets; and of Actions, many particular Circumstances. This decyaing sense, when wee would express the thing it self, (I mean fancy it selfe,) wee call Imagination, as I said before: But when we would express the decay, and signifie that the Sense is fading, old, and past, it is called Memory. So that Imagination and Memory, are but one thing, which for divers considerations hath divers names."

And a taste of Heraclitus: "A man in the night kindles a light for himself when his vision is extinguished; living he is in contact with the dead, when asleep, and with the sleeper, when awake."

And in my recipe when you combine Hobbes' imagination with Heraclitus' sleeper, well you arrive at Jorge Luis Borges' "The Circular Ruins." Somebody check my math, it may be the brown sugar notes in the Blue Batrak talking, or . . . in order for The American Colossus to protect the city, he must work on the quality of his dreams.

Footnote: One may contend that Heraclitian dreamin' is found in this bit from Hobbes: "The imagination of them that sleep, are those we call Dreams. And these also (as all other Imaginations) have been before, wither totally, or by parcells in the Sense."

What are you dreams for the city? Mine? That's right. The Furies.

Tomorrow: How My Syllabus for ENGL 2328 (American Literature II) Will Improve the Dreams of the American Colossus.

Was Breifly . . . Ah, yeah.

From the Newshour segment, Failed States, August 21, 2006:

"The danger in a failed state, as Afghanistan was briefly, is it throws up a radical movement that provides a safe haven for terrorism which then directly threatens the United States."
"Ralph Peters is a retired Army lieutenant colonel. His new book, "Never Quit the Fight," assesses U.S. strategic challenges in the Middle East."

From the New York Times, August 23, 2006:

"Interviews with ordinary Afghans and with foreign diplomats and Afghan officials make it clear that the expanding Taliban insurgency in the south represents the most serious challence to his [Karzai] presidency . . . corruption is so widespread, the government apparently so lethargic and the divide between rich and poor so gaping that Mr. Karzai is losing public support . . . ."

The American Colossus asked, "And the question facing this country is: Do we, one, understand the threat to the America? In other words, do we understand that a -- failed states in the Middle East are a direct threat to our county's security?" Indeed, do we, and is there a plan?

Rummy As Caliban

'That's not the way the world really works anymore,' he continued. 'We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.'"(Ron Suskind on an anonymous source, New York Times Magazine, Oct 17 2004)

Yes, suggested reading, Prospero to Ferdinand, that is advice from an old colossus to a neo-prince.

"These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits and
Are melted into air, into thin air;
And--like the baseless fabric of this vision--
The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And like this insubstantial pageant fades,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our litte life
Is rounded with a sleep."

Also, follow this link. Interesting discussion where both panelists are correct though they disagree with each other. Is this too nuanced for the American Colossus?

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east/july-dec06/failed_08-21.html

For Christmas, Give Yur Politician The Iliad, Simone Weil's "The Iliad, or the Poem of Force" . . . and a bottle of Corazon tequila

Simone Weil's analysis of the Iliad entitled "The Iliad, or the Poem of Force," has been read as a pacifist statement, a reading that with the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany on September 9, 1939 Weil rejected, but it is more successful as an analysis of the dangers of using force, and the humility that should reign when one weilds it. "Force is as pitiless to the man who possesses it, or thinks he does, as it is to its victims; the second it crushes, the first it intoxicates." We've seen the results of the Bush administration's hubris in Iraq (this is not an argument against the use of force, it's an argument against a naive, oversimplistic, immature use of force) and the Olmert administration's use of air power in Lebanon. Now it appears there are plans to bomb sites in Iran, as if maybe this time air power alone will save the day. Force, as our technological skill, certainly has become intoxicating to contemporary politicians, while those who are assigned "enemies" are quickly learning that they can oppose that technological force by not responding in kind. What's clear in Weil's reading of force in the Iliad is that no one can possess it exclusively. Writing about Agamemnon, Achilles and the rest of the Greeks Weil posits, "But at the time their own destruction seems impossible to them. For they do not see that the force in their possession is only a limited quantity; nor do they see their relations with other human beings as a kind of balance between unequal amounts of force. Since other people do not impose on their movements that halt, that interval of hesitation, wherein lies all our consideration for our brothers in humanity, they conclude that destiny has given complete license to them, and none at all to their inferiors." On one side religion appears to justify "complete license," on the other side political ideals and technology. What this calls upon the American Colossus to do is to avoid oversimplifications that the "enemy" from Iran to Gaza only gather together to oppose democracy (keep in mind Hamas was elected, keep in mind a democratically-elected goverment was undermined in Lebanon) and instead of obfuscating the situation, sit down and begin to learn what language fits the force that's necessary to solve the problem.

Tuesday: Captain Langston on Rhetoric and a link to a Newshour conversation on Failed States in the Middle East.
Wednesday: Decaying Imagination, Frigglefraggling, and a new Bloody Mary recipe or as my wife says, "maybe your just heading toward alcoholic gazpacho"

Cioran, Bloody Mary, and Swan Lake

Act II and the swans are out. Gorgeous . . . the legs, the . . . Now once you've filled a highball glass with ice, pour in an ounce of vodka (today I'm pouring Tito's, made right here in Texas) and repeat after me, "Love's great (and sole) originality is to make happiness indistinct from misery." Only have to read Sappho's Fragment 33 to know this . . . well and to have done a wee bit of stalkin'. Now, let's backtrack, and look at what you should have already prepared. Pour one cup of organic tomato juice into your blender of choice, also add one tablespoon of lime juice, lemon juice and this Cioran morsel, "He worked and produced, he flung himself into massive generalizations, astonished by his own fecundity. He was quite ignorant, fortunately for him, of the nightmare of nuance." Delicious. Now add a tablespoon of Worcestershire and a tablespoon of Blair's original Death Sauce, and then carefuly add "To see in every baby a future Richard III . . . ." Follow all of this with pinches of paprika, mustard powder, garlic powder, cumin, and coriander; blend it all together, chill it . . . and now return to your glass full of ice and one ounce of vodka . . . and add. Stir and along with a sprig of mint add "Who does not believe in Fate proves he has not lived." Oh yes. Look at those swans. Oh yes, read Frank Rich in the Week in Review section of the Times. Synchronicity between the Times and the Weekly Standard?

Saturday Sweetbreads and Gargantua Rump Roast in a Hobbesian Sauce (Chapters 1 in Leviathan and Gargantua)

Don't have access to wild mushrooms, never mind, and don't worry about the garlic and shallots, just make sure you have a pig butt and that good ol' thymus gland from a cow and let's get to work. After you've boiled that gland, saute it with Hobbes' observation that our perception of objects "is Fancy, the same waking, that dreaming." Yes, don't use all of it though, we'll want to save some for that Salad Borges we'll be working up later this month. Also, make sure to use the small yet powerfully suggestive "I say not this, as disapproving the use of Universities: but because I am to speak hereafter of their office in a Common-wealth." Good advice: next time you are around "insignificant speech" at your local college or university just ask yourself--"What good is this to the Common-wealth?" Keep in mind also my dear readers, that all of these recipes are only to be digested according to their office in the Common-wealth, or as we are calling it, the American Colossus. But what of that rump roast? After you have drowned the rump in a couple of bottles of Chimay, then you need to grate Gargantua's genealogy making sure that you cover the rump with as much detritus as you can. Remember: don't get sqeaumish about dead family members--cheese, wine and so on are the gifts of lovely decay; just think what your dead relatives might afford! Yes indeed, bits of a throat that have soaked in a resolve not to test whether you are awake or not will certainly help you down the bits of rum braised in all those bits of mothers, fathers, uncles, aunts, cousins you never were sure what to do with--until now!

Remember Pantagruelizing is the same waking or dreaming when drunk, hung-over or depressed sitting in front of the television on a Sunday morning with a bloody mary and the comedically banal Wolf Blitzer.

Coming Sunday: Quotes from Cioran and my Bloody Mary recipe.
Monday: What the United States, Great Britain, France and Israel may learn from reading the Iliad.

Politics and Comedy or Why Aristophanes Had it Right

"'You can't send in men telling them: Look what's going on but you don't have the right to defend yourself or to shoot,' the French Defence Minister Michele Alliot-Marie told RTL radio."
From the very government who insisted on forging a peace process, insisted upon doing the right thing for the Lebanese people. Brilliant comedy from the French.

"Hizbollah handed out bundles of cash on Friday to people whose homes were wrecked by Israeli bombing, consolidating the Iranian-backed group's support among Lebanon's Shi'ites and embarrassing the Beirut government. "
So let me understand this. Your crazy uncle firebombs your neighbors, who retaliate by firebombing your house, and then your crazy uncle comes over and says no problem I'll giv e you money to rebuild so we can do this all over again. Outstanding "New" Middle East Comedy.

"Ned Lamont's victory over Joe Lieberman in the Connecticut primary was a triumph for the European wing of the Democratic party. So it's fitting that Lamont is pro-carrot. It was impossible to go to Europe during Bush's first term without getting a lecture about the utility of carrots, the futility of sticks, and the Bush administration's regrettable neglect of the former and unfortunate proclivity for the latter. So Lamont is an appropriate spokesman for what one might call the Bugs Bunny caucus that now dominates the Democratic party."
An embarassing and shameful debacle in Iraq, but it all can be summed up here at home by references to Warner Borthers' cartoons. One of the great comedians of our day, ladies and gentlemen, William Kristol. Not that well-schooled of a comedian however. If Mr. Kristol knew anything about Loony Tunes he might have avoided Bugs Bunny. As scholars of American cartoons know, Mr. Bunny's nemesis is one Elmer J. Fudd who carries a big stick called a gun and is constantly shown to be the most incompetent hunter on the planet. Well, at least that part of the sketch works.

Readin' Little Boxes

Here are two quotes from Rabelais' Gargantua and Hobbes' Leviathan.

"Sileni were in olden times little boxes, such as we see nowadays in apothecaries' shops, painted on the outside with merry frivolous pictures, such as harpies, satyrs, bridled goslings, saddled ducks, flying goats, harnessed stags, and other such paintings imagined at will to set everyone laughing (such was Silenus, master of good old Bacchus); but inside they perserved fine drugs such as balm, amergris, amomum, musk, civet, precious stones, and other valuables"
(Gargantua).

"But to teach us, that for the similitude of the thoughts, and Passions of one man, to the thoughts, and Passions of another, whosoever looketh into himself, and considereth what he doth, when he does think, opine, reason, hope, feare, &c, and upon what grounds; he shall thereby read and know, what are the thoughts, and Passions of all other men, upon the like occasions" (Leviathan).

Mr. Pantagruel looks at his own little boxes, which are the views that Mr. Pantagruel has of himself, and even though of himself, are "merry frivolous pictures," and yet Mr. Pantagruel plans to decipher accurately the "balm" within; so as to know, what are the "merry frivolous pictures" in the American Colossus (a composite of all humanity, and thereby quite a shortcut) and by extension of the above logic, a view of what is balm to the American Colossus.

Something healing resides within the laughter of Mr. Pantagruel--but what is it?
Something healing resides within the laughter of the American Colossus--but what is it?

Captain Langston, Make Em See the Gorgons

When sailors don't read, and you're on the high seas,
what do you tell the miscreants?

"Terrors--terrors to tell, terrors all can see!
Their heavy, rasping breath makes me cringe.
And their eyes ooze a discharge, sickening . . . ."

A book unread demands retribution, retaliation,
demands for the unwashed and unread
to be hunted down and made keenly aware
of their disgrace.

So next time your charge respond with "I didn't read that,"
well dance around them souting "Aieeeeeeeeeeeeee"

It was a difficult Summer II semester, and only finely tuned magarittas
and this little speech helped me.

"But show us the guilty--one like this
who hides his reeking hands,
and up form the outraged dead we rise,
witness bound to avenge their blood
we rise in flames against him to the end!"

Shepherds and Sheep

Ah, Thrasymachus. Ah, Karl Rove.

"Because you suppose shepherds or cowherds consider the good of the sheep or the cows and fatten them and take care of them looking to something other than their master's good and their own; and so you also believe that the rulers in the cities, those who truly rule, think about the ruled differently from the way a man would regard sheep, and that night and day they consider anything else then how they will benefit themselves" (343b).

As a sheep, what good do you provide the American Colossus, what good do you provide to yourself? You see the American Colossus staring out his great window at the great expanse of pastures and woolly flocks and pondering, "What is the best way for them to die--for me and for themselves? Or do I keep them fat and shear them, taking from their hides what I need to warm myself?"

The American Colossus reads further: "And you are so far off about the just and justice, and the unjust and injustice, that you are unaware that justice and the just are really someone else's good, the advantage of the man who is stronger and rules, and a personal harm to the man who obeys and serves" (343c).

The American Colossus now understands its own words even more fully. "Why," it begins, "when I say it's about fightin' them over there and not here . . . why, I'm really talkin' about fightin' the war here by fightin' the war over there. It's so clear now. It's about defeatin' liberals, the true enemy, by lookin' like I'm fightin' Osama what's his name. Thank you sheep, thank you. Because, you see, the soul of the city is my duty, not that of the world, and the soul of the city is best protected by sacrifice, constant sacrifice . . . of the sheep. We must defeat the liberal enemy that wants to put the sheep on cage-free land, feed them organic meat and vegetables, and teach them that they're part of nature and not descendants of angels who came to earth and pleasured themselves with Halle Berry. And the sheep, hell the sheep will smile and lick my hand as I adjust the settings on the jackhammer because they know that sacrifice means there's something to sacrifice for and that idea . . . well it even puts a smile on my face. Not that I'm fighin' all the liberals--hell those Kerrys and Clintons and Libermans they're all right, they defend the killin' too. It's the few crafty sheep, the ones that read this same book but draw a far different message, those are the ones I'm fightin'. Funny thing is, I can't name one. Oh well, doesn't matter, Karl tells me they're there and Karl's always right. Just like them Right Brothers, I like them boys, I'll think I'll just put down this book, look at the casualties for today, and listen to "Bush was Right." Maybe I'll even sing along."

Of course, dear reader, this is Thrasymachus' view in the Republic, and we all know that Socrates carries the day. We all know it is about justice . . . that and a good bowl of Lamb Curry.

Erasmus' Tongue

For this recipe you need the tonuge of a calf (besides the young dyin' overseas they can also be sacrificed for taste), olive oil, red wine vinegar, onions, tomato sauce, parsley, and this sweet little statement by Folly from Erasmus' "The Praise of Folly": "I hardly need mention Minos and Numa, both of whom reigned over their stupid subjects on the strength of fabulous stories. It is trifles like this that stir to action the great beast the people." Let that simmer with the tongue and the young will even more willingly say, "Yeah, vacation in Baghdad!" Interesting note that the Norton Critical edition (edited by Robert Adams) supplies for Minos and Numa: "Minos on Crete and Numa in Italy both claimed they had supernatural guidance and imposed that belief on their people." Important Note for the American Colossus: seek divine inspiration, at least, tell a story of hearing divine voices. Also tell "fabulous stories." For instance, have you heard the one about the mushroom cloud that got away?

Tuesday: Shephards and Sheep Shearin'
Wednesday: Why Captain Languston should use the Furies in his classroom.
Thursday: Back to Hobbes and Rabelais.

Pickin' Sunday Brains

Compact and circular, I recommend Brain Masala / Maghaz--a delightful Pakistani dish to celebrate our ally in the War on Terror and their ingenious method of allowing Mr. Al Qaeda (who we know from Generalissimo Cheney subscribes to the Hartford Advocate and regularly calls into the Washington Journal on C-Span on the "Support Republicans" line) to gather and disseminate crucial terrorist recipes, thereby allowing us to know that they know that we know that they know. Green Chillies, Red Chillies, Garlic and Ginger paste, what' s not to like, especially when you serve it with Simone Weil's very tasty definition of force in the Iliad: "To define force--it is that x that turns anybody who is subjected to it into a thing. Exercised to the limit, it turns man into a thing in the most literal sense: it makes a corpse out of him."

Here's the first use of such force in Book 4 of the Iliad: "Antilochus was the first to kill a Trojan captain, / tough on the front lines, Thalysias' son Echepolus. / Antilochus thrust first, speared the horsehair helmet / right at the ridge, and the bronze spearpoint lodged / in the man's forehead, smashing through his skull / and the dark came whirling down across his eyes-- / he toppled down like a tower in the rough assault."

Note the movement of Echepolus from a son to a forehead split open by a spear to eyes covered by darkness.

The American Colossus has such force at the ready to turn anybody into an x. Many x's in Iraq. Many x's in Afghanistan. What guides the marking of an x on someone's son? We know the terrorists appear to mark anyone, what about the American Colussus? Do you think that as the American Colossus munches on it's Maghaz that it contemplates Acquinas' double effect which permits an action causing serious harm, such as the turning of a son into a corpse, as an effect of attaining a good end. And as the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy goes onto explain, "This reasoning is summarized with the claim that sometimes it is permissible to bring about as a merely foreseen side effect a harmful event that it would be impermissible to bring about intentionally." How does this work with bringing down a dictator and achieving at least what in Thucydides' view would be a civil war (see 3.84.85 in The Peloponnesian War)? How does this work with civilian casulaties? Has the American Colossus puzzled this out as it washes cow brains down with a tasty beverage? What about the prudent councillors to the American Colossus?

Tomorrow--Erasmus' Tongue.

Saturday Sweetbreads

Yum. Thymus gland . . . but from what animal . . . let's choose a lamb. Since it's summer, let's grill em! After boiling, salting, and placing on a fire, you'll want an appropriate sauce to finalize the full flavor. May I suggest the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701, which looks surprisingly like previous resolutions (here's a sample):

"8. Calls for Israel and Lebanon to support a permanent ceasefire and a long-term solution based on the following principles and elements:
Full respect for the Blue Line by both parties;
security arrangements to prevent the resumption of hostilities, including the establishment between the Blue Line and the Litani river of an area free of any armed personnel, assets and weapons other than those of the government of Lebanon and of UNIFIL as authorised in paragraph 11, deployed in this area;
Full implementation of the relevant provisions of the Taif Accords, and of resolutions 1559 (2004) and 1680 (2006), that require the disarmament of all armed groups in Lebanon, so that, pursuant to the Lebanese cabinet decision of July 27, 2006, there will be no weapons or authority in Lebanon other than that of the Lebanese state;
No foreign forces in Lebanon without the consent of its government;
No sales or supply of arms and related materiel to Lebanon except as authorized by its government;
Provision to the United Nations of all remaining maps of land mines in Lebanon in Israel's possession . . . ." (You can read the full text at the BBC link provided on this page.)

So, about two billion dollars worth of damamge to the Lebanonese infrastructure (as esimated by the Public Works Minister to Reuters), and also according to Reuters "at least 1,011 Lebanese, mostly civilians, have been killed in the war. On the 30th day, Israel's death toll has risen to 121 including at least 38 civilians . . . ." and billions in damage to Israel's economy. And so, does the above resolution provide an acceptable text on the right side of the equals sign for the numbers just provided that go on the left side of the equals sign. There's your full sauce for those grilled sweetbreads. Dip them in and chew. As your chewin', let's begin to think about force--what it is, what is it for, and how do you determine when it's worked or not, and then how should that determination affect your decisions?

Soon--the Iliad, Simone Weil, and Garganua goes to war.

Digestin' Rightly

As Captain Langston has pointed out, "remember that its the ability to "digest things rightly" that counts." And in so doing he brings us a delightful life-boat size secton of Corialanus emphasizing the importance of the stomach--the stomach as the the Roman Senators (Check out his quote form the play in the comment section of the previous post). Ah, Corialanus, an interesting Shakespearean/Roman version of Alcibiades--or an Alcibiades brought to heel. Much to chew on! Tomorrow--Saturday Sweetbreads and the initial foray into a consideration of force (with of course a nod toward the UN resolution which just might be the status quo though we have been told no status quo poker playin').

With the "stomach" in mind--who fits the bill in 2006 America? Of course, soon the wet nurse!

Friday's Orwellian Tripe

Now tripe is that wonderfully obtfuscating name given to the stomachs of various animals. For the most part, if you're dining on tripe, you're chewing beef--and that means cow boys and girls. Now our amazing giver of milk (ah yes, the wet nurse) has four stomachs, for Orwellian tripe we will use the third stomach or what is referred to as book tripe or bible tripe or leaf tripe. Bible tripe looks much like a human ear, cabbage, or a jaundiced carnation. Perfect. You may be thinking, "Mr Pantagruel, are you going with a "Bible Tripe & Roma Tomato Consomme." No. Though I am boiling that sucker for days, then sauteeing it with butter, garlic, and onions--also piles of ground mustard and truckloads of sage and oregano (and my secret strash of cumin, coriander and tumeric). We're ready. Now for Orwellian tripe you need to approach your local grocer with the following assumption: "Modern English, especially written English, is full of bad habits which spread by imitation and which can be avoided if one is willing to take the necessary trouble. If one gets rid of these habits one can think more clearly, and to think clearly is a necessary first step toward political regeneration: so that the fight against bad English is not frivolous and is not the exclusive concern of professional writers."

Cheers! It's the bad english of contemporary political discourse that makes this tripe recipe rock! Of course, "bad english" is a bit broad so let's narrow our shopping: dying metaphors, verbal false limbs (one of my favorites), pretentious diction, and meaningless words. Wowzers, look over in that stall! Piles and piles of a recent favorite dying if not zombie-like metaphor. Not as beaten to death as football, but poker has a long glorious history of saying everything and nothing in a very drab way. Here it is on ABC's This Week With George Stephanopooulos: "Because what we want to do here, George, and what the principles in this resolution do, is to establish a basis so that you can't go back to the status quo ante where Hezbollah acted as a state within a state, attacking Israel without the Lebanese Government even knowing." And again at Crawford Middle School (those lucky out-of-school kids): "This is a basis on which a cease-fire will take place, cessation of hostilities will take place so that there can't be a return to the status quo ante, which is extremely important to all the parties, because we don't want to create a situation in which we get out of this, and then you create the conditions in which Hezbollah, a state-within-a-state, goes across the line again, abducts soldiers, and we get another war. " And again on the Newshour (go PBS): "Well, the diplomacy is moving ahead. During the time that I was in the Middle East, I had a lot of very fruitful conversations with both the Lebanese and with the Israelis on what it would take to end this conflict on a basis that would not permit a return to the status quo ante."

Yes shipmates, the dreaded sports analogy. Oh yes! Perfect with tripe! Staus Quo ante? No way! We don't want your stinking status quo ante! As Condi peers over her sunglasses at Olmert and Nasrallah, the tension is unimaginable. Give us the . . . hey, no name yet for the sizzling, new, brilliant, shocking and awing new ante that will forever change the hearts and minds of bitter enemies, but obviously it has much to do with carnage, something like "we bet the destruciton of Lebanon and the loss of civilian lives in Lebanon and Israel," (works for me, because like those good people in Crawford, I don't live in the Middle East) yes carnage, the "Carne Ante"! What a better compliment to a stomach then a serving of the very meat that used to surround the stomach when the animal was still alive. Sounds like Lebanon! Feel the birth pangs! And that's what makes this "Dawn of the Dead" metaphor work so well--weak image and virtually no clarity on meaning. Throw that in with bible tripe and we're ready for some chewin'!

So thank you Condi Rice for an example of what Orwell defines "as a huge dump of worn-out metaphors which have lost all evocative power and are merely used because they save people the trouble of inventing phrases for themselves. " It's perfect to today's Orwellian tripe recipe.

Thank You First Mate Starbuck For Succinctly Harpooning Hobbes on . . . (Trumpets Blaring) Our American Colossus

"The thing I see in that first paragraph is that god’s art is insufficiently provident, that man is of insufficient strength and stature, that he needs defense, and defense of his own devising."

So as I read your words First Mate Starbuck (mind the octupus, that's our breakfast and I'm not done "pulpifying" it (found that word in a Harper's article on torture at KMart)) as a calling out from Ouranos (holding tightly onto that nasty wound his son gave him) that the "artificial" protect the "natural," though the "natural" is also artful (complicated, isn't it?). The Leviathan to protect the "natural" man. A ha! And we can see from Gargantua's example that this mighty colossus needs plenty of milk--needs an adequate wet nurse. Which brings us back, all the way back to Plato.

"When we came to this point in the argument and it was evident to everyone that the argument about the just had turned in the opposite direction, Thrasymachus, instead of answering, said, 'Tell me, Socrates, do you have a wet nurse?'"

And, pray tell, what service would a wet nurse provide to an old man?

"'Because,' he (Thrasymachus) said, 'you know she neglects your snivelling nose and doesn't give it the wiping you need, since it's her fault you do not even recognize sheep or shepherd.'" (343a Republic)

There we have it. What function do we need a wet nurse to provide to the American Colossus? Teaching him how to tell the sheep from the shepherd.

Let me get my shears, and we'll start.

Thank You Captain Langston (Renowned Harpooner of Gavelston Bay) For Your Colossus

"Certain things about the new President are not clear. I can't make out what he is thinking. When he has finished speaking I can never remember what he has said. There remains only the impression of strangeness, darkness . . . On the television, his face clouds when his name is mentioned. It is as if hearing his name frightens him. Then he stares directly in to the camera (an actor's preempting gaze) and begins to speak. One hears only cadences. Newspaper accounts of his speeches always say only that he touched on a number of matters in the realm of . . . "

How prescient on Barthelme's part. His short story "The President" appears in his 1968 collection "Unspeakable Practices, Unnatural Acts." Nixon/Bush? Onward to serious work on the American Colossus.

Milk or Formaldehyde . . . it's going to take a village . . . preferably not bombed or harboring terrorists . . . please.

"For by art is created that great LEVIATHAN called a COMMONWEALTH, or STATE (in Latin, CIVITAS), which is but an artificial man, though of greater stature and strength than the natural, for whose protection and defence it was intended . . . ." (Hobbes, Leviathan)

"And there were assigned for him seventeen thousand nine hundred and thirteen cows from Pontille and Brehemont to give him his ordinary milk. For it was impossible to find an adequate wet nurse in the whole countryside, considering the great quantity of milk required to feed him . . . ." (Rabelais, The Very Horrific Life of the Great Gargantua, Father of Pantagruel)

"No one can remember when he was not here in our city positioned like a sleeper in troubled sleep, the whole great expanse of him running form the Avenue Pommard to the Boulvard Grist. Overall length, 3,200 cubits." (Barthelme, The Dead Father)

So the huge, hungry, dead expanse of the state/father needs an adequate wet nurse and proper mortician. Where in the state, where in the city may this person or persons be found? Oedipus, Bat Man where are you?

Hizballah Tripe

“We have no alternative but to confront aggression by sacrifice.”

So runs an official Hizballah statement from 1985. Ah, what glorious tripe! Sacrifice meaning they “sacrifice” their lives or the lives of others? “Sacrifice” not as aggression, but as . . . ? This is the great success of tripe, one is no longer sure what a word means. Coming soon . . . Orwellian recipes for tripe!

Helpful Advice from a Prudent Counsellor

"A man that doth his business by the help of many prudent counsellors, with every one consulting apart in his proper element, does it best; as he that useth able seconds at tennis play, placed in their proper stations. "

Thank to PrudentStarbuck for this tasty morsel. No sausage casing here. This rolls around in my mouth like butter.

Haggis and Sports Analogies

Here's a small bowl of sheep's stomach from Slate, not because of Slate's serving of liver and spleen, but all because of Mr. Lieberman's outstanding use of a sports analogy, or by its other name--pig testicles.

"With 48 percent of the vote to Lamont's 52 percent, Lieberman conceded last night and, as he earlier promised, said he'll now run as an independent. "We just finished the finished the first half, the Lamont team is ahead,'' Lieberman said. "But in the second half, our team—Team Connecticut—is going to surge forward to victory."

Yes, Mr. Lieberman's obvious parody of stale-offal political thinking exemplifies why as an independent he'll be able to pull like-minded entrail lovers from both parties.

First Course of Tripe Stew

"The tripes were copious, as you understand, and so delicious that everyone was licking his fingers for them." Ah, tripe. Nothing like intestines stuffed with offal. Certainly what allowed Gargantua to be born such a healthy boy was his mother's outsized appetitie for tripe. But you may say to yourself, "Hey LeviathanBoy, where can I find meself some tripe so I can grow big and strong like Gargantua? Who will be a mother to me and serve tripe?"

Who's the perfect mother? I nominate William Kristol.

For instance, here is a lovely piece of tripe from the tripe-master himself, William Kristol of the Weekly Standard: "What drives so many Democrats crazy about Lieberman is not simply his support for the Iraq war. It's that he's unashamedly pro-American." Now only a small amount of rhetorical analysis reveals that Chef Kristol is offering on today's menu the classic, small intestine implicit linking of anti-war and anti-American. Of course, another juicy tidbit in this recipe from the lower regions is the assumption that Democrats are ashamed of America. And what makes this an award-winning combination of waste products served with a parsley garnish is that these two sentences (which really should be one) appear in an article belittling Rummy for not having a winning hand, scolds Bush mildly for not knowing what a winning hand is but still praising that according to all x-rays his heart is in the right place, and attacks Democrats (read Anti-Americans) for not having a plan. Oh that William Kristol! Of course, nowhere does he reveal his military genius, but that's exactly his point. He's not about rational support for unexamined biases, this man is after a steaming plate of dark stuff. Mr. William Kristol, one of the great parodists of our time, and a fine maker of tripe.

Mr. Pantagruel

Civitas

"For by art is created that great LEVIATHAN called a COMMONWEALTH, or STATE (in Latin, CIVITAS), which is but an artificial man, though of greater stature and strength than the natural, for whose protection and defence it was intended; and in which the sovereignty is an artificial soul, as giving life and motion to the whole body; the magistrates and other officers of judicature and execution, artificial joints; reward and punishment (by which fastened to the seat of the sovereignty, every joint and member is moved to perform his duty) are the nerves, that do the same in the body natural; the wealth and riches of all the particular members are the strength; salus populi (the people's safety) its business; counsellors, by whom all things needful for it to know are suggested unto it, are the memory; equity and laws, an artificial reason and will; concord, health; sedition, sickness; and civil war, death."

Yes, indeed Mr. Hobbes, this seems a mighty pondering. As lines maybe even pages surface from this whale of a book, other pages (possibly dolphins, possibly sharks) will appear as well. Why? Well in a land of many Ahabs and far too few Ishmaels, it might at least while away the time to take a gander at Hobbes, Thucydides, Plato, Weil, Orwell and Sweet Dionysus who knows who else to probably only darken the picture as to what passes for a sane world around us. The more specific question being--can liberals and conservatives if they read the same books very carefully arrive at a useful and useless definition of force that might shed some light and darkness on current muddlin's goin' on.

Harpoon #1: The state as a standing, possibly reclining, possibly too corpse-like human being. A Gargantua? The state as a lover of tripe? Yes. And where might one find all the tripe this state, ah America, needs? Political discourse. Let's set the table.