Joe Rogan recorded a 10 minute statement about the Spotify controversy Neil Young has created: https://youtu.be/8MYzpf007VY
I think most all here would appreciate Rogan’s measured remarks. He does a good job of explaining the credentials of the guests folks are upset about as well as explaining why he likes to feature differing viewpoints on his show.
Pedestrian stuff. Would have been completely mainstream even a decade ago. They are guests “Meet the Press” and other boring, Sunday morning shows would have featured two decades ago. Rogan is very polite and open, even mentions several times how much he likes Neil Young’s music. Rogan’s upbeat and open manner of address make Young look even more ignorant.
I know Rogan’s a comedian, but I am still convinced this is unintentional, yet it is hilarious: At one point he mentions how much he also loves Joni Mitchell’s music and he singles out, “Chuck E’s in Love!” I really believe that was unintended but it’s an hilarious joke regarding her and Young’s relevance!
I’m glad your electricity is working today. How was the weekend?
The abrupt abandonment of Afghanistan left hundreds, if not thousands, of US citizens, green-card holders and other folks involved with NGOs there without a way out or any degree of safety. Why has the whole thing been abandoned by the media? What is being done? who is or isn’t doing it?
Not to make light of those stuck in it, but this should be seen as more important than 2 feet of snow in Boston.
Fabulous video. Terrific song.
(To paraphrase Marlow, “The voices, the voices…”…. I’m a sucker for a voice I really like…)
Thanks!
(But I wonder…might this be Dr. Jill’s version? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCGD9dT12C0 )
– – – – – – – –
Meanwhile, back in the Covid news mosh pit, Ivermectin raises its hoary (therapeutic) head again…unfortunately for some who’d like to CANCEL it—including doctors and health officials (a tad strange, that…)—but most fortunately for those whose lives it saved…:
“‘Day three of controversial ”horse de-wormer”. I’m feeling pretty much back to normal…’: Laurence Fox claims to have successfully treated himself with Ivermectin…”— https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10459073/Laurence-Fox-reveals-Covid-treating-horse-medicine.html
“Telling me lies.” “Telling me lies.”
Well, from recent history, it appears that, to a greater and great extent, practically everyone in authority has been telling us lies–certainly the MSM, the vast majority of our supposed ” public health/medical authorities,” practically every politician, quite a few of our intelligence and military authorities, our educational authorities, law enforcement, etc., etc.
In fact, it’s hard to know who hasn’t tried, particularly in the last few years, to sell us a pack of lies.
The question then becomes, is there a point at which so many lies are told–and so widely–that public faith in the whole society collapses, and that society can no longer function as anything like what it used to be?
See, for example, the old U.S.S.R.
“The question then becomes,….”
I’m pretty sure that’s “Biden”‘s fall-back plan (i.e., if he can’t “successfully” torpedo the country, actively, then he’ll rely on—and give “himself” a pat on the back for—destroying the country “passively”, IOW by hollowing out and corroding its foundations in termite-like fashion while disintegrating any and all socio/historical cohesion and civility that might bind its citizens together for the greater, or common, good).
AKA “Win-win” in “Biden”ese…
Wouldn’t you think that musicians that are “passed it” (classical reference) would like that Rogan is bring listener to the music?
Barry Meislin–
As I’ve commented here before, we are rather quickly going from being one of the few–and perhaps the only real example of a reasonably functional “high trust” society–one major reason for our society’s functionality, social and economic progress precisely our “high trust” levels–into an example of the norm for most current day countries/societies, the all too common and dysfunctional “low trust” society.
In such a “low trust” society lasting progress is very difficult to achieve and rare, this because everyone thinks (and they’re probably right) that everyone else is lying to them to get something they want, no one trusts anyone else, everyone views everyone else as their enemy–out to do them harm, or to take something from them that is theirs; a Balkanized, tribal society, with each individual out for himself, or his family or locality, and no one sees any advantage in cooperating.
And in a similar vein, HSCC’s cover of the Christine McVie song about lies:
Love the foxes. Amazing voices. A note, the gentleman on the red guitar with the green shirt and white goatee recently passed. RIP.
David Foster at Chicagoboyz on the Great Liquidation:
“America is hanging by a thread. A great liquidation is underway, with many of the structures that support American society..or, in some cases, any viable society…being kicked away, sold off piecemeal, or just wantonly destroyed. I’m talking about physical structures, legal structures, and social structures.”
we are rather quickly going from being one of the few–and perhaps the only real example of a reasonably functional “high trust” society
C’mon. We’re just us. Be satisfied to just be us.
There’s a couple dozen countries which have been consistently functional and prosperous over the last century, at least when they were not subject to conquest by malicious neighbors.
“the catastrophe of 2021 was no accident, but a tactic in service of a strategy.”
Nice close harmony.
When you think about it, a lot of things in our society rely on us being a “high trust” society.
Take, for instance, the U.S. Postal Service, which relies on the fact that when they deliver mail to your post office box or mailbox, someone is not going to follow along behind them and steal your mail. Yet, more and more, that is apparently what is happening.
Then, there is Amazon and all the other outfits that deliver things you’ve bought to your doorstep, with the expectation that these items are safe until you come out of your door to pick them up.
Yet, if Youtube is to be believed, more and more “Porch pirates” (notice the effort here to both trivialize and romanticize theft by terming it such) are swarming–all over the country–to swoop down on your porch and snatch your goods.
To take another example, it used to be the case that you could pretty much trust someone’s word.
Now, though, there seems to be an ever growing epidemic—not of disease, but of phony veterans—infesting the land.
People who, quite often, were never in the military at all, but who are claiming not only to be veterans, but to have been highly decorated soldiers, or sometimes POWs, and to have been members of elite fighting groups like Delta force, Force Recon, or Navy Seals, running phony “veteran’s charities,” etc.
Moreover using forged DD-214s (official discharge summary) and a whole bunch of lies to claim VA benefits they’re not entitled to, to go to the head of the line, to be publicly honored, to get the girl, get the job or mortgage, and to steal from them the honor that actual vets deserve.
How many of these phony veterans are there running around?
No one knows for sure, and it appears that our authorities do not want to make any effort find out, but it appears that they are in the tens or, collectively, possibly in the hundreds of thousands.
Senior Chief Petty Officer Don Shipley, a former SEAL who tracks down and exposes phony SEALS, says that he has personally dealt with thousands of such phonies, and that’s primarily just phony SEALS.
The Stolen Valor thing goes WAAAY back, but I’m not at all surprised to hear that it’s increased lately.
Neo–For one outstanding example of Stolen Valor, a whole slew of phonies claim to have been awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, but the actual number of living recipients is currently only 66.
Who here has even heard of Harry Elmer Barnes and Charles Beard?
Certainly not me. Gone With the Wind.
Eva Marie @ 2:20pm,
Michael Palin of Monty Python fame did a several part series on traveling in North Korea. I highly recommend it. He was always my favorite Python on the show and the more I’ve learned about him in ensuing years he seems like an impressive man; honest, earnest, intelligent, kind.
He’s made quite a few travel shows and I’ve seen most of them (I think). There’s one where he attempts to go from the North Pole to the South Pole (the series is named, “Pole to Pole”) sticking to land as much as possible (minimal planes, helicopters and boats). I found it very fascinating. He gets incredibly bogged down in Africa and eventually has to break the rules to keep the series going. It wasn’t the intention of the series, but one comes away from it with an elevated understanding of how difficult African politics are among its many nations.
It’s fascinating watching him navigate North Korea while being careful to not offend his hosts, knowing they would halt the production if they sensed he was doing anything unfavorable.
Snow on Pine @5:26pm,
I know a woman whose son was severely, permanently disabled in a very high profile, botched robbery (her son was a completely innocent victim in a very public, “safe” place). It was a BIG, local news story due to the location.
A member of her family had to devote hours and hours of time, for weeks, deplatforming fake fund raising sites con artists were continuously creating. Her son did eventually get some money from a real “Go Fund Me” for his care, but at least twice as much was donated to bogus sights and he never saw any of that money.
How low does one have to be to “steal the valor” of a cripple?
Re: To give you some idea of the magnitude of the Stolen Valor epidemic , on a tv interview a couple of years ago Don Shipley put the number of phonies he had personally found, as of that time, as between 9 and 10 thousand.
To clarify, most of the phony SEALS/veterans Don Shipley dealt with were apparently dealt with over the phone, and only in a few cases did Don Shipley actually confront them in person.
ace.mu.nu has a news item about a mom who left her 9 and 11 year old kids home alone in Connecticut for three days while she vacationed in Florida. I’ve printed the text below.
She doesn’t sound like a great mom, but is what she did necessarily wrong? I’m pretty sure my folks vacationed together, leaving my sister and me home alone around the same ages. 11 years old? Sixth grade? I was definitely capable of getting myself to school, buying groceries, cooking, getting myself to bed and awake in the morning… in sixth grade. My sister and I had one set of grandparents about 1.5 miles away, the other set about two miles away and assorted Aunts, Uncles and cousins 1 – 3 miles from our home. Our relatives were aware we were alone and were available if needed. So our situation was far less risky.
Am I mis-remembering or overestimating the resourcefulness of sixth graders?
JANUARY 20–A Connecticut teacher left her two children at home alone while she vacationed with her boyfriend in Florida, according to investigators who say the woman told the minors to stay out of sight in the residence’s basement and “just eat candy” for dinner.
Kerry Caviasca, 36, was arrested Saturday on reckless endangerment and risk of injury charges in connection with her three-day trip to the Sunshine State in late-November. Caviasca is free on $5000 bond in advance of a January 25 Superior Court hearing.
Police began investigating Caviasca after her ex-husband reported that she had left the children, ages 9 and 11, alone in a Watertown residence.
@ Zaphod > “Who here has even heard of Harry Elmer Barnes and Charles Beard?”
Barnes, no idea.
But, I had to read Beard’s book, An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States (1913), in graduate school (MA, Political Science). That was at UT Austin in the 1970s, not exactly a hot-bed of conservative thought, but not so brain-dead woke as it is now.
However, although I thought at the time he made some good points, I wasn’t swayed enough by his arguments to join the liberal sort-of-throng of professors & students (not yet the vast majority they are today).
This is a pretty fair summation, based on my now-50-year-old memory.
I have not revisited the book since then.
That the Founders had economic interests is not debatable; that those interests were their primary purpose for leading the rebellion against Britain, and then writing the Constitution, most certainly is.
Beard was the Hannah-Jones of the 20th century.
That his ideas, though published so early, were still being debated (or at least taught) 60 years later (and still going strong, according to this link), is a marvel in itself; it shows the perseverance of the Left in pushing their social theories in academics until they finally take control.
https://study.com/academy/lesson/creation-of-the-us-constitution-charles-beards-interpretation.html
“Beard was arguing that America’s Founders adopted the U.S. Constitution primarily out of economic self-interest.
In formulating this interpretation, Beard drew from the scholarship of another famous historian named Carl L. Becker. Becker had argued the American Revolution really consisted of two revolutions: one against Great Britain for independence and the other a conflict to decide who should rule in the absence of British authority. Beard took this idea and ran with it. Beard conceived the Constitution as stemming from a class conflict between wealthy landowners and common farmers.
…
In the American Revolution and its aftermath, the common man had secured so much political power that many members of the upper-class felt threatened. Beard thus regarded the U.S. Constitution as stemming from a counter-revolution in which the elite upper-class acted to restore their power and thwart the masses from grasping too much influence.”
If the intent had been as Beard posited, there would be a LOT more protections for private property and business interests in the Constitution, and Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence would not have changed Locke’s “life, liberty, and property” into “life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.”
(There is, of course, a great deal of discussion about that subject.)
(Missed the edit window)
I was not familiar with the controversy and “cancelling” of Beard and Barnes in the 1930s, for, as much as I could tell, having principles unrelated to the reigning political parties and policy positions thereof.
Apparently, they was also the Glenn Greenwalds of their day.
And just another “uncontested election”(TM) reminder:
“Democrats were able to increase the overall total of ballots cast by mail from 28 million in 2016 to 66 million in 2020, a 131% increase.
“While simultaneously using covid-19 to alter election laws in 37 states and dropping the mail-in ballot rejection rate in key swing states. https://twitter.com/KoaTheGreat/status/1488275673466630145?cxt=HHwWgsCrzd-1tacpAAAA
H/T Lee Smith twitter feed.
@AesopFan:
Thank you for that Charles Beard Background which I certainly did not know about. As you might imagine I was happy enough to fixate 100% on WWII and post WWII cancellations you alluded to in your missed the edit window followup. (Lothrop Stoddard being another one I know of. Doubtless there are more.)
Having said that, I’ve been a kind of CliffsNotes Cod-Revisionist fifth-hand partisan of the idea that the Founding Fathers were motivated by more than pure idealism for some time now. Hopefully I’ll find time one day to look at Becker and Beard more. Many thanks!
“Apparently, they was also the Glenn Greenwalds of their day.”
Well….. Sorta kinda… yeesssss.
Thanks Rufus for the Palin suggestion. Here’s the link to his NK documentary: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rb5asNNRwSk
A couple of observations.
1. Technology is so advanced now that the production values are the same for the single tourist with his own camera and Michael Palin and his crew.
2. The single tourist Indigo Traveller is less dramatic in his narration, films more surroundings then being filmed himself, and shows you more of the country. Palin offers more interesting commentary.
3. I went to Palin’s website first to find the documentary. What a marvelous life he’s led.
The “Idealism” – “Realism” dialectic (or perhaps, better, scale or range) raises interesting points:
One could argue that the Founders were ALL idealists AND ALL realists—idealists because they wanted to improve not only the political-economic situation of the colonies and create a “more perfect” system of government (with its bicameral Congress and a balanced, to the point of almost “crippling” division of powers—“crippling” in order to prevent tyranny); and realists because they knew well the potential abuses of monarchical power, as well as the potential power of state religion, and did their best to prevent such abuses from harming their experiment in government.
At the same time, perhaps from a more nuanced (or micro) point of view, one could argue that amongst the Founders, Idealism battled Realism: that Jefferson’s “Idealism” was pitted against Hamilton’s/Madison’s “Realism” (or perhaps, better, “pragmatism”).
Moreover, one could say, that in the end, the “pragmatic” argument won the day (as it, perhaps, had to)—when Jefferson purchased the Louisiana Territories from Napoleonic France.
Even so, US policy throughout its history may well have pitted Idealism vs. Realism.
(OTOH, could one say that the War Between the States was a case of Idealism vs. Idealism?)
More recently, what the Democrats and their confederates have injected into the perennial Idealism-Realism dialectic is Nihilism (a description Victor Davis Hanson often uses), in the form of a pure, destructive, divisive and corrosive power grab.
Moreover—and unsurprisingly—they have the perversity to loudly and unrepentantly characterize their naked power grab as entirely consistent with America’s traditions, values and Constitution.
…which venality and utter dishonesty may constitute, far more than the Civil War, America’s true Second Revolution.
In other words, the Revolution AGAINST the Revolution. IOW the REACTION.
Was Trump’s real “mistake” visiting North Korea (June 2018)? Was China threatened so much that the whole Covid 19 drama was set into motion. Without Covid 19 and the opportunity for all that election havoc, Trump would still be President.
@ Eva Marie > this is what happens in the tweeted video
“Biden opens up for a question from GOP Gov Spencer Cox (UT) and the WH press handlers push reporters out of the room What are they scared of??”
As is now typical in his pressers, Biden says “They told me to call on” the governor.
Did he actually get to ask his question? What was it? Did Biden answer?
Inquiring minds wait for the inevitable leaks.
If there are no leaks, then that raises different questions.
AesopFan: My guess is that by now Biden’s handlers can sense when he’s losing coherence (maybe he misread) and immediately shut things down. Another guess is that his handlers are enjoying the power they have and now close down questioning whenever they want to.
Then that last photo shot of how very far away he was from everyone (their excuse probably Covid precaution) was surreal.
And unless there was an anticipated discussion of national defense or similar “sensitive” topic, why would “our” Governors put up with this charade, rather than walking out in protest when they saw the press being shewed away?
R2L: And the Biden handlers aren’t even polite about it. “Thank you guys. Let’s go.” It’s shocking.
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Joe Rogan recorded a 10 minute statement about the Spotify controversy Neil Young has created: https://youtu.be/8MYzpf007VY
I think most all here would appreciate Rogan’s measured remarks. He does a good job of explaining the credentials of the guests folks are upset about as well as explaining why he likes to feature differing viewpoints on his show.
Pedestrian stuff. Would have been completely mainstream even a decade ago. They are guests “Meet the Press” and other boring, Sunday morning shows would have featured two decades ago. Rogan is very polite and open, even mentions several times how much he likes Neil Young’s music. Rogan’s upbeat and open manner of address make Young look even more ignorant.
I know Rogan’s a comedian, but I am still convinced this is unintentional, yet it is hilarious: At one point he mentions how much he also loves Joni Mitchell’s music and he singles out, “Chuck E’s in Love!” I really believe that was unintended but it’s an hilarious joke regarding her and Young’s relevance!
I’m glad your electricity is working today. How was the weekend?
The abrupt abandonment of Afghanistan left hundreds, if not thousands, of US citizens, green-card holders and other folks involved with NGOs there without a way out or any degree of safety. Why has the whole thing been abandoned by the media? What is being done? who is or isn’t doing it?
Not to make light of those stuck in it, but this should be seen as more important than 2 feet of snow in Boston.
Fabulous video. Terrific song.
(To paraphrase Marlow, “The voices, the voices…”…. I’m a sucker for a voice I really like…)
Thanks!
(But I wonder…might this be Dr. Jill’s version?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCGD9dT12C0 )
– – – – – – – –
Meanwhile, back in the Covid news mosh pit, Ivermectin raises its hoary (therapeutic) head again…unfortunately for some who’d like to CANCEL it—including doctors and health officials (a tad strange, that…)—but most fortunately for those whose lives it saved…:
“‘Day three of controversial ”horse de-wormer”. I’m feeling pretty much back to normal…’: Laurence Fox claims to have successfully treated himself with Ivermectin…”—
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10459073/Laurence-Fox-reveals-Covid-treating-horse-medicine.html
“Telling me lies.” “Telling me lies.”
Well, from recent history, it appears that, to a greater and great extent, practically everyone in authority has been telling us lies–certainly the MSM, the vast majority of our supposed ” public health/medical authorities,” practically every politician, quite a few of our intelligence and military authorities, our educational authorities, law enforcement, etc., etc.
In fact, it’s hard to know who hasn’t tried, particularly in the last few years, to sell us a pack of lies.
The question then becomes, is there a point at which so many lies are told–and so widely–that public faith in the whole society collapses, and that society can no longer function as anything like what it used to be?
See, for example, the old U.S.S.R.
“The question then becomes,….”
I’m pretty sure that’s “Biden”‘s fall-back plan (i.e., if he can’t “successfully” torpedo the country, actively, then he’ll rely on—and give “himself” a pat on the back for—destroying the country “passively”, IOW by hollowing out and corroding its foundations in termite-like fashion while disintegrating any and all socio/historical cohesion and civility that might bind its citizens together for the greater, or common, good).
AKA “Win-win” in “Biden”ese…
Wouldn’t you think that musicians that are “passed it” (classical reference) would like that Rogan is bring listener to the music?
Barry Meislin–
As I’ve commented here before, we are rather quickly going from being one of the few–and perhaps the only real example of a reasonably functional “high trust” society–one major reason for our society’s functionality, social and economic progress precisely our “high trust” levels–into an example of the norm for most current day countries/societies, the all too common and dysfunctional “low trust” society.
In such a “low trust” society lasting progress is very difficult to achieve and rare, this because everyone thinks (and they’re probably right) that everyone else is lying to them to get something they want, no one trusts anyone else, everyone views everyone else as their enemy–out to do them harm, or to take something from them that is theirs; a Balkanized, tribal society, with each individual out for himself, or his family or locality, and no one sees any advantage in cooperating.
And in a similar vein, HSCC’s cover of the Christine McVie song about lies:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ek7NcF-kBL8
Victor David Hanson is on a tear in his latest column, along the lines Snow on the Pine suggests we’re moving, albeit much more detailed.
Wokidm means power for the few and nihilism inflicted upon the rest. There is no cease.
He starts by identifying the three or four explanations that are popular before launching into the destruction weaked on everyone, not only the irredeemable.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/wokeism-cruel-and-dangerous-cult
First rate VDH spares no quarter in this road to destruction and decline.
For something completely different, this is a travel series by a young New Zealander who journeyed to North Korea three years ago. It’s a highly monitored 11 part tourist tour of NK that is nevertheless very interesting.
https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLN0FlxE6vY5DlAPO1runQHOZSYyxePI1O&disable_polymer=1
Love the foxes. Amazing voices. A note, the gentleman on the red guitar with the green shirt and white goatee recently passed. RIP.
David Foster at Chicagoboyz on the Great Liquidation:
“America is hanging by a thread. A great liquidation is underway, with many of the structures that support American society..or, in some cases, any viable society…being kicked away, sold off piecemeal, or just wantonly destroyed. I’m talking about physical structures, legal structures, and social structures.”
https://chicagoboyz.net/archives/67041.html#comment-1053694
expat:
The weekend was fine. One day of snow and then one day of brilliant sunshine. Cold but nice.
This is an awesome piece by this young woman. Her mother is AJ Kay who has been one of the true fighters over the last two years.
https://bariweiss.substack.com/p/last-year-i-was-a-bryn-mawr-girl
we are rather quickly going from being one of the few–and perhaps the only real example of a reasonably functional “high trust” society
C’mon. We’re just us. Be satisfied to just be us.
There’s a couple dozen countries which have been consistently functional and prosperous over the last century, at least when they were not subject to conquest by malicious neighbors.
VDH on nihilism https://amgreatness.com/2022/01/30/joe-biden-and-the-uses-of-nihilism/
“the catastrophe of 2021 was no accident, but a tactic in service of a strategy.”
Nice close harmony.
When you think about it, a lot of things in our society rely on us being a “high trust” society.
Take, for instance, the U.S. Postal Service, which relies on the fact that when they deliver mail to your post office box or mailbox, someone is not going to follow along behind them and steal your mail. Yet, more and more, that is apparently what is happening.
Then, there is Amazon and all the other outfits that deliver things you’ve bought to your doorstep, with the expectation that these items are safe until you come out of your door to pick them up.
Yet, if Youtube is to be believed, more and more “Porch pirates” (notice the effort here to both trivialize and romanticize theft by terming it such) are swarming–all over the country–to swoop down on your porch and snatch your goods.
To take another example, it used to be the case that you could pretty much trust someone’s word.
Now, though, there seems to be an ever growing epidemic—not of disease, but of phony veterans—infesting the land.
People who, quite often, were never in the military at all, but who are claiming not only to be veterans, but to have been highly decorated soldiers, or sometimes POWs, and to have been members of elite fighting groups like Delta force, Force Recon, or Navy Seals, running phony “veteran’s charities,” etc.
Moreover using forged DD-214s (official discharge summary) and a whole bunch of lies to claim VA benefits they’re not entitled to, to go to the head of the line, to be publicly honored, to get the girl, get the job or mortgage, and to steal from them the honor that actual vets deserve.
How many of these phony veterans are there running around?
No one knows for sure, and it appears that our authorities do not want to make any effort find out, but it appears that they are in the tens or, collectively, possibly in the hundreds of thousands.
Senior Chief Petty Officer Don Shipley, a former SEAL who tracks down and exposes phony SEALS, says that he has personally dealt with thousands of such phonies, and that’s primarily just phony SEALS.
See, for instance, https://www.military.com/daily-news/2020/07/27/military-stolen-valor-cases-rise-investigators-say.html
Re: Don Shipley’s efforts see
for instance, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Lotf3DMmOE (strong language alert)
Snow on Pine:
The Stolen Valor thing goes WAAAY back, but I’m not at all surprised to hear that it’s increased lately.
Neo–For one outstanding example of Stolen Valor, a whole slew of phonies claim to have been awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, but the actual number of living recipients is currently only 66.
* See https://www.cmohs.org/recipients/overview
For further background, including how such phony medals came to be, see https://www.mishalov.com/False_MoH_Recipients.html
Everything you need to know about GETTR:
https://gab.com/Dissidentsoaps/posts/107717549952051368
Incorrect, Another Mike:
Two Feet of Snow in Boston *is* more important than importing more people to slit your grandchildren’s throats.
Kung Hei Fat Choi, Round Eyes!
On behalf of Emperor Pooh, best wishes for the Year of the Tigger.
Learned a new word today: Globaloney
https://orthosphere.wordpress.com/2022/01/31/%EF%BF%BCwars-rumors-of-wars-and-the-pretexts-of-liberal-tyranny/
Who here has even heard of Harry Elmer Barnes and Charles Beard?
Certainly not me. Gone With the Wind.
Eva Marie @ 2:20pm,
Michael Palin of Monty Python fame did a several part series on traveling in North Korea. I highly recommend it. He was always my favorite Python on the show and the more I’ve learned about him in ensuing years he seems like an impressive man; honest, earnest, intelligent, kind.
He’s made quite a few travel shows and I’ve seen most of them (I think). There’s one where he attempts to go from the North Pole to the South Pole (the series is named, “Pole to Pole”) sticking to land as much as possible (minimal planes, helicopters and boats). I found it very fascinating. He gets incredibly bogged down in Africa and eventually has to break the rules to keep the series going. It wasn’t the intention of the series, but one comes away from it with an elevated understanding of how difficult African politics are among its many nations.
It’s fascinating watching him navigate North Korea while being careful to not offend his hosts, knowing they would halt the production if they sensed he was doing anything unfavorable.
Snow on Pine @5:26pm,
I know a woman whose son was severely, permanently disabled in a very high profile, botched robbery (her son was a completely innocent victim in a very public, “safe” place). It was a BIG, local news story due to the location.
A member of her family had to devote hours and hours of time, for weeks, deplatforming fake fund raising sites con artists were continuously creating. Her son did eventually get some money from a real “Go Fund Me” for his care, but at least twice as much was donated to bogus sights and he never saw any of that money.
How low does one have to be to “steal the valor” of a cripple?
Re: To give you some idea of the magnitude of the Stolen Valor epidemic , on a tv interview a couple of years ago Don Shipley put the number of phonies he had personally found, as of that time, as between 9 and 10 thousand.
To clarify, most of the phony SEALS/veterans Don Shipley dealt with were apparently dealt with over the phone, and only in a few cases did Don Shipley actually confront them in person.
See one such confrontation here at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Atzow2jQPDg
ace.mu.nu has a news item about a mom who left her 9 and 11 year old kids home alone in Connecticut for three days while she vacationed in Florida. I’ve printed the text below.
She doesn’t sound like a great mom, but is what she did necessarily wrong? I’m pretty sure my folks vacationed together, leaving my sister and me home alone around the same ages. 11 years old? Sixth grade? I was definitely capable of getting myself to school, buying groceries, cooking, getting myself to bed and awake in the morning… in sixth grade. My sister and I had one set of grandparents about 1.5 miles away, the other set about two miles away and assorted Aunts, Uncles and cousins 1 – 3 miles from our home. Our relatives were aware we were alone and were available if needed. So our situation was far less risky.
Am I mis-remembering or overestimating the resourcefulness of sixth graders?
@ Zaphod > “Who here has even heard of Harry Elmer Barnes and Charles Beard?”
Barnes, no idea.
But, I had to read Beard’s book, An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States (1913), in graduate school (MA, Political Science). That was at UT Austin in the 1970s, not exactly a hot-bed of conservative thought, but not so brain-dead woke as it is now.
However, although I thought at the time he made some good points, I wasn’t swayed enough by his arguments to join the liberal sort-of-throng of professors & students (not yet the vast majority they are today).
This is a pretty fair summation, based on my now-50-year-old memory.
I have not revisited the book since then.
That the Founders had economic interests is not debatable; that those interests were their primary purpose for leading the rebellion against Britain, and then writing the Constitution, most certainly is.
Beard was the Hannah-Jones of the 20th century.
That his ideas, though published so early, were still being debated (or at least taught) 60 years later (and still going strong, according to this link), is a marvel in itself; it shows the perseverance of the Left in pushing their social theories in academics until they finally take control.
https://study.com/academy/lesson/creation-of-the-us-constitution-charles-beards-interpretation.html
“Beard was arguing that America’s Founders adopted the U.S. Constitution primarily out of economic self-interest.
In formulating this interpretation, Beard drew from the scholarship of another famous historian named Carl L. Becker. Becker had argued the American Revolution really consisted of two revolutions: one against Great Britain for independence and the other a conflict to decide who should rule in the absence of British authority. Beard took this idea and ran with it. Beard conceived the Constitution as stemming from a class conflict between wealthy landowners and common farmers.
…
In the American Revolution and its aftermath, the common man had secured so much political power that many members of the upper-class felt threatened. Beard thus regarded the U.S. Constitution as stemming from a counter-revolution in which the elite upper-class acted to restore their power and thwart the masses from grasping too much influence.”
If the intent had been as Beard posited, there would be a LOT more protections for private property and business interests in the Constitution, and Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence would not have changed Locke’s “life, liberty, and property” into “life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.”
(There is, of course, a great deal of discussion about that subject.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life,_Liberty_and_the_pursuit_of_Happiness
I liked this succinct post for not only agreeing with me, but for having a charming typo.
https://didyouknow.org/life-liberty-and-property/
(Missed the edit window)
I was not familiar with the controversy and “cancelling” of Beard and Barnes in the 1930s, for, as much as I could tell, having principles unrelated to the reigning political parties and policy positions thereof.
Apparently, they was also the Glenn Greenwalds of their day.
And just another “uncontested election”(TM) reminder:
“Democrats were able to increase the overall total of ballots cast by mail from 28 million in 2016 to 66 million in 2020, a 131% increase.
“While simultaneously using covid-19 to alter election laws in 37 states and dropping the mail-in ballot rejection rate in key swing states.
https://twitter.com/KoaTheGreat/status/1488275673466630145?cxt=HHwWgsCrzd-1tacpAAAA
H/T Lee Smith twitter feed.
@AesopFan:
Thank you for that Charles Beard Background which I certainly did not know about. As you might imagine I was happy enough to fixate 100% on WWII and post WWII cancellations you alluded to in your missed the edit window followup. (Lothrop Stoddard being another one I know of. Doubtless there are more.)
Having said that, I’ve been a kind of CliffsNotes Cod-Revisionist fifth-hand partisan of the idea that the Founding Fathers were motivated by more than pure idealism for some time now. Hopefully I’ll find time one day to look at Becker and Beard more. Many thanks!
“Apparently, they was also the Glenn Greenwalds of their day.”
Well….. Sorta kinda… yeesssss.
Thanks Rufus for the Palin suggestion. Here’s the link to his NK documentary:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rb5asNNRwSk
A couple of observations.
1. Technology is so advanced now that the production values are the same for the single tourist with his own camera and Michael Palin and his crew.
2. The single tourist Indigo Traveller is less dramatic in his narration, films more surroundings then being filmed himself, and shows you more of the country. Palin offers more interesting commentary.
3. I went to Palin’s website first to find the documentary. What a marvelous life he’s led.
The “Idealism” – “Realism” dialectic (or perhaps, better, scale or range) raises interesting points:
One could argue that the Founders were ALL idealists AND ALL realists—idealists because they wanted to improve not only the political-economic situation of the colonies and create a “more perfect” system of government (with its bicameral Congress and a balanced, to the point of almost “crippling” division of powers—“crippling” in order to prevent tyranny); and realists because they knew well the potential abuses of monarchical power, as well as the potential power of state religion, and did their best to prevent such abuses from harming their experiment in government.
At the same time, perhaps from a more nuanced (or micro) point of view, one could argue that amongst the Founders, Idealism battled Realism: that Jefferson’s “Idealism” was pitted against Hamilton’s/Madison’s “Realism” (or perhaps, better, “pragmatism”).
Moreover, one could say, that in the end, the “pragmatic” argument won the day (as it, perhaps, had to)—when Jefferson purchased the Louisiana Territories from Napoleonic France.
Even so, US policy throughout its history may well have pitted Idealism vs. Realism.
(OTOH, could one say that the War Between the States was a case of Idealism vs. Idealism?)
More recently, what the Democrats and their confederates have injected into the perennial Idealism-Realism dialectic is Nihilism (a description Victor Davis Hanson often uses), in the form of a pure, destructive, divisive and corrosive power grab.
Moreover—and unsurprisingly—they have the perversity to loudly and unrepentantly characterize their naked power grab as entirely consistent with America’s traditions, values and Constitution.
…which venality and utter dishonesty may constitute, far more than the Civil War, America’s true Second Revolution.
In other words, the Revolution AGAINST the Revolution. IOW the REACTION.
Was Trump’s real “mistake” visiting North Korea (June 2018)? Was China threatened so much that the whole Covid 19 drama was set into motion. Without Covid 19 and the opportunity for all that election havoc, Trump would still be President.
Via the American Thinker, stark proof that Pres. Biden is not in charge.
https://twitter.com/JJHunt10/status/1488191061474398208?s=20&t=5pUIOr6CFfGbQr1oAJoerg
@ Eva Marie > this is what happens in the tweeted video
“Biden opens up for a question from GOP Gov Spencer Cox (UT) and the WH press handlers push reporters out of the room What are they scared of??”
As is now typical in his pressers, Biden says “They told me to call on” the governor.
Did he actually get to ask his question? What was it? Did Biden answer?
Inquiring minds wait for the inevitable leaks.
If there are no leaks, then that raises different questions.
AesopFan: My guess is that by now Biden’s handlers can sense when he’s losing coherence (maybe he misread) and immediately shut things down. Another guess is that his handlers are enjoying the power they have and now close down questioning whenever they want to.
Then that last photo shot of how very far away he was from everyone (their excuse probably Covid precaution) was surreal.
And unless there was an anticipated discussion of national defense or similar “sensitive” topic, why would “our” Governors put up with this charade, rather than walking out in protest when they saw the press being shewed away?
R2L: And the Biden handlers aren’t even polite about it. “Thank you guys. Let’s go.” It’s shocking.