I couldn’t have put it in better words. I saw a video the day after the “event” last week saying people should stay silent and just mind their own business because this is white on white crime (killing their own was the phrase used) and it ain’t their issue. They should just go to their jobs and let it happen. They can exempt themselves cuz it ain’t their problem.
This is all our problems….
I enjoyed your read and at this point in time we need adult decision making and maturity and mindfulness to the reality we are in. It’s not good.
But it’s all our problems and I don’t believe a single group will be able to “exempt” themselves from what is going to be our immediate future.
1. I don't find this shocking. I am more shocked at how little this is thought in general, but then again I remember some of the continuation of the Days of Rage in the 70s and early 80s (I consider the 81 Brinks robbery the last gasp of 60s radicalism) yet they have been effectively memory holed and several principals rehabilitated into legitimate political actors to the point of helping select a POTUS candidate.
2. I think you are too rough on Lincoln but that you are not alone. I think we are in the part of the historical cycle where in overcoming the heroic narrative historians still don't see him as a real person, but as the villain image of the hero. And I say that as someone who considers his actions the third most important in creating the ability for the post WW2 world you describe.
3. Speaking of Lincoln, he was 7 when Liberia was founded. It declared independence from the US in 1847 although the US didn't recognize it until 1862 under Lincoln. Certainly something similar was what he supported, and in retrospect he might have been right, but he was not directly involved in its creation.
4. I'd put the date of sustained illegitimacy of Presidential elections at 2000, not 1992. While I do understand and heard the claims of illegitimacy you reference relative to Clinton I also heard those about Kennedy who was dead before I was born and about Nixon and Reagan's re-election.
What I didn't hear, and what Nixon specifically rejected in 1960, was the candidate himself engaging in that publicly. It was Gore who broke that taboo and I think that is critical. Once Gore did "polite society" allowed such beliefs became an acceptable thing to act upon. There is a much stronger line between his lawsuits and January 6 than anything said about Clinton or Nixon or Kennedy.
Once people who wield the power "awarded" in our elections decide bare-knuckle fighting in public is allowed the genie is out in a way all the post 60s violence never achieved.
5. My only surprise about last Saturday was we made it this far.
6. I think a very important extension of why it is worse now, as you admit around directly affecting high level elections (as opposed to things like The Battle of Athens) is the increasing centralization of power. While you allude to this I'd say Shelby Foote's "the United States are" vs. "the United States is" (harkening the problem all the way back to Lincoln) is the less relevant lower levels of power are and the less relevant certain states are (see the California exemption under the Clean Air Act allowing Sacramento to effective set air pollution policy nationwide) the more all the stakes are on that one bet, the President.
The irony is, as you showed on your Chevron post, the one institution pushing back on that "all the stakes" thinking, the SCUS, had made itself the single biggest stake and restoring it to that position is the goal of at least half the current factions (and not just on the Left).
No yelling from me. For whatever reason, I've always seen through it. The platitudes just never felt realistic. Humans are animalistic and tribal and also nonviolent. Yeah, right.
The question of how much and in what ways were similar to animals gets around a good deal. Many voices seem adverse to the comparison. Perhaps they are afraid people will use it to defend sadistic behavior or perhaps because they fear the potential for more animalistic tendencies to surface in themselves. But trying to understand people without evo. psychology or evo. biology really limits the conversation.
I feel like we have to acknowledge our animal-type instincts to really understand ourselves. I think it may be easier for women who have given birth just because before they happens, you have no idea the depths you will go to in order to protect that child. We don't even know it until the baby is out. Something we didn't even know we could feel just materializes immediately.
We are animals after all ;) and the instinct to protect our own is strong for good reasons. That organizations and governments are over ruling that instinct in mothers and fathers is, well, shitty. But it seems like the tide is turning on some of that stuff!
Uh huh. Teddy Roosevelt was elected on the strength of surviving that shot - golly, this is just sloppy. And Lincoln was guilty of fomenting the civil war - uh huh. Got it. I’m a Trump guy, have been for a while. Lots of this was pretty interesting, but I do know the history of my country. I’ve read John Calhoun, and much else. He thought that slavery was a positive good, and the states could nullify federal laws they determined to be unconstitutional. And now I am reading your stuff. When you notice, you notice. I suggest anyone reading this who found it persuasive should go immediately read Karl Marx. He hated freedom, it turns out, but he did it in a wonderfully persuasive way. Now, I don’t believe this writer is a communist. But like Marx he strings things together to achieve a pleasing flow of persuasive justification - but in this case for maximum liberty and no fences. Marx’s yin to this writer’s yang. Also, this was too long and its patness reminded me of Jim Garrison, minus the fake eyebrow guy. You think a lot, you think you’re right. I think you are just another persuasive guy. I love Substack, though.
1) That an historical survey looking at the results of assassination attempts doesn't talk about all the other factors in play (such as the three-way election that year, etc) shouldn't be surprising. The assassination attempt did serious work to cement Roosevelt's legend both before and after his election.
2) Yes, Lincoln did--either through incompetence or opportunism or malice--do much to ensure that the civil war happened. Here's a very brief hour-long survey with references. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piFmY_1pzro
3) "Maximum liberty and no fences." It may be reasonable to pull that from this one column, but it doesn't follow if you follow my work generally. When one is looking at the ecology of a given phenomenon, one is not required to advance one's own vision. I'm not particularly interested in the latter part, I'm interested in what's happening.
4) I'm glad you found it enjoyable even though objectionable.
Yeah, Roosevelt lost that election (1912) as a third party candidate. He was president after McKinley was assassinated till 1909. You're being sloppy about easily checkable facts. Not a good look.
I watched the McClanahan talk. Yikes. If that is your source for calling Lincoln something that he wasn't (the guy who could have prevented the civil war) you are missing out on a lot of the history of the 1840's and 1850's. It's wildly polemical and at least as "dishonest" as Lincoln the politician. He says a lot of true things about Lincoln's politics. Then he goes on to draw the laughable conclusion that the slave powers were amenable to ever limiting slavery to their current states and its prohibition in the territories. Sure, Lincoln was willing to leave it alone in the existing states - because he clearly believed it would ultimately die out if limited to the shit-holes where it festered and rotted, because rotten and rotting things are dying or dead (he may have been wrong about this, but he wasn't lying). Bottom line: by the time Lincoln was elected the argument about slavery was politically over in the north and in the south, and the only question was whether it could be resolved without bloodshed. The Slavers said no, we're fightin' (yeah, Lincoln made sure that they, not he, started the festivities at Sumter, but that was the only leverage he had in dealing with these fucking Democrats). This guy is making the arguments McClellan made in the election of 1864 - in other words, he is a Democrat, like McClellan, meaning, a fan of slavery. Or, he's just a whore, selling any crap he can to make a living (look at all the sunk costs the guy has in books on his bookshelf!). He's just selling words, man. A peddler of persuasion, a lawyer (in the worst sense of that word), a salesman. Its shit. Its arguing the truth from the perspective of slavers. If you're going to talk about these things, for the salvation of your own soul as a writer, make sure you have a handle on the history you talk about. I was enjoying your article and I passed over the Roosevelt gaffe; but the Lincoln stuff? It had me questioning what I was doing with my life. Sorry, but it is that bad.
I like your Heinlein stuff by the way - I also grew up on him and really enjoyed your book on his juveniles.
1) Thanks for the correction on Roosevelt--I was conflating two things. I have changed the text and added a footnote noting the change and what the original said.
2) I just don't buy that "He's sympathetic to the South" is a disqualifier, but I have added an extensive footnote pointing people down this way.
3) Glad you like the Heinlein stuff! Still beavering away on that follow-up book dealing with his later works.
A great piece, Daniel.
I couldn’t have put it in better words. I saw a video the day after the “event” last week saying people should stay silent and just mind their own business because this is white on white crime (killing their own was the phrase used) and it ain’t their issue. They should just go to their jobs and let it happen. They can exempt themselves cuz it ain’t their problem.
This is all our problems….
I enjoyed your read and at this point in time we need adult decision making and maturity and mindfulness to the reality we are in. It’s not good.
But it’s all our problems and I don’t believe a single group will be able to “exempt” themselves from what is going to be our immediate future.
I am of a similar mind, unfortunate and unpleasant though that mindspace is.
So, lots of thoughts.
1. I don't find this shocking. I am more shocked at how little this is thought in general, but then again I remember some of the continuation of the Days of Rage in the 70s and early 80s (I consider the 81 Brinks robbery the last gasp of 60s radicalism) yet they have been effectively memory holed and several principals rehabilitated into legitimate political actors to the point of helping select a POTUS candidate.
2. I think you are too rough on Lincoln but that you are not alone. I think we are in the part of the historical cycle where in overcoming the heroic narrative historians still don't see him as a real person, but as the villain image of the hero. And I say that as someone who considers his actions the third most important in creating the ability for the post WW2 world you describe.
3. Speaking of Lincoln, he was 7 when Liberia was founded. It declared independence from the US in 1847 although the US didn't recognize it until 1862 under Lincoln. Certainly something similar was what he supported, and in retrospect he might have been right, but he was not directly involved in its creation.
4. I'd put the date of sustained illegitimacy of Presidential elections at 2000, not 1992. While I do understand and heard the claims of illegitimacy you reference relative to Clinton I also heard those about Kennedy who was dead before I was born and about Nixon and Reagan's re-election.
What I didn't hear, and what Nixon specifically rejected in 1960, was the candidate himself engaging in that publicly. It was Gore who broke that taboo and I think that is critical. Once Gore did "polite society" allowed such beliefs became an acceptable thing to act upon. There is a much stronger line between his lawsuits and January 6 than anything said about Clinton or Nixon or Kennedy.
Once people who wield the power "awarded" in our elections decide bare-knuckle fighting in public is allowed the genie is out in a way all the post 60s violence never achieved.
5. My only surprise about last Saturday was we made it this far.
6. I think a very important extension of why it is worse now, as you admit around directly affecting high level elections (as opposed to things like The Battle of Athens) is the increasing centralization of power. While you allude to this I'd say Shelby Foote's "the United States are" vs. "the United States is" (harkening the problem all the way back to Lincoln) is the less relevant lower levels of power are and the less relevant certain states are (see the California exemption under the Clean Air Act allowing Sacramento to effective set air pollution policy nationwide) the more all the stakes are on that one bet, the President.
The irony is, as you showed on your Chevron post, the one institution pushing back on that "all the stakes" thinking, the SCUS, had made itself the single biggest stake and restoring it to that position is the goal of at least half the current factions (and not just on the Left).
No yelling from me. For whatever reason, I've always seen through it. The platitudes just never felt realistic. Humans are animalistic and tribal and also nonviolent. Yeah, right.
The question of how much and in what ways were similar to animals gets around a good deal. Many voices seem adverse to the comparison. Perhaps they are afraid people will use it to defend sadistic behavior or perhaps because they fear the potential for more animalistic tendencies to surface in themselves. But trying to understand people without evo. psychology or evo. biology really limits the conversation.
I feel like we have to acknowledge our animal-type instincts to really understand ourselves. I think it may be easier for women who have given birth just because before they happens, you have no idea the depths you will go to in order to protect that child. We don't even know it until the baby is out. Something we didn't even know we could feel just materializes immediately.
We are animals after all ;) and the instinct to protect our own is strong for good reasons. That organizations and governments are over ruling that instinct in mothers and fathers is, well, shitty. But it seems like the tide is turning on some of that stuff!
That's right! The sooner the better. They don't want to get the moms all riled up, surely. 🐻🦁
Those are the 2nd-5th boxes of liberty. My girlfriend’s vagina is of course the first.
Uh huh. Teddy Roosevelt was elected on the strength of surviving that shot - golly, this is just sloppy. And Lincoln was guilty of fomenting the civil war - uh huh. Got it. I’m a Trump guy, have been for a while. Lots of this was pretty interesting, but I do know the history of my country. I’ve read John Calhoun, and much else. He thought that slavery was a positive good, and the states could nullify federal laws they determined to be unconstitutional. And now I am reading your stuff. When you notice, you notice. I suggest anyone reading this who found it persuasive should go immediately read Karl Marx. He hated freedom, it turns out, but he did it in a wonderfully persuasive way. Now, I don’t believe this writer is a communist. But like Marx he strings things together to achieve a pleasing flow of persuasive justification - but in this case for maximum liberty and no fences. Marx’s yin to this writer’s yang. Also, this was too long and its patness reminded me of Jim Garrison, minus the fake eyebrow guy. You think a lot, you think you’re right. I think you are just another persuasive guy. I love Substack, though.
1) That an historical survey looking at the results of assassination attempts doesn't talk about all the other factors in play (such as the three-way election that year, etc) shouldn't be surprising. The assassination attempt did serious work to cement Roosevelt's legend both before and after his election.
2) Yes, Lincoln did--either through incompetence or opportunism or malice--do much to ensure that the civil war happened. Here's a very brief hour-long survey with references. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piFmY_1pzro
3) "Maximum liberty and no fences." It may be reasonable to pull that from this one column, but it doesn't follow if you follow my work generally. When one is looking at the ecology of a given phenomenon, one is not required to advance one's own vision. I'm not particularly interested in the latter part, I'm interested in what's happening.
4) I'm glad you found it enjoyable even though objectionable.
Yeah, Roosevelt lost that election (1912) as a third party candidate. He was president after McKinley was assassinated till 1909. You're being sloppy about easily checkable facts. Not a good look.
I watched the McClanahan talk. Yikes. If that is your source for calling Lincoln something that he wasn't (the guy who could have prevented the civil war) you are missing out on a lot of the history of the 1840's and 1850's. It's wildly polemical and at least as "dishonest" as Lincoln the politician. He says a lot of true things about Lincoln's politics. Then he goes on to draw the laughable conclusion that the slave powers were amenable to ever limiting slavery to their current states and its prohibition in the territories. Sure, Lincoln was willing to leave it alone in the existing states - because he clearly believed it would ultimately die out if limited to the shit-holes where it festered and rotted, because rotten and rotting things are dying or dead (he may have been wrong about this, but he wasn't lying). Bottom line: by the time Lincoln was elected the argument about slavery was politically over in the north and in the south, and the only question was whether it could be resolved without bloodshed. The Slavers said no, we're fightin' (yeah, Lincoln made sure that they, not he, started the festivities at Sumter, but that was the only leverage he had in dealing with these fucking Democrats). This guy is making the arguments McClellan made in the election of 1864 - in other words, he is a Democrat, like McClellan, meaning, a fan of slavery. Or, he's just a whore, selling any crap he can to make a living (look at all the sunk costs the guy has in books on his bookshelf!). He's just selling words, man. A peddler of persuasion, a lawyer (in the worst sense of that word), a salesman. Its shit. Its arguing the truth from the perspective of slavers. If you're going to talk about these things, for the salvation of your own soul as a writer, make sure you have a handle on the history you talk about. I was enjoying your article and I passed over the Roosevelt gaffe; but the Lincoln stuff? It had me questioning what I was doing with my life. Sorry, but it is that bad.
I like your Heinlein stuff by the way - I also grew up on him and really enjoyed your book on his juveniles.
1) Thanks for the correction on Roosevelt--I was conflating two things. I have changed the text and added a footnote noting the change and what the original said.
2) I just don't buy that "He's sympathetic to the South" is a disqualifier, but I have added an extensive footnote pointing people down this way.
3) Glad you like the Heinlein stuff! Still beavering away on that follow-up book dealing with his later works.