Posted on August 31st, 2006 by Daniel Larison
But this system, however efficient, is valid only as a particular and subordinate sector of human relations. In the contemporary world, the market ceaselessly extends its influence, not only geographically (economic “globalization”), but also temporally (Sundays fall increasingly under the sway of the market) and socially: the market rules more and more in sports, in [...]
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Filed under: culture, economics, politics
Posted on August 31st, 2006 by Daniel Larison
We all have our faults, and I feel bad rasing those of our neighbours, since few other people are so optimistic, and few other Westerners are so willing to take necessary risks. There are forms of cant that the whole rest of the OECD is far more steeped in than the USA. But no other [...]
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Filed under: hegemonism, politics
Posted on August 31st, 2006 by Daniel Larison
The following is not an original observation, but it’s one worth repeating: Much of the talk we hear from economists and government financial panjandrums nowadays treats the national economy as a thing in itself, to be egged on and expanded and caressed and cherished, without any concern for the actual citizens of this country. Sure, [...]
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Filed under: economics, politics
Posted on August 31st, 2006 by Daniel Larison
Since, unlike the present, tomorrow is always imaginary, such idolatry can be manipulated in many ways. On the one hand, of course, the Stalins of the world can demand the death of millions in the name of a future paradise. This is an especial concern of Camus, who complains of those who “glorify a future [...]
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Filed under: pessimism, politics
Posted on August 31st, 2006 by Daniel Larison
But we should all agree that the battle for Iraq is now central to the ideological struggle of the 21st century. ~George W. Bush
Without missing a beat, Mr. Bush sets up the main war as the “decisive ideological struggle” of the century, and then turns around and insists that we all agree that Iraq is [...]
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Filed under: pessimism, politics, rhetoric
Posted on August 31st, 2006 by Daniel Larison
“The war we fight today is more than a military conflict,” Bush told thousands of veterans at the American Legion convention. “It is the decisive ideological struggle of the 21st century.” ~MSNBC
The ideological struggle waged by revolutionary Marxism against revisionism at the end of the nineteenth century is but the prelude to the great revolutionary [...]
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Filed under: politics, rhetoric
Posted on August 31st, 2006 by Daniel Larison
The government calculated that by eliminating Mr Bugti it would undermine the insurgency. This logic underpinned its counter-insurgency strategy, with Mr Musharraf often blaming the war on the rebellious Bugti and Marri chiefs and another aged chieftain, of the smaller Mengal tribe. It reckoned that few Baluchis, nationalist or not, would shed tears for Mr [...]
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Filed under: foreign policy, politics
Posted on August 31st, 2006 by Daniel Larison
Charles Black, a longtime GOP consultant with close ties to both the first Bush administration and the current White House, said branding Islamic extremists as fascists is apt.
“It helps dramatize what we’re up against. They are not just some ragtag terrorists. They are people with a plan to take over the world and eliminate everybody [...]
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Filed under: foreign policy, politics, rhetoric
Posted on August 31st, 2006 by Daniel Larison
But here is where the issue of media bias comes in. Nearly all reporting of the issue is framed by a loaded term: the solar system. Notice that this phrase presupposes the Copernican theory, the idea that all the planets revolve around the Sun. This threatens to become the whole premise of the debate. Question [...]
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Filed under: miscellaneous
Posted on August 31st, 2006 by Daniel Larison
So according to Michael Ledeen, Mohammed Khatami, the former prime minister of Iran, is analogous to Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi minister of propaganda. Quoth Ledeen, on Khatami’s upcoming visit to the United States: “Would FDR have given Goebbels a visa while the Reich was attacking Czechoslovakia?” If Khatami–you know, the “dialogue of civilizations” guy–is Goebbels, [...]
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Filed under: ecumenism, politics, religion
