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Tuesday, February 28, 2017
BROOKS' SIMON SAYS ENLIGHTENMENT
This is a profoundly misleading account, but it is what Americans have been brought up on for generations now, throughout the 20th Century.
Brooks thinks that the Enlightenment never ended (about the time of the American Rebellion or the French Revolution, in my judgment)! From some of Professor Kaiser's remarks, he seems to share this time warp view as well.
Brooks thinks 20th century leaders, but only some of them he likes, are Enlightenment leaders! He really believes that.
Brooks thinks that the Enlightenment never ended (about the time of the American Rebellion or the French Revolution, in my judgment)! From some of Professor Kaiser's remarks, he seems to share this time warp view as well.
Brooks thinks 20th century leaders, but only some of them he likes, are Enlightenment leaders! He really believes that.
Do you think Enlightenment requires democracy? It certainly never meant anything of that kind for a long time, long before the Age of the Democratic Revolution, beginning only in about 1760.
How can you claim that Brooks' view is incorrect? Who would believe you? Where in this barrage would one begin?
Do you then get pegged as a Bannonist, whatever that turns out to be?
It certainly goes back to arguments claiming that the French Revolution somehow represented the Enlightenment. The founding fathers certainly all thought of themselves as enlightenment thinkers.
Of course Napoleon turned out to be a different thing, or did he? So, was he actually anti Enlightenment then?
He certainly believed in careers open to talent, and to rationalization and consolidation of the ostensibly backward Old European Order Europe, much as enlightened despots had themselves been trying to do for decades. He didn't care for religion. That's an enlightenment plus. He wasn't fond of an aristocracy, except of his relatives. That was an enlightenment plus. Jefferson started out calling him a wonderful man. Doesn't that make him the modern enlightened ruler par excellence, even though he didn't do it very democratically, to say the least? If not, why not?
The 19th Century movements Brooks calls anti Enlightenment, socialism, fascism, communism, were also themselves intellectual children of the Enlightenment. That is the ugly little secret he doesn't tell you either. WWI was painted as an imperialist war, thus somehow Anti Enlightenment.
Nationalism was a child of the Enlightenment.
Fascism, was a child, intellectually, of the enlightenment no less than was liberal democracy.
Communism, intellectually yet another child of the enlightenment.
Both communism and fascism sort of sprang from Hegel, who himself sort of sprang from the likes of Rousseau and Kant.
Nationalism was a child of the Enlightenment.
Fascism, was a child, intellectually, of the enlightenment no less than was liberal democracy.
Communism, intellectually yet another child of the enlightenment.
Both communism and fascism sort of sprang from Hegel, who himself sort of sprang from the likes of Rousseau and Kant.
Brooks doesn't really want to get into what I call this dark side of the Enlightenment, call it the Endarkenment.
He mentions Locke and Kant....He doesn't, of course, mention Rousseau, etc., classic later enlightenment thinker, hugely influential on the founding fathers and on revolutionary democratic Europe, idol of Robespierre.
He doesn't touch Hume, hugely important but poison for Brooks' theory of the power and goodness of Enlightenment reason. Yet he covers himself with his remarks on skepticism, painting it as leading to mostly good things in American democracy, separation of powers, checks and balances, things like that, things that, sadly, have not panned out at all as originally planned here, or as lauded by Tocqueville.
With Hume, on the intellectual plane, and especially with Rousseau, on the individual and emotional one, the Enlightenment worm had already turned on itself in mid 18th Century thought, actually even before the democratic revolution began in earnest in the 1760s.
Skepticism and the wantonness of the individual will represented the death of the Enlightenment, not its fruition. But the Enlightenment had plenty of offspring.
He mentions Locke and Kant....He doesn't, of course, mention Rousseau, etc., classic later enlightenment thinker, hugely influential on the founding fathers and on revolutionary democratic Europe, idol of Robespierre.
He doesn't touch Hume, hugely important but poison for Brooks' theory of the power and goodness of Enlightenment reason. Yet he covers himself with his remarks on skepticism, painting it as leading to mostly good things in American democracy, separation of powers, checks and balances, things like that, things that, sadly, have not panned out at all as originally planned here, or as lauded by Tocqueville.
With Hume, on the intellectual plane, and especially with Rousseau, on the individual and emotional one, the Enlightenment worm had already turned on itself in mid 18th Century thought, actually even before the democratic revolution began in earnest in the 1760s.
Skepticism and the wantonness of the individual will represented the death of the Enlightenment, not its fruition. But the Enlightenment had plenty of offspring.
RE THE BEST AND THE BRIGHTEST YOU HAVE TO KILL TO EAT
Delicious top level insider smut, much of it with substantial elements of truth, from a famed, relentlessly self seeking, rogue muckraker.
No wonder Bannon was enthralled.
He seems, although I have only begun it, to have had little qualm, a classic rat, about ratting out presumably confidential information held by his own long time employer, the NYT, the files of which, and the institutional knowledge from which, will apparently inform his account at every stage throughout, it seems. It is the kind of stuff, and the scope of it, that he could never have learned on his own, bottom third at Harvard and all...
Biting the liberal, tree hugging media hand that had fed him...
Yet, in journalism, liberal, vegetarian, vegan, environmental, or whatever, as in so many other areas, you have to kill to eat.
See Mark Moyar, on his propaganda misinformation role, back to and through the NYT, while in Vietnam, Wikipedia.
RE NATIONALISM VERSUS GLOBALISM
The crucially important point to make here, at the outset, is that the Cobdenist liberal international order never had a Plan B.
Nationalism was one of the big bugaboos it was ostensibly running from. Imperialism was another.
This was the story that was told.
Even this was, in many ways, a faux story, designed to further international financial and commercial interests over other interests within the countries and empires of Europe.
RE EUROPE AND AMERICA RE DK COMMENT
"To transfer European culture to America with its same population was natural." EB
Actually, although I wish this had been the case, for a variety of reasons, in the actual event, even leaving aside the later period of the American Rebellion of 1776 and after, it had not at all been how things had gone, since the early 1600s.
What developed here was something substantially different from, and less than, European culture, which itself was not a single thing formed into a readily identifiable single cultural thing.
What developed here was something substantially different from, and less than, European culture, which itself was not a single thing formed into a readily identifiable single cultural thing.
Monday, February 27, 2017
THE MENU SAUSAGE CONTINUED
So, what do you do with fresh sausage? Because it is not filled with preservatives, it has no shelf life. You have to refrigerate and then cook with it, within a few days, or freeze it immediately for later use.
RE NATIONALISM VERSUS GLOBALISM
I have seen this confrontation coming for ages. It is, of course, a confrontation that neither party has wanted. It had to come from outside the political establishment.
The basis for this anti globalism has been building year by year, and decade by decade, behind the scenes and under the superficial punditocratic radar designed for that purpose, except for the outbursts here and there.
Knowledgeable insiders, within various administrations, Democratic or Republican, have of course known the score since the beginning, say with Kindleberger, etc., at and after 1945.
Buchanan took a stab at it. Perot as well, against globalization.
ONCE BEFORE A REPUBLICAN DEMAGOGUE
had lured an already highly propagandized, and thus highly polarized, and mutually angry electorate into choosing him to somehow lead them back into unity.
He had long known where he stood regarding the polarization, and it wasn't at or near a vital center.
His unification did not result in any kind of unification or even a real consolidation.
That Republican demagogue was Abraham Lincoln.
Trump seems to be the most incredible presidential trick played on the American people ever.
He had long known where he stood regarding the polarization, and it wasn't at or near a vital center.
His unification did not result in any kind of unification or even a real consolidation.
That Republican demagogue was Abraham Lincoln.
Trump seems to be the most incredible presidential trick played on the American people ever.
KRUGMAN TODAY WOW
Where do I begin? I have to think about it.
OK, I thought a little about it:
Maybe this is a battle, to the death, between Krugman's NYT post Milner Group liberal international order liberal Jewry, and its liberal Christian stooges; and Breitbart's neocon nationalist, and pro Israel, Orthodox Jewry, and its conservative Christian stooges.
Krugman specifically calls Trump a white nationalist.
What did I say about the shrinking of the universe of discourse, to either good globalist versus bad racist?
This is an example, today, of one such shrinking, by Krugman, in spades.
See this recent post: RE RACIST UNIRACIALISM THE BROTHERHOOD OF MAN
Maybe that is just one subtext.
to be continued.
Just feel free to explain, in comments, how I err.
OK, I thought a little about it:
Maybe this is a battle, to the death, between Krugman's NYT post Milner Group liberal international order liberal Jewry, and its liberal Christian stooges; and Breitbart's neocon nationalist, and pro Israel, Orthodox Jewry, and its conservative Christian stooges.
Krugman specifically calls Trump a white nationalist.
What did I say about the shrinking of the universe of discourse, to either good globalist versus bad racist?
This is an example, today, of one such shrinking, by Krugman, in spades.
See this recent post: RE RACIST UNIRACIALISM THE BROTHERHOOD OF MAN
Maybe that is just one subtext.
to be continued.
Just feel free to explain, in comments, how I err.
NOTING LARGE MAXTHON BROWSER NUMBERS FOR PAGE VIEWS OF THIS SITE
If you think your privacy, on the web, or anywhere else now, really, can be protected, by anyone, public or private, forget it.
Rather like still thinking that a mere country can make you secure from a WMD, a terrorist attack, or even a natural disaster like Katrina. Forget it. Bobbitt admitted as much himself in Shield. He was quite right.
Wages of Western globalization sin. You bought it.
We had allowed the Rooskies to develop the bomb, unhindered, by 1948. We had actually aided them, previously, although this is little known.
The rest is history, as they say.
Rather like still thinking that a mere country can make you secure from a WMD, a terrorist attack, or even a natural disaster like Katrina. Forget it. Bobbitt admitted as much himself in Shield. He was quite right.
Wages of Western globalization sin. You bought it.
We had allowed the Rooskies to develop the bomb, unhindered, by 1948. We had actually aided them, previously, although this is little known.
The rest is history, as they say.
SNAPSHOT PAGEVIEWS TODAY NUMBERS AND BROWSERS
Pageviews by Browsers
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RE TRILLION DOLLAR INFRASTRUCTURE PLAN NOT INDUSTRIAL POLICY
Such a plan, even though he seems not to be going to do even it, big blind government infrastructure spending, helter skelter as it always has been, as distributed to and through each individual state, is not a federal industrial policy, and that point needs to be stressed when reading things I say about redevelopment, Marshall Plan, etc.
Lawton Chiles had a state loop road built around the quiet city of Lakeland Florida with federal money, which wasn't needed, and which almost no one used for decades.
Pork barrel politics, the only kind the American system is structured to do, is not national industrial policy.
Moreover, it would be very difficult to reform the one to try to get to the other eventually.
Lawton Chiles had a state loop road built around the quiet city of Lakeland Florida with federal money, which wasn't needed, and which almost no one used for decades.
Pork barrel politics, the only kind the American system is structured to do, is not national industrial policy.
Moreover, it would be very difficult to reform the one to try to get to the other eventually.
SOMEONE SAW THIS 2016 POST WHY NOT REPRISE IT NOW THAT TRUMP WON?
Saturday, December 17, 2016
BANNON POWER DIALOGUE MIDDLE EAST WITHOUT SHAME
Bannon: "They don't allow bi racial marriage."
Power: "Bomb them."
Bannon: "They discriminate against women."
Power: "Bomb their men."
Bannon: "They don't allow certain books to be defaced."
Power: "First amendment violation. Bomb."
Bannon: "They believe in Sharia."
Power: "Separation of church and state violation. Bomb."
Bannon: "What about Israel? They discriminate every way. They also are without shame."
Power: "Take a guess."
Power: "Bomb them."
Bannon: "They discriminate against women."
Power: "Bomb their men."
Bannon: "They don't allow certain books to be defaced."
Power: "First amendment violation. Bomb."
Bannon: "They believe in Sharia."
Power: "Separation of church and state violation. Bomb."
Bannon: "What about Israel? They discriminate every way. They also are without shame."
Power: "Take a guess."
Sunday, February 26, 2017
WHITE HOUSE DIALOGUE
Bannon: You can go for martial law, or bomb someone. There is no in between. This is the fourth turning.
McMaster: Wait a minute.
Tillerson: He needs help.
Trump: Who?
NAPOLEON EUROPE AND THE WEST
'In fact, Napoleon had never known what he wanted to do with Prussia...This was something new in French politics, another evidence that Napoleon was and remained a Corsican, never part of a real French tradition. Eighteenth Century France had always had a Prussian policy; leaders during the Revolution, whether they were for or against Prussia, had ideas of what it should be, whether ally, opponent, neutral, mediator, or buffer state. But this was because Frenchmen, however they differed on the subject, had always had some general concept of Europe, and Napoleon did not.' (my underlining)
THE MENU SAUSAGE
The next question, what form the sausage takes?
I favor, for simplicity, and flexibility, making sausage in a deep narrow casserole, rather than in an artificial skin in the form of hot dogs. Call it a sausage or pate casserole.
You can also roll it into sausage shaped rolls, or flatten it into patties, and fry or broil it that way. If you want a hot dog, or breakfast sausage patties, that may be the way to go.
You can also roll it into sausage shaped rolls, or flatten it into patties, and fry or broil it that way. If you want a hot dog, or breakfast sausage patties, that may be the way to go.
Then you can use it in different ways, also, with the casserole. Sausages stuffed into pigs intestines or artificial intestines and cooked or smoked were often then used in other ways later as well.
Commercial sausages contain a lot of preservatives, sulfates, and a lot of salt, also a preservative. Home made ones need not. When you think about it, that is a huge advantage.
What has been said so far about sausage is much more important than subsequent discussions regarding ethnic and national styles of sausage, and their various flavoring ingredients.
RE DK CURRENT POST
Skimpole makes some good points re:
"Modern societies," I wrote, "demand that wars be fought to a brilliantly successful conclusion, and wartime governments have become hostages to realities far beyond their control. ... War has been harder to begin, but also much harder to end, in the era of democracy." DK.
Re modern societies' requirements, it might be fairer, and more accurate, to say that modern political propaganda requirements, necessary for cohesion, require the assertion by by democratic leadership of the goal and necessity of brilliant victories.
"Modern societies," I wrote, "demand that wars be fought to a brilliantly successful conclusion, and wartime governments have become hostages to realities far beyond their control. ... War has been harder to begin, but also much harder to end, in the era of democracy." DK.
Re modern societies' requirements, it might be fairer, and more accurate, to say that modern political propaganda requirements, necessary for cohesion, require the assertion by by democratic leadership of the goal and necessity of brilliant victories.
Of course, neither WWI nor WWII actually resulted in brilliant victories at all, in fact the contrary, but that is how they were portrayed here at home, and have been until today frankly.
RE RACIST UNIRACIALISM THE BROTHERHOOD OF MAN
See this post: RACIST UNIRACIALISM UNIRELIGIONISM GLOBALISM MELTINGPOTISM
What has happened, especially in the US, is that appeals to a distinct civilizational ideal, even frankly a lost one, or civilizational political institutions, or nationalistic identifications, based in part on an overarching civilizational membership, and other related or even distinct political positions, are immediately converted, reduced, obfuscated, and labeled, here, as all different species of an underlying racism.
If you're a nationalist, well then you must be a fascist. If you're a fascist, well then of course you must be a racist. Similarly for Western Civilizationalists, Atlanticists, so called populists, anarchists, even civil libertarians, etc.
If you're a nationalist, well then you must be a fascist. If you're a fascist, well then of course you must be a racist. Similarly for Western Civilizationalists, Atlanticists, so called populists, anarchists, even civil libertarians, etc.
Imperialism is sometimes thrown in, but it is a little hard to accuse Americans, generally, of being imperialists as such, racist or not, in the old sense, although there may actually be some imperialist racist Americans here. Yet, imperialists generally are of course as a group tarred with the brush of racism, and have been for centuries now.
Nowadays they, most Americans, have all been brainwashed by ideological methods long in place to classify everyone here as either a good globalist or a bad racist, under the liberal international economic order.
They break this down further into either good liberal or conservative anti racist globalists; or as bad, racist, anti globalists, whether they are actually merely nationalists, populists, isolationists, anarchists, civil libertarians, civilizationalist, whatever, or even actually correctly as a true and strictly speaking, say, white racialists.
There are, of course, many so called good globalists, of all kinds, who actually harbor racialist or other preferences mentioned above of one kind or another, but their overarching moniker of good globalism frees them of this hidden taint, unless somehow their true views of one stripe or another, not necessarily even racist views technically, are found out.
There are also many non globalists who have had their particular non globalist views called merely racist by globalists for so long that they now believe that their views, whichever they might happen actually to be, must be, after all, in fact mainly racist. Sort of a self fulfilling classification. Like calling someone a nigger for so long, he really knows he's a nigger now and calls himself one.
There are also many non globalists who have had their particular non globalist views called merely racist by globalists for so long that they now believe that their views, whichever they might happen actually to be, must be, after all, in fact mainly racist. Sort of a self fulfilling classification. Like calling someone a nigger for so long, he really knows he's a nigger now and calls himself one.
THIS WAS SO IMPORTANT A POINT I REPUBLISH THEN WILL DISCUSS RACE AND CIVILIZATION
Saturday, December 10, 2016
RACIST UNIRACIALISM UNIRELIGIONISM GLOBALISM MELTINGPOTISM
Civilizationalism has become a racial slur under modern American uniracialism, which goes well beyond even the old American multiculturalism, to a whole other unheard of level, and is itself a form of racism, although still well disguised, in that it defines all racial distinctions, for whatever reasons, be they civilizational, national, religious, traditional, historical, ethnic, cultural, political, or social, other than uniracialism as racist.
That is also why uniracialism is also racist, but in a new way, and is an important implication: uniracialism actively discriminates, both religiously, socially and politically, against each and every distinct race, either now in being, or ever in being in the past.
Liberty, equality, fraternity, unirace, unitarianism, meltingpot ism
DJIBOUTI THEY HAVE CHOSEN A BATTLEFIELD AFRICA OF COURSE
Huge, strategically, says Naval War College Professor.
Kindof to be expected, don't you suppose?
Why fight in their own bathtub?
Kindof to be expected, don't you suppose?
Why fight in their own bathtub?
Saturday, February 25, 2017
THE MENU SAUSAGE
This is a brief lecture on meat, and on sausage meat.
You may think I am crazy, to go from what I have been discussing to this. Fair enough.
I use freshly ground meat for sausage, when I bother with it. Why? There are many reasons. Trust me.
But you do have to buy meat from somewhere.
When I grew up, the meat in the grocery was not watered down. Now, you buy a piece of meat, not even sausage, say a steak or ground meat, and it reduces by half while cooking, and often refuses even to brown properly because of the water standing in the pan. Why? Reduction in quality, drive for profitability, you name it.
So, first you have to find a butcher that doesn't water down meat, cut or ground.
Maybe that is enough on this subject for now.
You may think I am crazy, to go from what I have been discussing to this. Fair enough.
I use freshly ground meat for sausage, when I bother with it. Why? There are many reasons. Trust me.
But you do have to buy meat from somewhere.
When I grew up, the meat in the grocery was not watered down. Now, you buy a piece of meat, not even sausage, say a steak or ground meat, and it reduces by half while cooking, and often refuses even to brown properly because of the water standing in the pan. Why? Reduction in quality, drive for profitability, you name it.
So, first you have to find a butcher that doesn't water down meat, cut or ground.
Maybe that is enough on this subject for now.
BANNON NYT CARTOON
One might also show Bannon stomping the flat newspaper.
He might be depicted, by someone as talented as Blitt, as one of Daumier's plump naked midgets!
Trump might, or might not, be doing a duet with him. Your choice.
WORLD IS FLAT CARTOON MATCHSTICK MAN
We see enormous mountains, some tree covered, around the periphery of the page, several extending well above the visible top of the page, others not.
They are each labeled with a term for these various civilizations, religions, or great powers: Asia, Islam, Russia, China, India, Europe, Japan, The Middle East, etc.
In the generous center of the page a flat expanse, a flat desert like plain, really, cactus, tumbleweeds, etc.
The viewer, looking at the cartoon from somewhat above ground level, can see in the foreground.
A newspaper on the plain, opened as if being read, but we see the front and back covers only of that section A.
The words New York Times are visible across the top of the front page. Across the top of the back page the words US Edition.
A monologue bubble, coming up from beneath the open, flat, newspaper reads: The world is flat.
L S Lowry's matchstick man - type legs and feet protrude beneath the newspaper, in the nearer foreground, flat on the ground
L S Lowry's matchstick man - type legs and feet protrude beneath the newspaper, in the nearer foreground, flat on the ground
RE BANNON SLAMS CORPORATIST GLOBALIST MEDIA
This, unfortunately, is what the West has had, for a long time now, a corporatist globalist media, at least in part since perhaps WWI.
Some would argue since 1789 really. I have to generalize, in this very brief account, quite a lot.................
Where did it begin? It began in the French Revolution.
Let's just put it this way for the attention challenged, The French Revolution and Napoleonic Era did not end well for the West, although at the time that has been the general impression given, after 1815.
We have been in its very long shadow ever since.
At some point, after Napoleon, in the 19th Century, this ideology of an international leftist liberal or socialist Jacobin order of the French Revolution morphed. It did so even before Napoleon.
It was turning into liberal bourgeoise, but still vestigially imperialist, and nominally still aristocratic in part Western capitalist internationalism.
This in turn became transformed into nationalism, sometimes with a leftist edge which still favored internationalism, but the memory of Napoleon had left a bad taste in the mouth for Jacobin internationalism, and, moreover, the liberal bourgeoise post Napoleonic capitalist and imperialist core continued to endured and even flowered, even with the simultaneous rise of nationalism, so long as it allowed free trade, which had been sanctioned since 1776 by Adam Smith.
The liberal internationalist capitalist bourgeoise order, still also monarchist and aristocratic to a large extent, is that from which the corporatist globalist media arose.
If Bannon wants to deconstruct the administrative federal state, he has nothing left with which to make America great again, except 50 different state governments and their respective local parts, and a federal military, assuming he wants to keep that, or else revert to 50 state militias.
RE LIBERALISM GOVERNMENT AND THE MEDIA DOUBLE STANDARDS
The media insist vehemently on their freedom of expression true or false, with only weak private remedies available against them, even though they often claim to hold a sacred trust to the public at large for truth and accuracy, and for education and welfare, almost as fiduciaries, rather like the obligations imposed on government in fact by law; they insist on the confidentiality of their sources, and of their work product itself, of their deliberations, and their financing, and influences on them monetary and otherwise, to the extent they can protect them from disclosure, verification or falsification.
On the other hand, they have always insisted even more vehemently on government in the complete sunshine where deliberative bodies cannot even meet privately, public and quasi public records full and complete access, and absolute transparency in government functions of all kinds. This is especially true at the local level. States and the federal government have some protection, but they are constantly challenged and invaded by going to employees directly, whether they would qualify as whistleblowers, or merely informants or not. Only during actual or seriously anticipated litigation are such contacts, going around responsible authorities to others within government, restricted under the law. Government confidential informants in criminal investigations and litigation are also protected, as exceptions to the rules of transparency and disclosure.
Re The NYT's video, the truth is more important than every:
The classic Hollywood cinema is filled, filled, with good, faithful illustrations of mostly power hungry, unscrupulous, evil, or just greedy, newspaper men, down through the decades, owners, editors, and reporters, the lot. No better in fact or in principle than the politicians, or the mafiosi, that they so cynically covered. Take a look, some time, at just some of it.
The best account I have read about the skillful use of the privacy of the media, versus the public exposure of government, which is routine then and now, is Quigley's account of the Flora Shaw Affair at The Times, regarding the Jamestown Raid and related issues, where a secret society colluded with a newspaper controlled by it and with the Salisbury government, setting part of the stage, politically and propagandistically, for WWI. Of course, the major difference is that the British government in its actions and deliberations was not at that time subject to sunshine laws, or public records laws to the extent modern American governments are. The Anglo-American Establishment, "The Times".
The best account I have read about the skillful use of the privacy of the media, versus the public exposure of government, which is routine then and now, is Quigley's account of the Flora Shaw Affair at The Times, regarding the Jamestown Raid and related issues, where a secret society colluded with a newspaper controlled by it and with the Salisbury government, setting part of the stage, politically and propagandistically, for WWI. Of course, the major difference is that the British government in its actions and deliberations was not at that time subject to sunshine laws, or public records laws to the extent modern American governments are. The Anglo-American Establishment, "The Times".
Terms search: Lorch
RE TRUMP TALKING ABOUT FAKE NEWS WAR PROPAGANDA AND THE MEDIA
http://www.filmsforaction.org/news/war-propaganda-and-the-media-a-detailed-primer-on-the-tactics-of-modern-war-propaganda/
Another interesting chapter is that re The London Times, in Quigley's The Anglo-American Establishment .
People may think, and it seems to me that Quigley himself led them to believe in the book, that the program of the Milner Group, as it had been transformed from Rhodes' day, somehow came to an end with the failures of its program that resulted in WWII, failures for which not only did it not take responsibility politically, then or later, but for which it transferred ostensible responsibility to Germany. Many people in the English speaking world continue to hold this view, because it was part of political and media propaganda even leading up to WWII, that Germany, and no other, had been solely responsible for WWI. It was an article of faith for FDR; see Beschloss, The Conquerors.
Thinking this would be a big mistake. Clearly not only the post WWII political institutional world owed a great deal to the Milner Group's continuing influence on those who fashioned this post war liberal international economic order, but many of the non governmental and private entities set up under the auspices of the Milner group have carried on until today. It seems clear to me that the NYT is such an entity, a legacy of the Milner Group program and propaganda, and especially of Curtis' ideas. The CFR, and the journal Foreign Affairs, are direct lineal descendants.
These topics are anything but new. Since the development of mass media going back to mass printing, it has been used, along with manipulation of non media social and political features of society, to influence or bring about outcomes for or against a particular political objective or regime. There were real conspiracies, fake conspiracies, covert operations, overt influence, media use and abuse of all kinds, as well as straight diplomacy. Palmer's The Age of the Democratic Revolution has passages throughout recounting episodes of this kind, all over Europe and America, connected with actions for or against a particular regime or objective.
One can go back almost to the beginning, when Sophists were accused, rightly or wrongly, of making the worse argument appear the better.
These topics are anything but new. Since the development of mass media going back to mass printing, it has been used, along with manipulation of non media social and political features of society, to influence or bring about outcomes for or against a particular political objective or regime. There were real conspiracies, fake conspiracies, covert operations, overt influence, media use and abuse of all kinds, as well as straight diplomacy. Palmer's The Age of the Democratic Revolution has passages throughout recounting episodes of this kind, all over Europe and America, connected with actions for or against a particular regime or objective.
One can go back almost to the beginning, when Sophists were accused, rightly or wrongly, of making the worse argument appear the better.
Friday, February 24, 2017
RE TRUMP'S AGENDA
He cannot embark seriously on a make America great again program and at the same time shrink the federal government.
Not only would such an effort require enormous resources and central planning, but it would also require a different ideological and constitutional framework than the one we have always had.
Trump has not been heading in that direction at all. He wants to shrink the federal government, and at the same time use it to make America great again somehow.
His program so far, expelling illegals, limiting legals, imposing some tariffs, yelling at CEOs and threatening tax and duties, these things alone or together are not really anywhere near enough.
One would need something as elaborate as the reconstruction and developmental efforts of Japan, MITI and the Japanese Miracle, a sort of Marshall Plan for the US, full scale reindustrialization and enhanced cutthroat global raw materials procurement programs, domestic labor training programs on a large scale, vast import substitution, major reimposed tariff and nontariff barriers, incentives and subsidies of all kinds, rationing, embargo, etc., currency and finance coordination, to get anywhere. As I have pointed out, this would almost certainly lead to war in the near term.
In the past, we have only been able to move in such a coordinated nationwide program under conditions of war.
Now, war is the thing to avoid for various good reasons. Yet, Trump seems geared for military conflict.
We cannot make ourselves great again by war, under present conditions, but rather would accomplish the opposite.
Now, war is the thing to avoid for various good reasons. Yet, Trump seems geared for military conflict.
We cannot make ourselves great again by war, under present conditions, but rather would accomplish the opposite.
RE NYT BROOKS THE NATIONAL DEATH WISH DENMARK STUDY FALLOWS FALLACY CASTAWAYS
What more pleasant work would unemployed, felonized, non union, broke, part time, Americans be freed up to do in the fast food economy here, were more foreign workers than are already pouring over the border invited in?
He uses construction work as his example. It is one of those areas which cannot be off shored, for labor, although large US based construction firms have foreign operations, using foreign workers.
he discusses contractors raising wages. They usually rely on cheap labor. His example of a wage of $28 in Colorado bears no relation to reality in the real world he likes to refer to.
And why, after all, is construction so cyclical? Think about it.
What now remains of the source of Brooks' river?
His river is becoming a stream, a trickle really, not so much because of legal immigration at all, but the other thing of which he has been such a fan and still is, the ocean of globalization. That is where the stream flows.
Brooks wants to help everyone flow to the job they want to take. Roseate image.
Their dream job is now located on Gilligan's Island, Et In Arcadia Ego, in the globalized ocean we have created, not on the shore of the trickle of jobs here.
His model for America is a swampy, multicultural, cess pool like swampy coastland area, adjacent to the outfall of his trickle down stream, lacking land use regulations, regarding which even he complains about the aesthetic stench, Houston.
Land use regulations should be the least of Brooks' concerns, given his world view.
Most of his desirable illegal immigrants (the great bulk of immigrants) in fact come from areas without decent drinking water, much less good land use regulations. They are grateful even for a place to take a clean crap. If he thinks Houston leaves a little land use something to be desired, he needs to get a load of Bombay, Shanghai, Mexico City, Manaus, Casablanca, or Jakarta, to say nothing of cities in the Middle East.
His last paragraph is sort of a tour de force of sophism, where he rails against the so called Zero Sum, static minded, slow growth liberals of the 70s, such as Lester Thurow. Thurow wanted income redistribution, as the solution, much as Piketty recently has. Thurow ignored, much as Piketty has as well, the huge problem of the movement of production and prosperity elsewhere as a result of globalization.
In this sense, both parties have spent since the 1930s, together, selling out the average American, and the domestic economy, for their both left and right globalist agenda, favoring mainly the elites of both parties.
It is now global income convergence, rather than income disparity only within the West, that has become the 800 pound gorrilla in the room which no economist can safely touch because it is the gorilla which their policies have brought into being.
Brooks was to the right of the vital center, back then, Thurow to the left.
Now he's to the left of what it used to be, but exists no more. It has been disastrous for all Americans, for the past 70 years, either way.
Brooks thinks his views represent freedom, dynamism, and ingenuity.
Incredible, really.
It is hard to be either dynamic or ingenious, after you have been hollowed out by Japan and then squashed flat by China.
Brooks is rolling with the punches now from the right, formerly his own right, and attacking a low hanging centrist fruit, a couple of senators, he imagines as reincarnations of a so called liberal left, but also itself a globalist left, back then, not a nationalist left which unfortunately we never ever had.
In the globalist ocean of average wage convergence, there is almost no where left to swim to reach dry land, except an occasional island. Most of what will pass for land, in the globalist ocean, will be swampy coastal grassland areas, like Houston.
Terms search: Gilligan's Island, offshoring
Brooks wants to help everyone flow to the job they want to take. Roseate image.
Their dream job is now located on Gilligan's Island, Et In Arcadia Ego, in the globalized ocean we have created, not on the shore of the trickle of jobs here.
His model for America is a swampy, multicultural, cess pool like swampy coastland area, adjacent to the outfall of his trickle down stream, lacking land use regulations, regarding which even he complains about the aesthetic stench, Houston.
Land use regulations should be the least of Brooks' concerns, given his world view.
Most of his desirable illegal immigrants (the great bulk of immigrants) in fact come from areas without decent drinking water, much less good land use regulations. They are grateful even for a place to take a clean crap. If he thinks Houston leaves a little land use something to be desired, he needs to get a load of Bombay, Shanghai, Mexico City, Manaus, Casablanca, or Jakarta, to say nothing of cities in the Middle East.
His last paragraph is sort of a tour de force of sophism, where he rails against the so called Zero Sum, static minded, slow growth liberals of the 70s, such as Lester Thurow. Thurow wanted income redistribution, as the solution, much as Piketty recently has. Thurow ignored, much as Piketty has as well, the huge problem of the movement of production and prosperity elsewhere as a result of globalization.
In this sense, both parties have spent since the 1930s, together, selling out the average American, and the domestic economy, for their both left and right globalist agenda, favoring mainly the elites of both parties.
It is now global income convergence, rather than income disparity only within the West, that has become the 800 pound gorrilla in the room which no economist can safely touch because it is the gorilla which their policies have brought into being.
Brooks was to the right of the vital center, back then, Thurow to the left.
Now he's to the left of what it used to be, but exists no more. It has been disastrous for all Americans, for the past 70 years, either way.
Brooks thinks his views represent freedom, dynamism, and ingenuity.
Incredible, really.
It is hard to be either dynamic or ingenious, after you have been hollowed out by Japan and then squashed flat by China.
Brooks is rolling with the punches now from the right, formerly his own right, and attacking a low hanging centrist fruit, a couple of senators, he imagines as reincarnations of a so called liberal left, but also itself a globalist left, back then, not a nationalist left which unfortunately we never ever had.
In the globalist ocean of average wage convergence, there is almost no where left to swim to reach dry land, except an occasional island. Most of what will pass for land, in the globalist ocean, will be swampy coastal grassland areas, like Houston.
Terms search: Gilligan's Island, offshoring
Thursday, February 23, 2017
BANNON ECONOMIC NATIONALISM
I thought I was perhaps the only person who considered himself an ' economic nationalist '.
I had agreed with Professor Kaiser regarding this aspect of Trump's campaign rhetoric. I never seriously thought he would actually try to implement economic populist nationalism in any serious way if elected. (I even thought he might succumb to the Kennedy Fallacy in that regard. See my blog and DK's.) I doubt that many people did.
I thought that the religious conservatism aspect of his campaign rhetoric was much more important both to him and his constituents, and its anti Islamic apocalypticism aspect was the most troubling thing about him.
Terms search this blog: economic nationalism, economic nationalist
I knew I had not coined this term. I did not guess that anyone like Bannon would come along, some day, and take it over for what he claims he is doing. Maybe he read my blog....
I had agreed with Professor Kaiser regarding this aspect of Trump's campaign rhetoric. I never seriously thought he would actually try to implement economic populist nationalism in any serious way if elected. (I even thought he might succumb to the Kennedy Fallacy in that regard. See my blog and DK's.) I doubt that many people did.
I thought that the religious conservatism aspect of his campaign rhetoric was much more important both to him and his constituents, and its anti Islamic apocalypticism aspect was the most troubling thing about him.
Terms search this blog: economic nationalism, economic nationalist
I knew I had not coined this term. I did not guess that anyone like Bannon would come along, some day, and take it over for what he claims he is doing. Maybe he read my blog....
I had thought that I was the only person bemoaning the fact that we had not implemented economic nationalism, many decades ago, while we still might have. He doesn't seem to even see that point.....
Sadly, it is no longer a live option, (another very very important point he doesn't see), just at the time when Bannon is trying now, apparently, to begin to roll it out.
As I have said, a real economic nationalist program would be enormously expensive, require enlarging and really rationalizing the federal government, require the US avoiding war, but would itself very likely result in a major war among nations which, especially since WWII, have come to be deeply integrated into the American sponsored global economy with us, and which now consider it a species of birthright. Terms search: Marshall Plan
Professor Kaiser must be as disappointed that Bannon adopted S & H as I am that he calls himself an economic nationalist!
Sadly, it is no longer a live option, (another very very important point he doesn't see), just at the time when Bannon is trying now, apparently, to begin to roll it out.
As I have said, a real economic nationalist program would be enormously expensive, require enlarging and really rationalizing the federal government, require the US avoiding war, but would itself very likely result in a major war among nations which, especially since WWII, have come to be deeply integrated into the American sponsored global economy with us, and which now consider it a species of birthright. Terms search: Marshall Plan
Professor Kaiser must be as disappointed that Bannon adopted S & H as I am that he calls himself an economic nationalist!
JOCHEN BITTNER JOHN LENNON STEVE BANNON
This editorial sums it up nicely. It doesn't get much of the history behind the present situation. It favors Lennon over Bannon, as the West has done at least since 1789.
The big problem for Bittner's position now is that all the evidence has been that if you believe in the viability of civilizations, such as the West, you have to be wary of Lennonist globalization.
It you really want a West, or a Western nation state with any real cultural or economic integrity, then you can't really also have a Lennon world. They are mutually exclusive.
I don't really know what Bannon's ideal world would ultimately look like, and if he were merely a neoWesternizer for the West, which I doubt, he came much too late for that.
Bittner's analysis highlights, it seems to me, some of the limitations and errors of Bannon's position. Bittner paints Bannon as a basically secular ideologue. I question that. He also characterizes hims as ok with free trade.
One begins to see Bannon, under Bittner's view, as just a little more conservative liberal, with a strong anti Islamist bent. I don't think Bannon is quite in that mold, but maybe I am wrong.
Bannon does seem to have inherited, parenthetically, the same prejudice against Islam for which I criticized Huntington's The Clash, although as I have pointed out, The Clash has a lot of other very very insightful civilizational analysis as well.
Bittner, like other liberals, wants to see, and hopes he sees, a return to a center, a so called vital center, really, like the one I have already criticized here for having gotten us into this globalization trap in the first place.
But, as with others like Brooks, Thomas Friedman, Krugman, et al, they fail to see the hopelessness of Western Lennonist liberalism and its vital center, the very thing that caused the decline of the West under its own sponsorship of globalization.
It has lead to relative decline of the West. It is leading to average or median income convergence across a globalized work force. It has not, and will not, lead to peace, as its Lennonist proponents have claimed going back to Cobden, etc., in the 19th Century.
You can kid yourself about it. Do the numbers. Not Piketty's, mine. It is basic math. Even Martin Schulz could do it, even though he didn't graduate from high school. He must be a talented rhetor.
Bittner's analysis highlights, it seems to me, some of the limitations and errors of Bannon's position. Bittner paints Bannon as a basically secular ideologue. I question that. He also characterizes hims as ok with free trade.
One begins to see Bannon, under Bittner's view, as just a little more conservative liberal, with a strong anti Islamist bent. I don't think Bannon is quite in that mold, but maybe I am wrong.
Bannon does seem to have inherited, parenthetically, the same prejudice against Islam for which I criticized Huntington's The Clash, although as I have pointed out, The Clash has a lot of other very very insightful civilizational analysis as well.
Bittner, like other liberals, wants to see, and hopes he sees, a return to a center, a so called vital center, really, like the one I have already criticized here for having gotten us into this globalization trap in the first place.
But, as with others like Brooks, Thomas Friedman, Krugman, et al, they fail to see the hopelessness of Western Lennonist liberalism and its vital center, the very thing that caused the decline of the West under its own sponsorship of globalization.
It has lead to relative decline of the West. It is leading to average or median income convergence across a globalized work force. It has not, and will not, lead to peace, as its Lennonist proponents have claimed going back to Cobden, etc., in the 19th Century.
You can kid yourself about it. Do the numbers. Not Piketty's, mine. It is basic math. Even Martin Schulz could do it, even though he didn't graduate from high school. He must be a talented rhetor.
Wednesday, February 22, 2017
RE TRUMP RESCINDS RULES ON TRANSGENDER BATHROOMS
What is transgender?
Simon says.
Here's a solution tailored for America:
skip separate bathrooms, for anyone.
The next step: skip public bathrooms entirely. Why not strike at this definitional problem at its root?
Private bathrooms can still call them anything they want, and segregate them any way they want.
What about PPPs?
Simon says.
Here's a solution tailored for America:
skip separate bathrooms, for anyone.
The next step: skip public bathrooms entirely. Why not strike at this definitional problem at its root?
Private bathrooms can still call them anything they want, and segregate them any way they want.
What about PPPs?
TRUMP PUTIN DIALOGUE
P: You want Snowden?
T: Naw, you can keep im.
P: Tanks.
T: What are friends for?
T: Naw, you can keep im.
P: Tanks.
T: What are friends for?
I THOUGHT THIS WAS RATHER GOOD
SOMEONE SAW IT WHY NOT REPRISE IT:
RACIST UNIRACIALISM UNIRELIGIONISM GLOBALISM MELTINGPOTISM
RACIST UNIRACIALISM UNIRELIGIONISM GLOBALISM MELTINGPOTISM
RE MEET THE 5 TRUMP ADMINISTRATIONS THOMAS L FRIEDMAN
I am actually enjoying this: Friedman writhing in the first anti globalization administration Friedman, or any of his liberal international economic order bi partisan globalization cronies has ever faced.
Trump is the ugly, too late, unhelpful, unreasoned, frank, aggressive, paranoid, overboard American response to Friedman's brand of liberal flat world international economic order globalization. His represents the only kind of response a country set up like America could have made.
It is more wrong than the liberal economic globalization disease we ourselves promulgated, in the end after WWII, on ourselves and the West in the first place.
Trump can't really shut down globalization, at this point, without really getting into a major disastrous global war.
He wouldn't know how to do it, were it even still feasible, by other means, although he is trying some of them.
He struggles with other means: immigration, deportation, tariffs, bullying MNCs verbally and threat of adverse economic measures, etc.
Trust me, they won't work at this late date. War won't work either, much worse. Cul de sac.
THE FIFTH CENTURY ENLIGHTENMENT NOMOS PHYSIS DISTINCTION
This was a pivotal distinction, developed at this time. At the simplest, it was a distinction between, or a relationship between, law, convention, and custom, nomos; and what was conceived of as nature, physis.
'Once the view had gained currency that laws, customs and conventions (nomoi) were not part of the immutable order of things (nature, physis), it was possible to adopt very different attitudes towards them.'
A code of laws drawn up by a human lawgiver...could not, ostensibly, be accepted in the old way as part of the everlasting order of things...
On the other hand, the Greeks had long seen laws in the making, yet still had attributed their force and validity to Apollo (immutable order of things, both divine and natural), advising the legislator through the oracle at Delphi.
There had also developed by this time a distinction within the concept of nomoi, but one identifying certain nomoi with the divine and with physis, a pietistic distinction if you will, between written and unwritten laws, wherein the unwritten laws of the gods regarding mens' conduct trumped mens' written ones.
In contradistinction from the written unwritten distinction, there rose a thread of thought maybe tending toward agnosticism or atheism, with nomos in the ascendancy in a sense over physis, seen in Euripides' Hecuba's plea for mercy that nomos is master of the gods because it is by nomos that we believe in them. See Guthrie, V. 3.
There had also developed by this time a distinction within the concept of nomoi, but one identifying certain nomoi with the divine and with physis, a pietistic distinction if you will, between written and unwritten laws, wherein the unwritten laws of the gods regarding mens' conduct trumped mens' written ones.
In contradistinction from the written unwritten distinction, there rose a thread of thought maybe tending toward agnosticism or atheism, with nomos in the ascendancy in a sense over physis, seen in Euripides' Hecuba's plea for mercy that nomos is master of the gods because it is by nomos that we believe in them. See Guthrie, V. 3.
Tuesday, February 21, 2017
RE THIS CENTURY IS BROKEN ANOTHER STUDY IN THE FALLOWS FALLACY
The last century was broken first. People like Brooks just did not see it unfolding against them, and their Democratic adversaries.
As he says, they all thought they were growing up in great times. (Great mainly for the middle and upper middle income groups, of course. The word class doesn't really ring true, over here.)
Those good times were temporary, frankly mainly more a matter of luck than anything else, and concealed a disastrous situation largely of our own, and pundits like Brooks', making, unfolding just beneath the surface.
PLATO DEMOCRACY AND MERITOCRACY
One of his most telling criticisms of Athenian democracy was of its rejection of merit as a criterion of government service.
He viewed experts, and special expertise, useful, in fact essential, as against the Athenian democratic tendency, and willingness, to place anyone, regardless of prior knowledge, skill, or expertise, in positions of authority in the city state.
Re the issue, experts versus amateurs, in grand strategy, today, Cf NYT article today: Can McMaster Stabilize Trump's Foreign Policy Team?
Certain of the Sophists recommended just rhetoric, since the successful rhetorician (politician) could then get all the experts, of whatever stripe, he needed and wanted.....
Re the issue, experts versus amateurs, in grand strategy, today, Cf NYT article today: Can McMaster Stabilize Trump's Foreign Policy Team?
Certain of the Sophists recommended just rhetoric, since the successful rhetorician (politician) could then get all the experts, of whatever stripe, he needed and wanted.....
RE THE FIFTH CENTURY ENLIGHTENMENT CONTINUED
'I have spoken as if the political circumstances and public actions of the Greek states gave rise to the irreligious and utilitarian moral theories of the thinkers and teachers, but it is more likely that practice and theory acted and reacted mutually on one another....In Plato's opinion it was not they (and, by implication, Socrates) who should be blamed for infecting the young with pernicious thoughts, for they were doing no more than mirror the lusts and passions of the existing democracy....', Guthrie, V. 3, p 20, Plato, Republic, 493a. My comment in parenthesis.
THE US HAS BEEN AN ECONOMIC PLAYGROUND FOR RECONSTRUCTION EUROPE AND THE DEVELOPMENTAL ASIAN WORLD
Just as Germany, Prussia, and Austria had been for Napoleon both economically and militarily.
Monday, February 20, 2017
YOU ONLY DIE TWICE HOLLOWED OUT BY JAPAN THEN FLATTENED BY CHINA
Fattening and flattening!
Japan and China: Fattening them up, and flattening us down.
Thomas Friedman got something right: the world sure does look flat, to Americans.
Here's a post they seem to like, from 2010:
Japan and China: Fattening them up, and flattening us down.
Thomas Friedman got something right: the world sure does look flat, to Americans.
Here's a post they seem to like, from 2010:
HUAN TRADING PLACES MISE EN SCENE HOG TIED YOU ONLY DIE TWICE
Terms search: fattening things up, hollowing hollowed out
Terms search: fattening things up, hollowing hollowed out
RE TRUMP-MURDOCH AXIS
Murdoch controls an empire based on the kinds of things the media has been mostly made of, muckraking. It often has an ideological edge.
Sometimes, they have an actual ideological ax to grind, apart from the muck.
They are often almost as dangerous as pure ideologues than as ideological muckrakers.
RE THE BIGGEST THREAT DK POST
"Two weeks ago I suggested that the Republicans would try to undo the expansion of the role of the federal government since 1933, if not since 1901..." DK
I made a comment on his site, so hesitate to clutter it up again, but here is another observation.
It seems obvious that Trump's Presidency is not actually the biggest threat, domestically, and that, itself, is a huge qualification, because I believe the biggest threats are elsewhere.
But to continue with threats on the domestic scene, it seems to me that recent history, for decades now, clearly shows that a strong tendency of the Republican Party has been to go back and undo the expansion of the role of the federal government, not just since 1933, or even 1901.
The real, and deeper, goal is to undo the federal expansion effected after the Civil War in 1865. I believe that this is plain for anyone who has reviewed that history to see.
I believe, for example, that the post Civil War constitutional amendments, rammed through by a Northern Congress after 1865, during a Reconstruction Era of martial law and terror throughout the South which went on for many years, at a time when the South was not actually yet represented again in Congress, are finally now back on the table.
Here is an old post from 2011. I am with Franklyn, as he stood at that time. The Civil War was not a joinder:
I believe, for example, that the post Civil War constitutional amendments, rammed through by a Northern Congress after 1865, during a Reconstruction Era of martial law and terror throughout the South which went on for many years, at a time when the South was not actually yet represented again in Congress, are finally now back on the table.
Here is an old post from 2011. I am with Franklyn, as he stood at that time. The Civil War was not a joinder:
Sunday, August 7, 2011
RE WIN TOGETHER OR LOSE TOGETHER THOMAS FRIEDMAN NYT EDITORIAL JOIN OR DIE ALL OVER AGAIN
WIN TOGETHER OR LOSE TOGETHER
We are still, politically, deep down, weak as a kitten.
He, Friedman, actually has some good, or not so bad as usual, ideas this time: Rogoff, mortgages, etc. He actually sounds a little like a 'communist' here. But all within the context of the existing 'framework' of course.
Unfortunately, not much has changed, really, regarding this framework, since the Albany Congress of 1754.
Maybe that is one reason why so many Americans are disenchanted with the current Congress members' performance: it pretends to portray a united entity.
But that was never what the colonists, from each colony, or perhaps more accurately, each big town, wanted, for various reasons. And it was not what they, or we, got.
What was that Conference about? Not what you may think.
A video reference: Before 1776, Allison, Teaching Company, Lecture 29.
We are still, politically, deep down, weak as a kitten.
He, Friedman, actually has some good, or not so bad as usual, ideas this time: Rogoff, mortgages, etc. He actually sounds a little like a 'communist' here. But all within the context of the existing 'framework' of course.
Unfortunately, not much has changed, really, regarding this framework, since the Albany Congress of 1754.
Maybe that is one reason why so many Americans are disenchanted with the current Congress members' performance: it pretends to portray a united entity.
But that was never what the colonists, from each colony, or perhaps more accurately, each big town, wanted, for various reasons. And it was not what they, or we, got.
What was that Conference about? Not what you may think.
A video reference: Before 1776, Allison, Teaching Company, Lecture 29.
Sunday, February 19, 2017
PAGE VIEW SNAPSHOT TONIGHT
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RE POPULISM NATIONALISM LIBERALISM AND WHAT IS CALLED RIGHT OR LEFT WING
This is one of the vexed questions facing all people, especially in the West, now.
Its roots go back several hundred years at least.
America got rid of most of its nationalist, and globalist, socialists, by attrition, over many decades. We never had much of a nationalist socialist trade union presence, such as that of Britain. Our so called left now actually plays a very small role in politics here, in spite of Sanders' candidacy, since they have almost no national industrial material employment base from which to operate any more.
Liberals are mostly globalist, not very nationalistic, not particularly Western Civilization oriented, not especially committed to any particular state, city, country, or Western Civilization itself. They often think of themselves now as proto citizens of the world.
Most Americans, but not all, by any means, who think of themselves as conservatives, are also somewhat nationalistic, lately.
These people are usually characterized, especially by so called liberals, from whom they may be distinguished, as populists, usually of limited means, which is a code word among liberals for nationalist fascism.
But some other conservatives, who are usually not also nationalists, and who are often wealthy to very wealthy, are globalists, in contradistinction from being nationalist populist, conservatives.
They are conservative globalists, also on the so called right, and that means that they believe that both individuals and private entities, usually corporations, should be able to do whatever they want, anywhere. They believe in having a government, but with limited control over their activities.
There are also conservative civil libertarians who can be conservative globalists, but there are other conservative civil libertarians who are more a species of anarchist, and are not globalists. They believe in no government anywhere, not just limited government here and there.
Maybe I will augment this account anon.
I know this seemingly repetitive terminological rat's nest is hard to follow. It was a little hard to write, but these crazy distinctions, and relations seem to me to characterize what we now have.
They are generally globalists of one stripe or another; or nationalists of one stripe or another, often somewhat overlapping; or anarchists, and even these may be globalists as has happened in history, as well as nativists (nationalists here is the wrong word, for them).
I know this seemingly repetitive terminological rat's nest is hard to follow. It was a little hard to write, but these crazy distinctions, and relations seem to me to characterize what we now have.
They are generally globalists of one stripe or another; or nationalists of one stripe or another, often somewhat overlapping; or anarchists, and even these may be globalists as has happened in history, as well as nativists (nationalists here is the wrong word, for them).
RE RHODE ISLAND SLAVE TRADE
I listened to a good part of a podcast by a professor of history somewhere, about colonial history re mainly slavery.
She dodn't get into indentured servitude, except to note that after slavery was aboloshied the children of slaves were to be indentured rather than enslaved. Nice touch.
One of her main points is that the history of America has been sanitized, but sanitized in a peculiear way. According to her account, slavery had been a national rather than a southern disease. She cites innumerable facts to show how the colony, and later state, of Rhode Island was literally built on the slave trade almost from the beginning. It had started out, after all, as a lawless refuge for religious refugees, often exiles, from Massachusetts. I didn't hear all of it, but the financing for slavery in the South was based, on what I know, completely in Northern, I guess mainly New York, banks.
The South has been portrayed, since the Civil War, even by knowledgeable historians like Professor Kaiser, as the site of a horrid disease, slavery. The North was innoculated, or even had always somehow been immune, from this terrible social disease, as the story goes.
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