Op-Ed Contributor (New York Times)
Pirates of the Mediterranean
By ROBERT HARRIS
Published: September 30, 2006
Kintbury, England
IN the autumn of 68 B.C. the world’s only military superpower was dealt a profound psychological blow by a daring terrorist attack on its very heart. Rome’s port at Ostia was set on fire, the consular war fleet destroyed, and two prominent senators, together with their bodyguards and staff, kidnapped.
The incident, dramatic though it was, has not attracted much attention from modern historians. But history is mutable. An event that was merely a footnote five years ago has now, in our post-9/11 world, assumed a fresh and ominous significance. For in the panicky aftermath of the attack, the Roman people made decisions that set them on the path to the destruction of their Constitution, their democracy and their liberty. One cannot help wondering if history is repeating itself.
Consider the parallels. The perpetrators of this spectacular assault were not in the pay of any foreign power: no nation would have dared to attack Rome so provocatively. They were, rather, the disaffected of the earth: “The ruined men of all nations,” in the words of the great 19th-century German historian Theodor Mommsen, “a piratical state with a peculiar esprit de corps.”
Like Al Qaeda, these pirates were loosely organized, but able to spread a disproportionate amount of fear among citizens who had believed themselves immune from attack. To quote Mommsen again: “The Latin husbandman, the traveler on the Appian highway, the genteel bathing visitor at the terrestrial paradise of Baiae were no longer secure of their property or their life for a single moment.”
What was to be done? Over the preceding centuries, the Constitution of ancient Rome had developed an intricate series of checks and balances intended to prevent the concentration of power in the hands of a single individual. The consulship, elected annually, was jointly held by two men. Military commands were of limited duration and subject to regular renewal. Ordinary citizens were accustomed to a remarkable degree of liberty: the cry of “Civis Romanus sum” — “I am a Roman citizen” — was a guarantee of safety throughout the world.
But such was the panic that ensued after Ostia that the people were willing to compromise these rights. The greatest soldier in Rome, the 38-year-old Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (better known to posterity as Pompey the Great) arranged for a lieutenant of his, the tribune Aulus Gabinius, to rise in the Roman Forum and propose an astonishing new law.
“Pompey was to be given not only the supreme naval command but what amounted in fact to an absolute authority and uncontrolled power over everyone,” the Greek historian Plutarch wrote. “There were not many places in the Roman world that were not included within these limits.”
Pompey eventually received almost the entire contents of the Roman Treasury — 144 million sesterces — to pay for his “war on terror,” which included building a fleet of 500 ships and raising an army of 120,000 infantry and 5,000 cavalry. Such an accumulation of power was unprecedented, and there was literally a riot in the Senate when the bill was debated.
Nevertheless, at a tumultuous mass meeting in the center of Rome, Pompey’s opponents were cowed into submission, the Lex Gabinia passed (illegally), and he was given his power. In the end, once he put to sea, it took less than three months to sweep the pirates from the entire Mediterranean. Even allowing for Pompey’s genius as a military strategist, the suspicion arises that if the pirates could be defeated so swiftly, they could hardly have been such a grievous threat in the first place.
But it was too late to raise such questions. By the oldest trick in the political book — the whipping up of a panic, in which any dissenting voice could be dismissed as “soft” or even “traitorous” — powers had been ceded by the people that would never be returned. Pompey stayed in the Middle East for six years, establishing puppet regimes throughout the region, and turning himself into the richest man in the empire.
Those of us who are not Americans can only look on in wonder at the similar ease with which the ancient rights and liberties of the individual are being surrendered in the United States in the wake of 9/11. The vote by the Senate on Thursday to suspend the right of habeas corpus for terrorism detainees, denying them their right to challenge their detention in court; the careful wording about torture, which forbids only the inducement of “serious” physical and mental suffering to obtain information; the admissibility of evidence obtained in the United States without a search warrant; the licensing of the president to declare a legal resident of the United States an enemy combatant — all this represents an historic shift in the balance of power between the citizen and the executive.
An intelligent, skeptical American would no doubt scoff at the thought that what has happened since 9/11 could presage the destruction of a centuries-old constitution; but then, I suppose, an intelligent, skeptical Roman in 68 B.C. might well have done the same.
In truth, however, the Lex Gabinia was the beginning of the end of the Roman republic. It set a precedent. Less than a decade later, Julius Caesar — the only man, according to Plutarch, who spoke out in favor of Pompey’s special command during the Senate debate — was awarded similar, extended military sovereignty in Gaul. Previously, the state, through the Senate, largely had direction of its armed forces; now the armed forces began to assume direction of the state.
It also brought a flood of money into an electoral system that had been designed for a simpler, non-imperial era. Caesar, like Pompey, with all the resources of Gaul at his disposal, became immensely wealthy, and used his treasure to fund his own political faction. Henceforth, the result of elections was determined largely by which candidate had the most money to bribe the electorate. In 49 B.C., the system collapsed completely, Caesar crossed the Rubicon — and the rest, as they say, is ancient history.
It may be that the Roman republic was doomed in any case. But the disproportionate reaction to the raid on Ostia unquestionably hastened the process, weakening the restraints on military adventurism and corrupting the political process. It was to be more than 1,800 years before anything remotely comparable to Rome’s democracy — imperfect though it was — rose again.
The Lex Gabinia was a classic illustration of the law of unintended consequences: it fatally subverted the institution it was supposed to protect. Let us hope that vote in the United States Senate does not have the same result.
Saturday, September 30, 2006
But Has The American Colossus Learned How to Interpret?
If the American Colossus makes an interpretive claim that may not be challanged, then are we sure the American Colossus has the knowledge and wisdom to interpret for the rest of us? How Hobbesian is this administration becoming?
A fine paragraph by Glenn Greenwald:
"There is a profound and fundamental difference between an Executive engaging in shadowy acts of lawlessness and abuses of power on the one hand, and, on the other, having the American people, through their Congress, endorse, embrace and legalize that behavior out in the open, with barely a peep of real protest. Our laws reflect our values and beliefs. And our laws are about to explicitly codify one of the most dangerous and defining powers of tyranny -- one of the very powers this country was founded in order to prevent."
http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/09/legalization-of-torture-an_115945829460324274.html
And as the NYT states today in their news analysis: "Rather than reining in the formidable presidential powers Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have asserted since Sept. 11, 2001, the law gives some of those powers a solid statutory foundation. In effect it allows the president to identify enemies, imprison them indefinitely and interrogate them — albeit with a ban on the harshest treatment — beyond the reach of the full court reviews traditionally afforded criminal defendants and ordinary prisoners."
It does appear that John Yoo and others are bringing American back to a Hobbesian definition of the soveriegn: "The law is all the right reason we have, and (though he, as often as it disagreeth with his own reason, edny it) is the infallible rule of moral goodness. The reason whereof is this, that because neither mine nor the Bishop's reason is right reason fit to be a rule of our moral actions, we have therefore set up over ourselves a sovereign governor, and agreed his alwas shall be unto us, whatsoever they be, in the place of right reason, to dictate to us what is really good" (Hobbes debate with Dr. Bramhall, Bishop of Derry as qtd. in The Philosophy of Hoobes by W.G. Pogson Smith.)
In place of an objective right, we have the sovereign's right. And in Chapter XXVI of Part II of Leviathan, Hobbes writes:m "The Legislator known; and the Lawes, either by writing, or by the light of nature, sufficiently published; there wanteth yet another very materiall circumstance to make them obligatory. For it is not the Letter, but the Intendment, or Meaning; that is to say, the authentique Interpretation of the Law ( which is the sense of the Legislator,) in which the nature of the Law consisteth; And therefore the Interpretation of all Lawes dependeth on the Authority Soveraign . . . ."
Yet, for The American Colossus, another document curbs his "Authority Soveraign."
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.table.html
Especially Seciton 2 of Article III. It's time now for the Supreme Court to have a talk with the American Colossus about his tripe recipes.
A fine paragraph by Glenn Greenwald:
"There is a profound and fundamental difference between an Executive engaging in shadowy acts of lawlessness and abuses of power on the one hand, and, on the other, having the American people, through their Congress, endorse, embrace and legalize that behavior out in the open, with barely a peep of real protest. Our laws reflect our values and beliefs. And our laws are about to explicitly codify one of the most dangerous and defining powers of tyranny -- one of the very powers this country was founded in order to prevent."
http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/09/legalization-of-torture-an_115945829460324274.html
And as the NYT states today in their news analysis: "Rather than reining in the formidable presidential powers Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have asserted since Sept. 11, 2001, the law gives some of those powers a solid statutory foundation. In effect it allows the president to identify enemies, imprison them indefinitely and interrogate them — albeit with a ban on the harshest treatment — beyond the reach of the full court reviews traditionally afforded criminal defendants and ordinary prisoners."
It does appear that John Yoo and others are bringing American back to a Hobbesian definition of the soveriegn: "The law is all the right reason we have, and (though he, as often as it disagreeth with his own reason, edny it) is the infallible rule of moral goodness. The reason whereof is this, that because neither mine nor the Bishop's reason is right reason fit to be a rule of our moral actions, we have therefore set up over ourselves a sovereign governor, and agreed his alwas shall be unto us, whatsoever they be, in the place of right reason, to dictate to us what is really good" (Hobbes debate with Dr. Bramhall, Bishop of Derry as qtd. in The Philosophy of Hoobes by W.G. Pogson Smith.)
In place of an objective right, we have the sovereign's right. And in Chapter XXVI of Part II of Leviathan, Hobbes writes:m "The Legislator known; and the Lawes, either by writing, or by the light of nature, sufficiently published; there wanteth yet another very materiall circumstance to make them obligatory. For it is not the Letter, but the Intendment, or Meaning; that is to say, the authentique Interpretation of the Law ( which is the sense of the Legislator,) in which the nature of the Law consisteth; And therefore the Interpretation of all Lawes dependeth on the Authority Soveraign . . . ."
Yet, for The American Colossus, another document curbs his "Authority Soveraign."
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.table.html
Especially Seciton 2 of Article III. It's time now for the Supreme Court to have a talk with the American Colossus about his tripe recipes.
Friday, September 29, 2006
Ah, the Humorous Mr. Kristol!
In response to Bob Woodward's well-timed sea-change on the Bush administration, the King of Comedy Mr Kristol finds more reasons to blame . . . of course, the Democrats. The Democrats have failed plans, whereas Bush is lauded because . . ."Bush, on other hand, understands that the only acceptable exit strategy is victory. (If, as Woodward reports, he's been bolstered in that view by Henry Kissinger, then good for Henry. Invite him to the Oval Office more often!) ."
If only Mr. Kristol had at his fingers the plan for victory that Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld have crafted. If only a plan for the inadequate troop level in the Anbar province existed, if only a plan to correct corruption within Iraq and Afghanistan existed, if only a "real" conversation between this administration and the military existed. Good laughs Mr. Kristol, good laughs.
If only Mr. Kristol had at his fingers the plan for victory that Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld have crafted. If only a plan for the inadequate troop level in the Anbar province existed, if only a plan to correct corruption within Iraq and Afghanistan existed, if only a "real" conversation between this administration and the military existed. Good laughs Mr. Kristol, good laughs.
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Laughing with Hobbes
"Ignorance of the causes, and originall constitution of Right, Equity, Law, and Justice, disposeth a man to make Custome and Example the rule of his actions; in such manner as to think that Unjust which it hath been the custome to punish; and that Just, of the impunity and approbation whereof they can produce an Example, or (as the Lawyers which onely use this false measure of Justice barbarously call it) a Precedent; like little children, that have no other rule of good and evill manners, but the correction they receive from their Parents, and Masters; save that children are constant to their rule, whereas men are not so; because grown strong, and stubborn, they appeale from custome to reason, and from reason to custome, as it serves their turn; receding from custome when their interest requires it, and setting themselves against reason, as oft as reason is against them: Which is the cause, that the doctrine of Right and Wrong, is perpetually disputed, both by the Pen and the Sword: Whereas the doctrine of Lines and Figures, is not so; because men care not, in that subject what be truth, as a thing that crosses no mans ambition, profit or lust. For I doubt not, but if it had been a thing contrary to any mans right of dominion, or to the interest of men that have dominion, That the three Angles of a Triangle, should be equall to two Angles of a Square; that doctrine should have been, if not disputed, yet by the burning of all books of Geometry, suppressed, as farre as he whom it concerned was able."
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
With the Rest of the World Going Mad (read Tom Friedman's op-ed in the NYT today) How About Some Cironian Madness
"I would like to go mad on one condition, namely, that I would become a happy madman, lively and always in a good mood, without any troubles and obsessions, laughing senselessly from morning to night. Although I long for luminous ecstacies, I wouldn't ask for any, because I know they are followed by great depressions. I would like a shower of warm light to fall from me, transfiguring the entire world, an unecstatic burnst of light perserving the calm of luminous eternity. Far from the concentrations of ecstacy, it would be all graceful lightness and smiling warmth. The entire world should float in this dream of light, in this tgransparent and unreal state of delight. Obstacles and matter, form and limits would cease to exist. Then let me die of light in such a landscape." E.M. Cioran, "On The Heights of Despair."
Light for Cioran? "The premonition of madness is complicated by the dread of lucidity in madness, the dread of the moments of return and reunion, when the intuition of disaster is so painful that it almost provokes a greater madness." Let's hope that some in this current madness have the ability to be lucid, light-filled, happy--turning dread into delight.
Light for Cioran? "The premonition of madness is complicated by the dread of lucidity in madness, the dread of the moments of return and reunion, when the intuition of disaster is so painful that it almost provokes a greater madness." Let's hope that some in this current madness have the ability to be lucid, light-filled, happy--turning dread into delight.
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
Worthwhile Comments on the NIE Report
If you like what you read, click on the title and go to http://blogs.chron.com/bluebayou/
" . . . President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney also have highlighted the war in Iraq as the United States' main thrust in the fight against terrorism, contending that the world is safer without Saddam Hussein in power.
Also, Sunday's newspaper articles on the National Intelligence Estimate -- by the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times -- were "not representative of the complete document," the White House said. That assessment was echoed by National Intelligence Director John D. Negroponte, whose office prepared the report.
In a statement e-mailed to reporters Sunday afternoon, Negroponte said "the conclusions of the intelligence community are designed to be comprehensive, and viewing them through the narrow prism of a fraction of judgments distorts the broad framework they create."
"The Estimate highlights the importance of the outcome in Iraq on the future of global jihadism," he said. If Iraq develops "a stable political and security environment, the jihadists will be perceived to have failed, and fewer jihadists will leave Iraq determined to carry on the fight elsewhere."
Negroponte is probably right about the importance of resolving the situation in Iraq, but again, this is a rather evasive response; it's perfectly reasonable for a report to observe that the war has increased the level of danger, but needs to be won. In other words: we've created a bad situation, but we've got to get out of it.
As for whether this part of the document is "representative," I find myself wondering whether any single part of a document that summarizes a wide range of information is going to be "representative." A more interesting question is whether that part of it is accurate and that's the question that the White House is dodging.
It's important to remember that documents like this are not policy documents; they are information to help those who create policy make good decisions. It would be perfectly legitimate for this or any administration to review this kind of data and conclude that while an action might actually endanger us, there are other policy goals that make it, on balance, worthwhile.
The situation is a bit analogous to scientific data that's presented to Congress and the White House. A scientific study will tell you that a certain chemical poses a health risk, or that current levels of carbon emissions are contributing to global warming. The job of policy makers is to weight that evidence against other concerns and decide how to act.
The response to both kinds of information by the Bush administration is revealing. Rather than make an honest determinations ("We understand this risk, but it is outweighed by the following...") this administration generally simply denies that the information is real.
When the administration reacts to these things by ignoring information, rather than putting it in context and explaining how other issues outweigh it, we should be very suspicious. The entire history of the Iraq war has been characterized by this sort of thing, from the ever-shifting rationales that were revealed as wrong one after the other, to the completely unrealistic predictions of the effort (in terms of time, money, and soldiers' lives) required, and now to the impact of our actions.
Dishonesty or incompetence? It's hard to say. As long as the administration chooses to operate in an alternate reality rather than deal with the one its own advisors are presenting to it, we're unlikely to know. "
Posted by John Whiteside at September 26, 2006 11:05 AM on Blue Bayou
" . . . President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney also have highlighted the war in Iraq as the United States' main thrust in the fight against terrorism, contending that the world is safer without Saddam Hussein in power.
Also, Sunday's newspaper articles on the National Intelligence Estimate -- by the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times -- were "not representative of the complete document," the White House said. That assessment was echoed by National Intelligence Director John D. Negroponte, whose office prepared the report.
In a statement e-mailed to reporters Sunday afternoon, Negroponte said "the conclusions of the intelligence community are designed to be comprehensive, and viewing them through the narrow prism of a fraction of judgments distorts the broad framework they create."
"The Estimate highlights the importance of the outcome in Iraq on the future of global jihadism," he said. If Iraq develops "a stable political and security environment, the jihadists will be perceived to have failed, and fewer jihadists will leave Iraq determined to carry on the fight elsewhere."
Negroponte is probably right about the importance of resolving the situation in Iraq, but again, this is a rather evasive response; it's perfectly reasonable for a report to observe that the war has increased the level of danger, but needs to be won. In other words: we've created a bad situation, but we've got to get out of it.
As for whether this part of the document is "representative," I find myself wondering whether any single part of a document that summarizes a wide range of information is going to be "representative." A more interesting question is whether that part of it is accurate and that's the question that the White House is dodging.
It's important to remember that documents like this are not policy documents; they are information to help those who create policy make good decisions. It would be perfectly legitimate for this or any administration to review this kind of data and conclude that while an action might actually endanger us, there are other policy goals that make it, on balance, worthwhile.
The situation is a bit analogous to scientific data that's presented to Congress and the White House. A scientific study will tell you that a certain chemical poses a health risk, or that current levels of carbon emissions are contributing to global warming. The job of policy makers is to weight that evidence against other concerns and decide how to act.
The response to both kinds of information by the Bush administration is revealing. Rather than make an honest determinations ("We understand this risk, but it is outweighed by the following...") this administration generally simply denies that the information is real.
When the administration reacts to these things by ignoring information, rather than putting it in context and explaining how other issues outweigh it, we should be very suspicious. The entire history of the Iraq war has been characterized by this sort of thing, from the ever-shifting rationales that were revealed as wrong one after the other, to the completely unrealistic predictions of the effort (in terms of time, money, and soldiers' lives) required, and now to the impact of our actions.
Dishonesty or incompetence? It's hard to say. As long as the administration chooses to operate in an alternate reality rather than deal with the one its own advisors are presenting to it, we're unlikely to know. "
Posted by John Whiteside at September 26, 2006 11:05 AM on Blue Bayou
Sunday, September 24, 2006
Click This, Read, And Send the American Colossus A Copy of Politics and the English Language
Noteworthy compilation of Orwell, Bush, Cheney, Chirac and others. Thank Captian Langston.
Captain Langston Illuminates Inwards
Captain Langston: "As Foucault famously shows, time and again, power is a medium, a relationship."
And for Machiavelli and Hobbes, "desire" is the key.
Machiavelli: "It is a thing truly very natural and ordinary to desire to aquire; and when men who are able to do so do it, they are always praised or not blamed; but when they are not able and yet want to do so in every mode, here is the error and the blame" (Prince, Mixed Principates).
Hobbes: "Nor can a man anymore live, whoe Desires are at an end, than he, whose Senses and Imaginations are at a stand. Felicity is a continuall progresse of the desire, from one object to another; the attaining of the former, being still but the way to the later."
Hobbes also establishes knowledge (that which we have when we "pretend to Reasoning") is of consequences--such as, "Science, that is Knowledge of Consequences; which is called also Philosophy" or "Consequences from the Accidents of Politique Bodies which is called Politiques and Civill Philosophy: 1. Of Consequences from the Institution of Common-Wealths, to the Rights and Duties of the Body Politique, or Soveraign. 2. Of Consequences from the same, to the Duty, and Right of the Subjects."
This is what worries us all about the Bush Administration's use of power, which appears to only be able to repeat a status quo without being able to study and learn from the consequences of misapplied force and a population that is not homogeneous. Again Chapter III from the Prince:
"For the Romans, in these cases, did all that wise princes ought to do, which is, to have regard not only for present disorders, but also for future ones, and with all industry to anticipate and provide for them; because, when one forsees them from afar, once can easily remedy them; but if you wait until they are near the medicine is not in time, for the malady has become incurable."
Also, "In this mode you have as enemies all those whom you have hurt in seizing that principate; and you are not able to maintain as friends those who have placed you there, being unable to satisfy them in the mode that they had expected and by your not being able to use strong medicines against them, being obligated to them, for even if one has the most powerful of armies, one always has need of the favor of the inhabitants of a province to enter it." Saddam Hussein's Iraq appears to meet the definition of a mixed principate. But, of course, others might better advise me on this.
And for Machiavelli and Hobbes, "desire" is the key.
Machiavelli: "It is a thing truly very natural and ordinary to desire to aquire; and when men who are able to do so do it, they are always praised or not blamed; but when they are not able and yet want to do so in every mode, here is the error and the blame" (Prince, Mixed Principates).
Hobbes: "Nor can a man anymore live, whoe Desires are at an end, than he, whose Senses and Imaginations are at a stand. Felicity is a continuall progresse of the desire, from one object to another; the attaining of the former, being still but the way to the later."
Hobbes also establishes knowledge (that which we have when we "pretend to Reasoning") is of consequences--such as, "Science, that is Knowledge of Consequences; which is called also Philosophy" or "Consequences from the Accidents of Politique Bodies which is called Politiques and Civill Philosophy: 1. Of Consequences from the Institution of Common-Wealths, to the Rights and Duties of the Body Politique, or Soveraign. 2. Of Consequences from the same, to the Duty, and Right of the Subjects."
This is what worries us all about the Bush Administration's use of power, which appears to only be able to repeat a status quo without being able to study and learn from the consequences of misapplied force and a population that is not homogeneous. Again Chapter III from the Prince:
"For the Romans, in these cases, did all that wise princes ought to do, which is, to have regard not only for present disorders, but also for future ones, and with all industry to anticipate and provide for them; because, when one forsees them from afar, once can easily remedy them; but if you wait until they are near the medicine is not in time, for the malady has become incurable."
Also, "In this mode you have as enemies all those whom you have hurt in seizing that principate; and you are not able to maintain as friends those who have placed you there, being unable to satisfy them in the mode that they had expected and by your not being able to use strong medicines against them, being obligated to them, for even if one has the most powerful of armies, one always has need of the favor of the inhabitants of a province to enter it." Saddam Hussein's Iraq appears to meet the definition of a mixed principate. But, of course, others might better advise me on this.
Saturday, September 23, 2006
Lively Debate Between Helprin, Hitchens and Kristol
Certainly one of the best forums I've seen recently. Check C-Span to see if it replays.
Saturday Morning Serving of Hobbesian Power or Gargantuan Power is a Thirsty One
"The Greatest of humane Powers, is that which is compounded fof the Powers of most men, united by consent, in one person, Naturall, or Civill, that has the use of all their Powers depending on his will; such as is the Power of a Common-wealth: Or depending on the wills of each particular; such as i the Power of a Faciton, or of divers factions leagued. Therefore to have servants is Power; To have friends, is Power: for they are strengths united."
"The palaver of the potted.
Then in the same place they started talking about dessert. Then flagons got going, hams trotting, goblets flying, glasses clinking . . . You wine stewards, creators of new forms, from not drinking make me drinking" and "Great God made the planets [planettes] and we make the plates clean [platz netz]."
Therefore to have wine stewards is Power; to have stewed friends is Power.
"The palaver of the potted.
Then in the same place they started talking about dessert. Then flagons got going, hams trotting, goblets flying, glasses clinking . . . You wine stewards, creators of new forms, from not drinking make me drinking" and "Great God made the planets [planettes] and we make the plates clean [platz netz]."
Therefore to have wine stewards is Power; to have stewed friends is Power.
Thursday, September 21, 2006
Captain Langston Sees the Gorgons and Raises Them an Alice
"The executioner's argument was, that you couldn't cut off a head unless there was a body to cut it off from: that he had never had to do such a thing before, and he wasn't going to begin at HIS time of life. The King's argument was, that anything that had a head could be beheaded, and that you weren't to talk nonsense. The Queen's argument was, that if something wasn't done about it in less than no time she'd have everybody executed, all round. (It was this last remark that had made the whole party look so grave and anxious.)Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"
Yes, of course, the discourse has to have a possiblity of making sense. Given yeserday's UN speeches and that odd man with the beard on CNN interviewing the American Colossus, I suggest that Lewis Carroll be deemed a political philosopher.
Yes, of course, the discourse has to have a possiblity of making sense. Given yeserday's UN speeches and that odd man with the beard on CNN interviewing the American Colossus, I suggest that Lewis Carroll be deemed a political philosopher.
United Nations Debacle or Rabelais for 500?
Sweet, sweet Jesus yesterday's gamut of disorientation was impressive. The American Colossus presented Afghanistan, Iraq and Lebanon as election-success stories, obviously relegating all this talk of bodies, torture, civil war, corruption, opium, infrastructure ruin to the status of illusion. Will somebody please investigate why the liberals and the media have invented all this "negative" and "unreal" news? Then there's the performance of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who responded to a wtiness to Dachau with "I think we should allow more impartial studies to be done on this." And then of course there's Mr. Chavez who tried out his merengue moves on a journalist and kept referring to the presence of Satan, and (this is my favorite) lamented that he had not been able to meet Noam Chomsky before his death (the Noam Chomsky who is still alive). Then of course there is the rejection of UN forces by the President of Sudan because they're in the middle of genocide and would like to get on with it. What shall we say of politics as exampled by the above: "I discovered," said Gargantua, "by long and painstaking experiments a way to wipe my ass, the most lordly, the most excellent, the most expedient that was ever seen." Oh Rabelais! Oh humanity!
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
Ah, Pericles . . . or why Mr. Snow Might Want to Have a Conversation with The American Colossus on Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War
"Our policies are considered and evaluated. We do not believe that talking endangers action. The real danger comes when we do not talk the plan through before doing what has to be done. We are unique in the way we combine bravado with reasoned debate about every project."
Saturday, September 16, 2006
Can Someone Help the American Colossus II?
""This debate is ocurring because of the Supreme Court's ruling that sauid that we must conduct ourselves under the Common Article 3 of the Geneva Convention, and that Common Article 3 says that, you know, there will be no outrages upon human dignity. That's like--it's very vague. What does that mean, "Outrages upon human dignity?" George W. Bush, September 15, 2006
Common Article 3 is actually more specific than the President's language would indicate. Read the following.
"Common Article 3
Common Article 3 reads, in its entirety:
Article 3
In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions:
1. Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria.
To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:
(a) Violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;
(b) Taking of hostages;
(c) Outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment;
(d) The passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.
2. The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.
An impartial humanitarian body, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, may offer its services to the Parties to the conflict.
The Parties to the conflict should further endeavour to bring into force, by means of special agreements, all or part of the other provisions of the present Convention.
The application of the preceding provisions shall not affect the legal status of the Parties to the conflict. "
For more on this issue go to the Center for Derense Information home page. Link to the side of this page.
Common Article 3 is actually more specific than the President's language would indicate. Read the following.
"Common Article 3
Common Article 3 reads, in its entirety:
Article 3
In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions:
1. Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, colour, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria.
To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:
(a) Violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;
(b) Taking of hostages;
(c) Outrages upon personal dignity, in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment;
(d) The passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.
2. The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.
An impartial humanitarian body, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, may offer its services to the Parties to the conflict.
The Parties to the conflict should further endeavour to bring into force, by means of special agreements, all or part of the other provisions of the present Convention.
The application of the preceding provisions shall not affect the legal status of the Parties to the conflict. "
For more on this issue go to the Center for Derense Information home page. Link to the side of this page.
Can Someone Help the American Colossus?
"The Iraqi government plans to seal off Baghdad within weeks by ringing it with a series of trenches and setting up dozen of traffic checkpoints to control movement in and out of the violent city of seven million people, an Interior Ministry spokesman said Friday."
Edward Wong, New York Times, September 16, 2006
"President Bush made an impassioned defense on Friday of his proposed rules for the interrogation and prosecution of terrorism suspects, warning that the nation's ability to defend itself would be undermined if rebellious Republicans in the Senate did not come round to his position."
Jim Rutenberg and Sheryl Gay Stolberg, New York Times, September 16, 2006
Quite possibly the nation's ability to defend itself will be compromised if an effective strategy for winning the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is not devised. Creating medieval seige defenses doesn't look like a way to effectively protect the home front, even if we have the "right" to pull off the fingernails of "the enemy."
Edward Wong, New York Times, September 16, 2006
"President Bush made an impassioned defense on Friday of his proposed rules for the interrogation and prosecution of terrorism suspects, warning that the nation's ability to defend itself would be undermined if rebellious Republicans in the Senate did not come round to his position."
Jim Rutenberg and Sheryl Gay Stolberg, New York Times, September 16, 2006
Quite possibly the nation's ability to defend itself will be compromised if an effective strategy for winning the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is not devised. Creating medieval seige defenses doesn't look like a way to effectively protect the home front, even if we have the "right" to pull off the fingernails of "the enemy."
Friday, September 15, 2006
What Queequeg Said As We Hoisted the Boats
Upon hearing of my pairing Hobbes with Darwin on the nature of the human condition and the struggle for existence, Queequeg coughed and wiggled out, "Yuh don' mean yur channelin' Anaximander?" Upon looking at Queequeg with deliberate non-comprehension, he remoeved from his pocket a folded piece of paper, which when I opened it revealed three different versions of Anaximanders view of the necessity of destruction (also some god-awful looking snot on that piece of paper that it appears Q. used to wipe his nose).
"Simplicius referring to Anaximander:
And the source of coming-to-be for existing things is that into which destruction, too, happens 'according to necessity; for they pay penalty and retribution to each other for their injustice according to the assessment of Time,' as he describes it in these rather poetical terms."
"Hippolytus (unfortunate name) referring to Anaximander:
This nature is eternal and unageing, and it also surrounds all the worlds. He talks of Time as though coming-to-be and existence and destruciton were limited."
"Plutarch referring to Anaximander:
He declared that destruction, and much earlier coming-to-be, happen from infinite ages, since they are all occurring in cycles."
If this is a case, then we can draw a "nice" line from Anaximander to Hobbes to Darwin to Borges, "The Circular Ruins."
Now, what am I going to do with Q.'s snot-rag?
"Simplicius referring to Anaximander:
And the source of coming-to-be for existing things is that into which destruction, too, happens 'according to necessity; for they pay penalty and retribution to each other for their injustice according to the assessment of Time,' as he describes it in these rather poetical terms."
"Hippolytus (unfortunate name) referring to Anaximander:
This nature is eternal and unageing, and it also surrounds all the worlds. He talks of Time as though coming-to-be and existence and destruciton were limited."
"Plutarch referring to Anaximander:
He declared that destruction, and much earlier coming-to-be, happen from infinite ages, since they are all occurring in cycles."
If this is a case, then we can draw a "nice" line from Anaximander to Hobbes to Darwin to Borges, "The Circular Ruins."
Now, what am I going to do with Q.'s snot-rag?
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
Orwell Award of the Day or Cheney's Drumbeating Makes Sunshine
"CHENEY'S LOGIC
ONE OF the few college textbooks I still have is "Introduction to Logic" by Irving M. Copi. When I read Vice President Cheney's argument that because of the war in Iraq, 'there has not been another attack on the United States' ("Cheney defends hard-line role," Page A9, Sept. 11), I pulled that book from the shelf. Sure enough, there it was - a logical fallacy so old that it has a Latin name (post hoc ergo propter hoc, or "false cause"). The example Professor Copi gives is remarkably apt: 'Certainly we should reject the savage's claim that beating his drums is the cause of the sun's reappearing after an eclipse.'"
The Boston Globe
September 12, 2006 Tuesday THIRD EDITION
LETTERS; Pg. A14
ROGER GOULET
ONE OF the few college textbooks I still have is "Introduction to Logic" by Irving M. Copi. When I read Vice President Cheney's argument that because of the war in Iraq, 'there has not been another attack on the United States' ("Cheney defends hard-line role," Page A9, Sept. 11), I pulled that book from the shelf. Sure enough, there it was - a logical fallacy so old that it has a Latin name (post hoc ergo propter hoc, or "false cause"). The example Professor Copi gives is remarkably apt: 'Certainly we should reject the savage's claim that beating his drums is the cause of the sun's reappearing after an eclipse.'"
The Boston Globe
September 12, 2006 Tuesday THIRD EDITION
LETTERS; Pg. A14
ROGER GOULET
Succulent Hobbesian and Darwinian Salivary Glands
Hobbes, Part I Chapter XIII:
"Hereby it is manifest, that during the time men live without a common Power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called Warre; and such a warre, as is of every man, against every man. For WARRE, consisteth not in Battell onely, or the act of fighting; but in a tract of time, wherein the Will to contend by Battell is sufficiently known: and therefore the notion of Time, is to be considered in the nature of Warre; as it is in the nature of Weather. For as the nature of Foule weather, lyeth not in a showre or two of rain; but in an inclination thereto of many dayes together: So the nature of War, consisteth not in actuall fighting; but in the known disposition thereto, during all the time there is no assurance to the contrary. All other time is PEACE."
Darwin, Chapter III, Struggle for Live Most Severe between Individuals and Varieties of the Same Species:
"It is good thus to try in imagination to give any one species an advantage over another. Probably in no single instance should we know what to do. This ought to convince us of our ignorance on the mutual relations of all organic beings; a conviciton as necessary, as it is difficult to acquire. All that we can do, is to keep steadily in mind that each organic being is striving to increase in a geometrical ratio; that each at some period of its life, during some season of the year, during each generation or at intervals, has to struggle for life and to suffer great destruction. When we reflect on this struggle, we may console ourselves with the full belief, that the war of nature is not incessant, that no fear is felt, that death is generally prompt, and that the vigorous, the healthy, and the happy survive and multiply."
"Hereby it is manifest, that during the time men live without a common Power to keep them all in awe, they are in that condition which is called Warre; and such a warre, as is of every man, against every man. For WARRE, consisteth not in Battell onely, or the act of fighting; but in a tract of time, wherein the Will to contend by Battell is sufficiently known: and therefore the notion of Time, is to be considered in the nature of Warre; as it is in the nature of Weather. For as the nature of Foule weather, lyeth not in a showre or two of rain; but in an inclination thereto of many dayes together: So the nature of War, consisteth not in actuall fighting; but in the known disposition thereto, during all the time there is no assurance to the contrary. All other time is PEACE."
Darwin, Chapter III, Struggle for Live Most Severe between Individuals and Varieties of the Same Species:
"It is good thus to try in imagination to give any one species an advantage over another. Probably in no single instance should we know what to do. This ought to convince us of our ignorance on the mutual relations of all organic beings; a conviciton as necessary, as it is difficult to acquire. All that we can do, is to keep steadily in mind that each organic being is striving to increase in a geometrical ratio; that each at some period of its life, during some season of the year, during each generation or at intervals, has to struggle for life and to suffer great destruction. When we reflect on this struggle, we may console ourselves with the full belief, that the war of nature is not incessant, that no fear is felt, that death is generally prompt, and that the vigorous, the healthy, and the happy survive and multiply."
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
When Students Don't Think / When Students Don't Read And Exactly Why Do I Want Them to Do Both
Tuesday Morning. Multicultural Literature. We're discussing Marquez's "A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings." The first question concerns why the villagers have found a woman turned into a spider more interesting, more compelling than an apparent ancient angel who has crash-landed in the courtyard of Pelayo and Elisenda. Answers, proposals, thoughts are slow in coming and as I proceed with observations of how the "angel" does not live up the expectations of Father Gonzaga, how the villagers poke it with a burning iron, and how the angel and a child both come down with chicken pox, I begin to wander (to myself) if my students just believe this is a crazy story about a decrepit angel when everyone knows that angels are bright, young and above ill-repute. Conceptual thinking is slow-going at the mall-about-to-be-destroyed. How should I let them know that reality is put together each day in more or less the same way that the angel is shoved into a chicken coop and that the "human story" of a girl punished for defying her parents and going out at night to dance by being turned into a spider is going to win over the incomprehensible and incommunicative any day? And then, why do I especially want them to know this?
Reading the Rand
Brian Michael Jenkins on the RAND Corporation site offers his view on the war on terrorism. On of his salient points follows:
"Preserve American values. “Whatever we do . . . must be
consistent with our values, and here I think we in America are
in some danger,” warns Jenkins. “We have too readily accepted
assertions of executive authority as necessary for our security.
We have confused the appropriate need to gather intelligence
with the rejection of all rules that govern collection. We have
yielded too much to fear, and it is fear that could destroy us.”
Jenkins concludes: “We cannot claim to be a nation of laws, a
champion of democracy, when we too easily accept a disturbing
pattern of ignoring inconvenient rules, justifying our actions
by extraordinary circumstances, readily resorting to extrajudicial
actions based on broad assertions of unlimited executive
authority, and espousing public arguments against any
constraints on how we treat those in our custody. Th e defense
of democracy demands the defense of democracy’s ideals. To
ignore this is to risk alienation and isolation. And defeat.”
http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB9193/
"Preserve American values. “Whatever we do . . . must be
consistent with our values, and here I think we in America are
in some danger,” warns Jenkins. “We have too readily accepted
assertions of executive authority as necessary for our security.
We have confused the appropriate need to gather intelligence
with the rejection of all rules that govern collection. We have
yielded too much to fear, and it is fear that could destroy us.”
Jenkins concludes: “We cannot claim to be a nation of laws, a
champion of democracy, when we too easily accept a disturbing
pattern of ignoring inconvenient rules, justifying our actions
by extraordinary circumstances, readily resorting to extrajudicial
actions based on broad assertions of unlimited executive
authority, and espousing public arguments against any
constraints on how we treat those in our custody. Th e defense
of democracy demands the defense of democracy’s ideals. To
ignore this is to risk alienation and isolation. And defeat.”
http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB9193/
Monday, September 11, 2006
Monday Morning Melville
"Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off--then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball."
I get to the whale as soon as I can. That and a magaritta with Cabo Wado tequilla (reposado), Patron Citronge, lime juice, and a jalapeno slice--all vigorously shaken, not blended.
I get to the whale as soon as I can. That and a magaritta with Cabo Wado tequilla (reposado), Patron Citronge, lime juice, and a jalapeno slice--all vigorously shaken, not blended.
Saturday, September 09, 2006
Shock and Awe Advocates: Al Qaeda and Neo-Cons or What A Healthy Respect for Force Might Lead You to Avoid And How to Combine Brookings and Heritage
"Only he who has measured the dominion of force, and knows how to respect it, is capable of love and justice." Simone Veil, "The Iliad, or the Poem of Force."
"Thus, in the Iliad, force appears as both the supreme reality and the supreme illusion of life. Force, for Homer, is divine insofar as it represents a superabundance of life that flashes out in the contempt for death and ecstacy of self-sacrifice; it is detestable insofar as it contains a fatality that transforms it into inertia, a blind course, on to its own abolition and the obliteration of the very values it engenders." Rachel Bespaloff, "On the Iliad."
From Brookings:
"What about the losers? Top among them must be Osama bin Laden and the Al Qaeda organization he created and led. With his organization smashed, many of his lieutenants killed or captured, and his Afghan sanctuary closed down, the world's leading terrorist is living a life on the run, from one cave to the next, with little more to do than issuing the occasional video or audio tape. That is quite a change from five years ago, when bin Laden watched his hand-picked terrorists commit their horrific acts on CNN International via satellite high up in the Afghan mountains. Of course, in one crucial respect, bin Laden has emerged victorious: his idea of a global jihad against America and its supporters is now embraced throughout the Muslim world. But by all accounts he has lost his ability to direct the movement or to plan and execute the kind of attacks that shook the world five years ago. Neoconservatism is another major loser. The idea that America had the power to remake the world in its own image — and that after 9/11 it had the opportunity to do so largely on its own — was dealt a deadly blow in the sands of Mesopotamia. The forceful ouster of Saddam Hussein set in motion political forces that America did not, and probably could not, contain — sectarian forces that are now ripping the country violently apart. Far from Iraq becoming a positive example of change and reform for the wider region, the chaos that has befallen it stands as testament of the limits of American unilateralism and the failure of an ideology that relied on it to effect positive change throughout the Mideast."
"Five Years After 9/11 - A Balance Sheet" America Abroad Weblog, September 6, 2006 Ivo H. Daalder, Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies, Brookings Institution.
From Heritage:
"There is no practical U.S. military solution to the instability in Iraq. Neither the U.S. nor
other Western allies have the troops to fully garrison Iraq. Even maintaining the status quo helps neither Americans nor the Iraqis. The operational troop levels and tempo of operations are undermining long-term U.S. readiness and are perpetuating a condition of dependency on the part of the Iraqis."
"The United States has an important role to play outside Iraq. The Bush Administration must work to contain Syria and Iran; press for dismantling Hamas and Hezbollah; strengthen ties and cooperation and promote growth and healthy civil society in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf Coast states, Jordon, and Turkey; support a strong Israel that negotiates for peace from a position of strength, not weakness; combat transnational terrorist groups and proliferation; maintain a well-funded military, and build missile defenses. These are security policies that will help make the Middle East safer for a free Iraq and the peoples of the region."
"U.S. Military Policy in Iraq: “Cut and Run” a Disaster for the U.S. and the Middle East" by James Jay Carafano, Ph.D., and James PhillipsWebMemo #1207
"Thus, in the Iliad, force appears as both the supreme reality and the supreme illusion of life. Force, for Homer, is divine insofar as it represents a superabundance of life that flashes out in the contempt for death and ecstacy of self-sacrifice; it is detestable insofar as it contains a fatality that transforms it into inertia, a blind course, on to its own abolition and the obliteration of the very values it engenders." Rachel Bespaloff, "On the Iliad."
From Brookings:
"What about the losers? Top among them must be Osama bin Laden and the Al Qaeda organization he created and led. With his organization smashed, many of his lieutenants killed or captured, and his Afghan sanctuary closed down, the world's leading terrorist is living a life on the run, from one cave to the next, with little more to do than issuing the occasional video or audio tape. That is quite a change from five years ago, when bin Laden watched his hand-picked terrorists commit their horrific acts on CNN International via satellite high up in the Afghan mountains. Of course, in one crucial respect, bin Laden has emerged victorious: his idea of a global jihad against America and its supporters is now embraced throughout the Muslim world. But by all accounts he has lost his ability to direct the movement or to plan and execute the kind of attacks that shook the world five years ago. Neoconservatism is another major loser. The idea that America had the power to remake the world in its own image — and that after 9/11 it had the opportunity to do so largely on its own — was dealt a deadly blow in the sands of Mesopotamia. The forceful ouster of Saddam Hussein set in motion political forces that America did not, and probably could not, contain — sectarian forces that are now ripping the country violently apart. Far from Iraq becoming a positive example of change and reform for the wider region, the chaos that has befallen it stands as testament of the limits of American unilateralism and the failure of an ideology that relied on it to effect positive change throughout the Mideast."
"Five Years After 9/11 - A Balance Sheet" America Abroad Weblog, September 6, 2006 Ivo H. Daalder, Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies, Brookings Institution.
From Heritage:
"There is no practical U.S. military solution to the instability in Iraq. Neither the U.S. nor
other Western allies have the troops to fully garrison Iraq. Even maintaining the status quo helps neither Americans nor the Iraqis. The operational troop levels and tempo of operations are undermining long-term U.S. readiness and are perpetuating a condition of dependency on the part of the Iraqis."
"The United States has an important role to play outside Iraq. The Bush Administration must work to contain Syria and Iran; press for dismantling Hamas and Hezbollah; strengthen ties and cooperation and promote growth and healthy civil society in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf Coast states, Jordon, and Turkey; support a strong Israel that negotiates for peace from a position of strength, not weakness; combat transnational terrorist groups and proliferation; maintain a well-funded military, and build missile defenses. These are security policies that will help make the Middle East safer for a free Iraq and the peoples of the region."
"U.S. Military Policy in Iraq: “Cut and Run” a Disaster for the U.S. and the Middle East" by James Jay Carafano, Ph.D., and James PhillipsWebMemo #1207
Thursday, September 07, 2006
I Am Travis Bickle and Tyler Durden
Teaching at the mall-soon-to-be-demolished includes actively being aware of the existence of parallel realities. In the reality (supposedly that I inhabit) I lead a Humanities class on Thursday evenings; in the reality of the computer (the one I suppose I'm supposed to actually be in) I am teaching an American Literature II class on Tuesday and Thursday evenings and it has eight students. Maybe I am really teaching that class as well as the one that I am teaching. Yes. Today I meditated on what "huge genitals" means as my Multicultural Literature class discussed Carter's "The Company of Wolves;" and angry, young men with golf clubs as my American Literature II class pondered Rivera's "Marisol." Tonight: more golf clubs and a war in heaven. Omophagos. Omophagos.
Wednesday, September 06, 2006
Damnorum Experientia for The American Colossus or Why an Infernal Three-Way Between Thomas Hobbes, Leo Strauss and Angela Carter May Save Us All
Ah, Mr. Strauss, this does sound like a Gargantuan morning:
"Living in the world of his imagination, he need do nothing, in order to convince himself of his superiority to others, but simply think out his deeds for himself; in this world, in which indeed 'the whole word obeys him', everything is accomplished according to his wishes."
But the cave has cases of Amarone Valplicella or for a far more reasonable price Allegrini Valpolicella Classico 2004 (which, Mr. PrudentStarbuck, you may find in the Dining Section of the New York Times paired with a Lobster Spaghetti with Fresh Tomatoes (get those Heirloom Tomotoes at WholeFoods)--tell me, can the Weekly Standard say the same?). What could possibly make the American Colossus leave?
"He can awaken from his dream-world and come to himself only when he feels in his own person--by bodily hurt--the resistance of the real world."
Oh yes, kick the rock and the gigantic foot swells. Baghdad has that affect. But still, why should the large man on campus leave the pleasant restraints of dim places?
"By damnorum experientia man becomes reasonable." (Strauss, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes)
Oh. Well then, time to assign Angela Carter's "The Company of Wolves" for The American Colossus to read:
"Those slavering jaws; the lolling tongue; the rime of saliva on the grizzled chops--of all the teeming perils of the night and the forest, ghosts, hobgoblins, ogres that grill babies upon gridirons, witches that fatten their captives in cages for cannibal tables, the wolf is worst, for he cannot listen to reason."
I knew cannibalism wasn't that bad. And further,
"We keep the wolves outside by living well."
But eventually,
"She will lay his head on her lap and she will pick out the lice from his pelt and perhaps she will put the lice into her mouth and eat them, as he will bid her, as she would in a savage marriage ceremony."
Yes, let the wolf into the cave. Ah, so the American Colossus can still enjoy the lobster and spaghetti with a valpolicella and the rapturous notes of Swan Lake if he goes to bed with his dark old self. Hmmm, let's end with little bit from Mr. Hobbes.
"And from hence it comes to passe, that men have no other means to acknowledge their owne Darknesse, but onely by resoning from the un-foreseen mischances, that befall them in their ways . . . ." If one remembers that "the wolf cannot listen to reason."
"Living in the world of his imagination, he need do nothing, in order to convince himself of his superiority to others, but simply think out his deeds for himself; in this world, in which indeed 'the whole word obeys him', everything is accomplished according to his wishes."
But the cave has cases of Amarone Valplicella or for a far more reasonable price Allegrini Valpolicella Classico 2004 (which, Mr. PrudentStarbuck, you may find in the Dining Section of the New York Times paired with a Lobster Spaghetti with Fresh Tomatoes (get those Heirloom Tomotoes at WholeFoods)--tell me, can the Weekly Standard say the same?). What could possibly make the American Colossus leave?
"He can awaken from his dream-world and come to himself only when he feels in his own person--by bodily hurt--the resistance of the real world."
Oh yes, kick the rock and the gigantic foot swells. Baghdad has that affect. But still, why should the large man on campus leave the pleasant restraints of dim places?
"By damnorum experientia man becomes reasonable." (Strauss, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes)
Oh. Well then, time to assign Angela Carter's "The Company of Wolves" for The American Colossus to read:
"Those slavering jaws; the lolling tongue; the rime of saliva on the grizzled chops--of all the teeming perils of the night and the forest, ghosts, hobgoblins, ogres that grill babies upon gridirons, witches that fatten their captives in cages for cannibal tables, the wolf is worst, for he cannot listen to reason."
I knew cannibalism wasn't that bad. And further,
"We keep the wolves outside by living well."
But eventually,
"She will lay his head on her lap and she will pick out the lice from his pelt and perhaps she will put the lice into her mouth and eat them, as he will bid her, as she would in a savage marriage ceremony."
Yes, let the wolf into the cave. Ah, so the American Colossus can still enjoy the lobster and spaghetti with a valpolicella and the rapturous notes of Swan Lake if he goes to bed with his dark old self. Hmmm, let's end with little bit from Mr. Hobbes.
"And from hence it comes to passe, that men have no other means to acknowledge their owne Darknesse, but onely by resoning from the un-foreseen mischances, that befall them in their ways . . . ." If one remembers that "the wolf cannot listen to reason."
Pentagon and White House Dreaming (A summary of Monday's Blog with Hamlet added) or Between Dreams and Lime-Twiggs Lies the Rub
". . . dreams indeed are ambition; for the very substance of the ambition is merely the shadow of a dream". Hamlet, Act I, sc. ii
"Seeing then that truth consisteth in the right ordering of names in our affirmations, a man that seeketh precise truth, had need to remember what every name he uses stands for; and to place it accordingly; or else he will find himself entangled in words, as a bird in lime-twiggs; the more he struggles, the more belimed." Hobbes, Leviathan.
"Thus, the violence in Iraq cannot be categorized as the result of a single organized or unified opposition or insurgency; the security situation is currently at its most complex state since the initiation of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Similarly, Iraqi or Coalition security strategies must be tailored for the different objectives, methods, and support structures of each particular threat." "Measuring Secuity and Stability in Iraq" August 2006 / http://www.defenselink.mil/
"The Terrorists Serve A Clear And Focused Ideology. The ideology known as Islamic radicalism, militant Jihadism, or Islamo-fascism - different from the religion of Islam - exploits Islam to serve a violent political vision that calls for the murder of all those who do not share it. The followers of Islamic radicalism are bound together by their shared ideology, not by any centralized command structure. Although they fight on scattered battlefields, these terrorists share a similar ideology and vision for the world openly stated in videos, audiotapes, letters, declarations, and websites. ""Fact Sheet: President Bush Remarks on the War on Terror" / http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/10/20051006-2.html
"Seeing then that truth consisteth in the right ordering of names in our affirmations, a man that seeketh precise truth, had need to remember what every name he uses stands for; and to place it accordingly; or else he will find himself entangled in words, as a bird in lime-twiggs; the more he struggles, the more belimed." Hobbes, Leviathan.
"Thus, the violence in Iraq cannot be categorized as the result of a single organized or unified opposition or insurgency; the security situation is currently at its most complex state since the initiation of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Similarly, Iraqi or Coalition security strategies must be tailored for the different objectives, methods, and support structures of each particular threat." "Measuring Secuity and Stability in Iraq" August 2006 / http://www.defenselink.mil/
"The Terrorists Serve A Clear And Focused Ideology. The ideology known as Islamic radicalism, militant Jihadism, or Islamo-fascism - different from the religion of Islam - exploits Islam to serve a violent political vision that calls for the murder of all those who do not share it. The followers of Islamic radicalism are bound together by their shared ideology, not by any centralized command structure. Although they fight on scattered battlefields, these terrorists share a similar ideology and vision for the world openly stated in videos, audiotapes, letters, declarations, and websites. ""Fact Sheet: President Bush Remarks on the War on Terror" / http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/10/20051006-2.html
Monday, September 04, 2006
At Home Thinkeries . . . Yeah!
Thank you anonymous cloud (in response to Why Mr. Hobbes, That is a Thinkery! ).
"Anonymous said...
Very nice! I found a place where you can make some nice extra cash secret shopping. Just go to the site below and put in your zip to see what's available in your area. I made over $900 last month having fun!make extra money "
Screw the professorhsip at the demolished mall, I'm starting my own little think-yank.
"Anonymous said...
Very nice! I found a place where you can make some nice extra cash secret shopping. Just go to the site below and put in your zip to see what's available in your area. I made over $900 last month having fun!make extra money "
Screw the professorhsip at the demolished mall, I'm starting my own little think-yank.
Hobbes the Father of Orwell and Americans Belimed
"Seeing then that truth consisteth in the right ordering of names in our affirmations, a man that seeketh precise truth, had need to remember what every name he uses stands for; and to place it accordingly; or else he will find himself entangled in words, as a bird in lime-twiggs; the more he struggles, the more belimed."
Ah yes, the importance of naming. Very well, what names are used by the Pentagon's assessment of the conflict.
"The Nature of the Conflict
Violence in Baghdad is the most prominent feature of the conflict in Iraq in this period, as Sunni and Shi’a extremist death squads pursue their sectarian agendas. The resulting violence overwhelmingly targets civilians, causing segments of the populace to tolerate or even endorse extremist actions on their behalf as an effective means to guarantee their safety, undermining both the Government of Iraq’s ability to deliver security and its pursuit of a reconciliation program. Although Baghdad remains the focus for sectarian and terrorist violence in Iraq, violence tied to the Rejectionist insurgency, terrorist intimidation, political and tribal tensions, and criminality continue in other regions. Sectarian violence is gradually spreading north into Diyala Province and Kirkuk as Sunni, Shi’a, and Kurdish groups compete for provincial influence. Conflict in Anbar Province remains centered on the Sunni insurgency. Although al-Qaeda in Iraq continues its intimidation to coerce passive Sunni support, tribes are pushing back to eject al-Qaeda in Iraq and reestablish their dominant role. In the southern, predominantly Shi’a region of the country, political and tribal rivalries are a growing motive behind violence, particularly in
Basrah, with limited anti-Coalition forces attacks likely undertaken by rogue Shi’a militia with Iranian support. "
And what about the enemy?
"The Enemy
Violence against the Iraqi people and Coalition forces is committed generally by a combination
of both Sunni and Shi’a groups, who are overwhelmingly Iraqi but with a small yet significant component of foreign suicide operatives. Sunni groups include Rejectionists— many of whom were members of, or associated with, the former regime—and terrorists groups, including al-Qaeda in Iraq, Ansar al Sunnah (AS), and other smaller groups. Shi’a groups include elements of militias and illegal armed groups, many of whom receive Iranian support. The threat posed by Shi’a illegal armed groups, filling perceived and actual security vacuums, is growing and represents a significant challenge for the Iraqi government. The appearance and activity of death squads is a growing aspect of the violence in Iraq, with both Sunni and Shi’a death squads adding to the violence by targeting civilians and inciting reprisal. Al- Qaeda in Iraq and elements of JAM (nominally under the control of Muqtada al-Sadr) are among most prominent groups engaging in a continuing pattern of attacks and reprisals against individuals or communities representing the other’s sectarian affiliation. Thus, the violence in Iraq cannot be categorized as the result of a single organized or unified opposition or insurgency; the security situation is currently at its most complex state since the initiation of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Similarly, Iraqi or Coalition security strategies must be tailored for the different objectives, methods, and support structures of each particular threat." "Measuring Secuity and Stability in Iraq" August 2006 / http://www.defenselink.mil/
And yet.
"The Terrorists Serve A Clear And Focused Ideology. The ideology known as Islamic radicalism, militant Jihadism, or Islamo-fascism - different from the religion of Islam - exploits Islam to serve a violent political vision that calls for the murder of all those who do not share it. The followers of Islamic radicalism are bound together by their shared ideology, not by any centralized command structure. Although they fight on scattered battlefields, these terrorists share a similar ideology and vision for the world openly stated in videos, audiotapes, letters, declarations, and websites. "
"Fact Sheet: President Bush Remarks on the War on Terror" / http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/10/20051006-2.html
A difference between then Pentagon assessment (the war in Iraq) and the Bush message (the War at Home). A purposeful entanglement?
Ah yes, the importance of naming. Very well, what names are used by the Pentagon's assessment of the conflict.
"The Nature of the Conflict
Violence in Baghdad is the most prominent feature of the conflict in Iraq in this period, as Sunni and Shi’a extremist death squads pursue their sectarian agendas. The resulting violence overwhelmingly targets civilians, causing segments of the populace to tolerate or even endorse extremist actions on their behalf as an effective means to guarantee their safety, undermining both the Government of Iraq’s ability to deliver security and its pursuit of a reconciliation program. Although Baghdad remains the focus for sectarian and terrorist violence in Iraq, violence tied to the Rejectionist insurgency, terrorist intimidation, political and tribal tensions, and criminality continue in other regions. Sectarian violence is gradually spreading north into Diyala Province and Kirkuk as Sunni, Shi’a, and Kurdish groups compete for provincial influence. Conflict in Anbar Province remains centered on the Sunni insurgency. Although al-Qaeda in Iraq continues its intimidation to coerce passive Sunni support, tribes are pushing back to eject al-Qaeda in Iraq and reestablish their dominant role. In the southern, predominantly Shi’a region of the country, political and tribal rivalries are a growing motive behind violence, particularly in
Basrah, with limited anti-Coalition forces attacks likely undertaken by rogue Shi’a militia with Iranian support. "
And what about the enemy?
"The Enemy
Violence against the Iraqi people and Coalition forces is committed generally by a combination
of both Sunni and Shi’a groups, who are overwhelmingly Iraqi but with a small yet significant component of foreign suicide operatives. Sunni groups include Rejectionists— many of whom were members of, or associated with, the former regime—and terrorists groups, including al-Qaeda in Iraq, Ansar al Sunnah (AS), and other smaller groups. Shi’a groups include elements of militias and illegal armed groups, many of whom receive Iranian support. The threat posed by Shi’a illegal armed groups, filling perceived and actual security vacuums, is growing and represents a significant challenge for the Iraqi government. The appearance and activity of death squads is a growing aspect of the violence in Iraq, with both Sunni and Shi’a death squads adding to the violence by targeting civilians and inciting reprisal. Al- Qaeda in Iraq and elements of JAM (nominally under the control of Muqtada al-Sadr) are among most prominent groups engaging in a continuing pattern of attacks and reprisals against individuals or communities representing the other’s sectarian affiliation. Thus, the violence in Iraq cannot be categorized as the result of a single organized or unified opposition or insurgency; the security situation is currently at its most complex state since the initiation of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Similarly, Iraqi or Coalition security strategies must be tailored for the different objectives, methods, and support structures of each particular threat." "Measuring Secuity and Stability in Iraq" August 2006 / http://www.defenselink.mil/
And yet.
"The Terrorists Serve A Clear And Focused Ideology. The ideology known as Islamic radicalism, militant Jihadism, or Islamo-fascism - different from the religion of Islam - exploits Islam to serve a violent political vision that calls for the murder of all those who do not share it. The followers of Islamic radicalism are bound together by their shared ideology, not by any centralized command structure. Although they fight on scattered battlefields, these terrorists share a similar ideology and vision for the world openly stated in videos, audiotapes, letters, declarations, and websites. "
"Fact Sheet: President Bush Remarks on the War on Terror" / http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/10/20051006-2.html
A difference between then Pentagon assessment (the war in Iraq) and the Bush message (the War at Home). A purposeful entanglement?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)