Writing in the New York Post, Ralph Peters argued that Israel's very existence is on the line in this struggle against Hamas. Peters wrote:
"Dead Jews aren't news, but killing terrorists outrages global activists. On Saturday, Israel struck back powerfully against its tormentors. Now Israel's the villain. Again."
"How long will it be until the UN General Assembly passes a resolution creating an international Holocaust Appreciation Day? "
"Israel's airstrikes against confirmed Hamas terrorist targets in the Gaza Strip were overdue, discriminating and skillful. So far, this retaliatory campaign has been a superb example of how to employ postmodern airpower."
"Instead of bombing empty buildings in the dead of night in the hope of convincing bloodthirsty monsters to become peace-loving floral arrangers - the US Air Force version of "Shock and Awe" - the Israeli Defense Force aimed to kill terrorists."
In a recent Wall Street Journal article, Michael Oren and Yossi Klein Halevi made the argument that in order for the peace process to continue and maybe be succesful Hamas must be defeated. They wrote:
"A quarter century has passed since Israel last claimed to go to war in the name of peace."
""Operation Peace for Galilee" -- Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon -- failed to convince the international public and even many Israelis that its goal was to promote reconciliation between Israel and the Arab world. In fact, the war had precisely the opposite results, preparing the way for Yasser Arafat's disastrous return to the West Bank and Gaza, and for Hezbollah's ultimate domination of Lebanon. And yet, Israel's current operation in Gaza is essential for creating the conditions that could eventually lead to a two-state solution."
"Over the past two decades, a majority of Israelis have shifted from adamant opposition to Palestinian statehood to acknowledging the need for such a state. This transformation represented a historic victory for the Israeli left, which has long advocated Palestinian self-determination. The left's victory, though, remained largely theoretical: The right won the practical argument that no amount of concessions would grant international legitimacy to Israel's right to defend itself."
"That was the unavoidable lesson of the failure of the Oslo peace process, which ended in the fall of 2000 with Israel's acceptance of President Bill Clinton's proposal for near-total withdrawal from East Jerusalem and the territories. The Palestinians responded with five years of terror."
As I have mentioned in a previous post I have been listening to my iPod quite a bite lately. For the past two days I have been listened to Justin Townes Earle's debut album The Good Life, which is just amazing. One of the stand outs on this album is the song "Lone Pine Hill" which is song from the perspective of a confederate soldier. Earle, in an interview, claimed that he has spent much time reading about the Civil War and that this has inspired many of his songs. In this song, Earle's soldier exclaims: "I've never known a man who has ever owned another and I never owned nothing of my own, and after four long years I just can't tell you what the hell I've been fighting for" (If these lyrics are inaccurate please let me know)
This is David Harsanyi's response to an idiotic article by Arianna Huffington:
"Celebrated progressive doyenne Arianna Huffington recently penned a brilliantly absurd piece, titled "Laissez-Faire Capitalism Should Be as Dead as Soviet Communism.""
"Huffington argues, in effect, that communism and "laissez-faire" (minimal-intervention) capitalism are equivalent ideological extremes."
"Sure, one of these philosophies spurred the murder and misery of hundreds of millions worldwide; the other promotes liberty, innovation and welcomes foreigners to lounge around in expansive mansions paid for by their former oil baron husbands."
"So we can agree; there is no such thing as a flawless ideology."
"Yet this serious, but temporary, recession -- and we've had at least four of them since 1980 -- is, evidently, the ironclad justification "to drive the final nail into the coffin of laissez-faire capitalism by treating it like the discredited ideology it inarguably is.""
"When a pundit informs you that a point is "inarguable," one instantaneously recognizes that the point is, in fact, remarkably arguable. Hordes of economists quarrel about this very idea each and every day. So the disaster narrative offered by Huffington and fellow panic-mongers, you can imagine, is riddled with underlying problems."
This is an interesting post from Ron Radosh on his blog a Pajamas Media. Radosh wrote:
"What is the difference between the five Muslim immigrants convicted in a Federal court in Camden, New Jersey on Monday, and Bill Ayers and his comrades in the Weather Underground?"
"The answer: not much, except for the outcome. The men were convicted for conspiring to kill American soldiers in Fort Dix. They had taken concrete steps to train and arm themselves. The government had taped conversations about their plans between them and FBI informants; propaganda videos, and proof of the purchase of machine guns. The jury was evidently not impressed with the defendants’ arguments that they were not serious, and had been coaxed into making incendiary arguments by the informants. If that was so, any sane juror realized, it would not explain why they actually purchased the weapons for the planned attack."
"In the case of the Weather Underground, as Bob Owens recounts on his blog today, the FBI had only one inside informant- Larry Grothwol. Like today’s informants, Grothwol had first hand knowledge of terrorist plans of the communist cell, and of actual attacks they carried out. But the Bureau didn’t need this to find evidence- the Weathermen group did it themselves when their home made bomb went off prematurely, killing only themselves."
The question one asks after reading this is why was this man and his comrades never prosecuted by the federal government? What is even more baffleing is how during the election the media soft peddled this disgusting man's past. They portrayed him as merely a patriotic man who let himself get carried away. This man is truly a horrible individual.
"In the wake of the mortgage crisis, a growing chorus of economists today questions the status of home ownership as the fulfillment of the American dream. An argument supporting home ownership is found – of all places – in the Hebrew Bible. Although usually read as part of a religious text, the Bible's economic prescriptions may be mined to recover the roadmaps by which past thinkers navigated, even if no longer fully applicable today."
"Economic commentators Paul Krugman and James Surowiecki argue that the American dream increasingly ends with a rude awakening. With the market value of houses falling, many Americans are now trapped in mortgages that exceed the value of their homes. And for many more, they argue, the hassles of buying and selling a home make it harder for underemployed home owners to move to where the jobs are."
"But consider the original context of a touchstone of American political culture, the biblical inscription on the Liberty Bell in Independence Hall in Philadelphia: "Proclaim Liberty throughout all the land to all the inhabitants thereof." Contrary to popular conception, the verse in question, Leviticus 25:10, addresses neither despotic rule nor slavery, but is an economic prescription. When read in the larger context of that biblical chapter it emerges as a call to ownership stability, part of an economic plan that was radical for its time."
"Elsewhere in the ancient Near East, land was held chiefly by the kings and by the temples. The Hebrew Bible, for the first time, sought to put the vast majority of landholdings into the hands of ordinary people. Land -- the means of production in an agrarian society -- was apportioned to extended kinship groups. The vision was that you never dwelt alone, but as part of a deeply intertwined social fabric of extended kin. If a landowner suffered crop failure, or illness, he could sell his land, but would then find himself alienated from his property with no means of getting back on his feet. The Bible's solution was that every fifty years property was restored to the original owners: "Proclaim Liberty throughout all the land to all the inhabitants thereof, for the Jubilee year it will be for you, and each man shall return to his property and each man unto his kin." The "Liberty" is from debt, and the prescription is for stability of property ownership in the company of one's kin."
"The Bible sought to empower citizens by granting them equity. The distribution of lands was similar in spirit to the Homestead Act of 1863. Opening the Great Plains to mass settlement, nearly any person 21 years of age could acquire at virtually no cost a tract of 160 acres that would become his after five years of residence and farming. For 2 million new arrivals and other landless Americans, the Homestead Act was an opportunity to acquire assets and to bring equality of economic standing in line with equality before the law."
Post-Modernism. One of those pithy, esoteric philosophical terms that both mean nothing and everything simultaneously. Any good student of Post-Modernism (PoMo) will tell you that transformation of America’s epistemology is not complete (or if you are crazy enough, has already ended), but there is a clear distinction between Modernism and Post-Modernism. [Or Post-Post-Modernism…that’s right…Post-Post-Modernism, be afraid, be very afraid.]
Logistically, PoMo has meant many things for America, and the world as a whole. Greatly inspired by the philosophical movements of French Existentialism and Deconstruction, Post-Modernism embodies pluralism, tolerance, and individuality—to the extreme. In that sense, PoMo is very much a post-1960s world view. The “enlightened” masses have come to accept basic human rights as valuable, that civil rights and equality are necessary regardless of race, gender, or sexual orientation, and embraced the pluralistic “don’t-judge-me-unless-you-know-me-but-you’ll-never-know-me-so-forget-it” mentality of my (unfortunate) generation. [Some philosophers put it one generation back, for those who reached puberty in the 1980s.]
Here’s the big question, I guess: What does PoMo mean practically, and how will it affect me (if I even realize it exists)? I read one commentator who compared Modernism to Post-Modernism as one would compare KennedySpaceCenter to a shopping mall. Modernism represents the collective will, the triumph of the human spirit, the progress and enlightenment of man. When President Kennedy proclaimed that we would send a man into space, it didn’t matter that Joe Six-Pack would not be the one to do it. It was his goal. It was his desire. He would support and uplift it as a symbol of the power of America and its spirit.
Conversely, PoMo lacks the collective will (or even the capacity) to unite behind a single idea. Every idea is valid, every pursuit worthy, every cause noble. Thus, Joe Six-Pack has no need to unite with his fellow Americans and shop at Wal-Mart, and drive a Chevy, or pursue the American Dream. Joe want’s to shop at Hollister, he wants to drive a Honda, and he wants to be left alone in his world of consumption. In PoMo, everyone can experience space—space in one’s individual conception of space.
PoMo is changing everything, one just has to look. PoMo has an emphasis on connection (though it remains disconnected). PoMo has and emphasis on the individual (though it feigns community). PoMo desires clarity and sincerity (though it is bogged down my meta-narratives). PoMo wants honest dialog (though everyone’s language is incomprehensible). PoMo desires change (though it is the afterthought of real change). PoMo promises a world of both/and(though it works under the past of either/or).
I will admit (and I’m kind of ashamed to admit it) that I fell in love with the idea of Post-Modernism. It was not about the promises of “community,” “sincerity,” or “individualism.” I was attracted to the pluralism of its politics. I don’t consider myself a Republican or Democrat. I hate the term “independent” and “undecided” is even worse (effing fence sitters). To be completely honest, I have some very hodge-podge political views. I support smaller government, but believe there is a need for government involvement in education and civil rights. I support the right to privacy, yet oppose gay marriage. I do not support abortion, but recognize its need to exist. I’m a free market capitalist who would support property redistribution if Americans understood and held a “collective” good. I believe that environmentalism is important, that poor people should be helped, that hungry people should be fed, that homeless people should be sheltered, that equality (social, political, economic) is desired; but I also believe in rugged individualism, social Darwinism, and traditional progressivism. Thus, PoMo was very attractive to me. It seemed to have a place for me politically. It could have been my home.
[I also struggled with much of the same issues in my personal faith. I am a Christian, but was looking for the middle. I though I had found it in PoMo.]
However, like a kid finding out for the first that Santa Clause is not real, I found out that PoMo and its movements were not what they appeared. After hours of contemplating Christian and political PoMo, longing for sincerity and truth, I discovered that the movements were a guise for political liberalism. The EmergentChurch—the forefront of PoMo Christianity—preached moderation and middle-ground. However, when they released their causes and goals that they hoped to focus on for 2008, I finally understood PoMo in its true light. There document was a point-by-point reiteration of the liberal platform—from social justice, to abortion, to damn-near socialism.
I was heart broken.
But the pain gave me insight. Post-Modernism is the ultimate meta-narrative. Post-Modernism promises things it cannot deliver, in an effort to surpass and disguise its true intentions.
The Presidential Election of 2008 embodies Post-Modernism like no election has. First is the makeup of the candidates. There is Barack Obama who is calling for Hope and Change—meta-narrative themes if I’ve ever heard them—looking for more accountability and sincerity in government. It was not a reality based campaign; people were moved, at an almost spiritual level, to follow Obama. (The Right didn’t call him the “messiah” for nothing.”). Obama’s candidate surpassed the nominal level of everyday politics. Col. Powell called Obama a “transcendent” figure. Obama was not a person or a candidate. He was an idea. Never mind his experience. Never mind his thoughts or beliefs or relationships or affiliations. At the end of the day, Obama represents two things—Hope and Change.
However, the democrats were not the only party to evoke PoMo. Both John McCain and Sarah Palin used PoMo to attract voters. John McCain is a “maverick” who challenged his own party on sincerity, honesty, and openness. “Joe the Plumber” represents the ultimate meta-narrative. Yes, there is a Joe, yes he is a plumber, yes he is a conservative, and yes he is fearful of Obama. But that information had no bearing on the context of “Joe the Plumber.” He represented “Joe Six-Pack” (another awful meta-character) Americans. He became a verbal weapon used to bash opponents. SarahPlain, and her small-town ethic, represented PoMo to the extreme. Almost all of her images were “meta” in nature. Pit bulls, hockey moms, lipstick, Joe Six-Pack, terrorists, small towns. PoMo removed there initial value and substituted instead other values, above their normal context.
What is the result?
Never before in the history of America, has there been an election where we knew less about the candidates, less about the issues, less about foreign policy, and more about Hope, Change, and a Plumber from the mid-west.
PoMo does not offer any clarity; it only blurs the issues into negligibility.
Worse yet, the feigning of sincerity attract those Americans who are looking for honesty in politics. Do you think it is coincidence that Obama invoked the methods of Lincoln and Regan in his political addresses? Where is the bipartisanship promised? Tax cuts or tax credits? Middle-class equality or social welfare? The language used to discuss policy has made sustentative debate impossible.
When Obama says he will cut taxes for 95% of Americans, he invokes traditional conservative values. But these “tax cuts” are actually tax credits. His policies result in a net tax increase and more money back after taxes. But because the tax credits will make those increases (in some cases) negligible, he can claim them as tax cuts, despite the meaning of “tax cut.” Likewise, when Obama plans on “balancing the budget” and “pay-as-you-go,” they are polite ways of saying tax and spend (which in itself is loaded). How can Obama balance a budget but offer trillions (literally) in new spending?
The problem is the narrative has surpassed reality. And in a PoMo world, perception is reality. The meta-narrative complicates what is actually being said. It is much like doublethink and doublespeak in 1984—except real. When one word (like tax cut) means something to a majority of people, but can mean something different to other people, how can we understand the word “tax cut?” The political narrative no longer focuses on strong and fair tax policy, but the definition of even the word “tax cut.”
Aye, there’s the rub: In a PoMo world, language is individual amongst groups and individuals. To understand one another, we must speak each other’s language. Thus, people’s stories, their lives, their personal selves are necessary to understand one another. This explains the shift in art, literature, and film towards narrative type story-telling. It is emotionally driven; character development is key. Tricky plot lines are difficult to follow, but understanding the characters is key. Shows like Lost, Heroes, 24, etc. are popular because they are a series of little stories, about characters and centering on character development, while at the same time offering plot. PoMo explains the huge success and growth for TLC and Discovery Channel.
The biggest argument against Post-Modernism is that it rejects absolute truth. Although the philosophy does not directly state this, the logical conclusion of its pluralistic nature and view of “language” leads to that assumption. I though I could fight this view. Here is how:
If PoMo is represented by the various languages spoken by groups and individuals (no languages as in French and English, but nuance, sarcasm, idioms, inside jokes, etc.), and the only way to understand those languages is through narrative communication and involvement in a group or with an individual, then in theory, Post-Modernism should allow for a heightened need and desire for dialogue. PoMo, by its very nature should promote substantive dialogue—political, social, and religious, etc. PoMo however does not do that.
Post-Modernism, by blurring what language means, and by focusing more on the individual, while feigning community, completely obliterates the opportunity for dialogue. After all, we can never truly understand each other! So much for round tables! So much for diplomatic missions!
How the hell does Obama expect to talk to crazy fucking ARABS WITHOUT PRECONDITIONS IN A POSTMODERN WORLD? DAMNIT!
Now that that is out of my system, I would still like to offer a critique of Modernism & Post-Modernism.
Before I discovered Post-Modernism, I thought I was in the middle of the political spectrum, leaning mostly to the right. After my tryst with Post-Modernism, I’m confused. I am now in the middle of the middle?
There is certainly more to come, about why post-modernism makes everything worthless. I’ll write about it late. I’m too pissed off to continues.
The dialogue is a like, the meta narrative is empty, and lacks of absolutes only result in more separation and worthlessness.
This Victor Davis Hanson article was published on NationReview.com:
"When someone screams about a terrible policy of the present administration, just pose four questions:"
"First, was the controversial decision taken with bipartisan support? Second, were there precedents for such action in prior Democratic administrations? Third, will such polices continue under the newly elected Obama administration? Four, have the media changed their position on the issue since the November election?"
"If the answer is yes to these questions, then the acrimony was probably about politics and style, not principle and substance."
"Take the so-called war on terror. The Patriot Act passed Congress in October 2001 by majorities in both parties — and was reauthorized in 2006. The original versions of the FISA wiretapping accords were enacted under the Carter administration in 1978."
"Both the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were given authorization by Congress. The pre-9/11 precursor for the removal of Saddam Hussein was the unanimous passage of the 1998 Iraq Liberation Act — prompted by then-President Clinton’s warnings about Saddam’s dangerous weapons: “Some day, some way, I guarantee you he’ll use the arsenal.”"
I have been listening to my iPod a lot lately. For some strange reason music helps me write and since I am in the midst of writing my graduate thesis my iPod has not left my side. Recently I have realized something that I haven't noticed in the past. During the late 1960s and early 1970s there were numerous songs recorded that dealt with the South and issues of race.
First, there is "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down" by The Band. This song is about a white soldier, Virgil Caine, who served in the Confederate Army. In the song Caine claimed "Like my father before me, I will work the land, Like my brother above me, who took a rebel stand. He was just eighteen, proud and brave, But a Yankee laid him in his grave..." This song embraces the myth of the Lost Cause and makes no mention of slavery or slaves.
Then there is The Rolling Stones' "Brown Sugar," which is about interracial sexual relations in the Slave South. Here is the song's opening verse: "Gold coast slave ship bound for cotton fields / Sold in a market down in new Orleans / Scarred old slaver knows he's doing alright/ Hear him whip the women, just around midnight / Brown sugar how come you taste so good?/ Ah, brown sugar just like a young girl should." I don't know why, but this song makes me think of Thomas Jefferson.
There is also the well known feud between Neil Young and Lynyrd Skynyrd. Young's "Southern Man" was a scathing attack on the South's treatment of African Americans. This attack angered the members of Skynyrd, who responded with "Sweet Home Alabama."
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