http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4adxe5N6Ato
Great!
Friday, 24 October 2008
Of Generals and Weathermen....
William Ayres...Pah! Jonny McCain palls around with successful Terrorists, not wannabe hippies. Four figure terrorists, not your namby-pamby 'oh, pass the dookie', kaftan wearing freak-asaurs. Ones with nice uniforms and fine economic theories, guns, camps, torture chambers, you know, infrastructure. Jonny McCain admires their international reach (the 1976 assassination of former ambassador to the US and former Foreign Minister Orlando Letelier in Washington), with ambition and a great deal of ingenuity, pluck if you will. Ones with access to delightful country retreats ('The McCains spent the three and a half days fishing for salmon and trout and riding horses').
This is not particularly to do with McCain, but rather the grime and the muck, the residual evil that enthusiastic dabbling in the Dirty Wars, both in South America and Asia that stuck to politicians of varied stripes in the west. Lest we forget....the Cold War was hot
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-dinges/mccain-meets-a-bloody-dic_b_137422.html
This is not particularly to do with McCain, but rather the grime and the muck, the residual evil that enthusiastic dabbling in the Dirty Wars, both in South America and Asia that stuck to politicians of varied stripes in the west. Lest we forget....the Cold War was hot
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-dinges/mccain-meets-a-bloody-dic_b_137422.html
Thursday, 23 October 2008
Help, Help...I'm being assessed
I was wondering if any of you fine fellows and fellow-ettes might aid me.
I'm currently doing a project for the tail end of my BA. It will comprise of a reader of primary sources with commentary. The subject I've decided is the recent evolution of anti-semitic discourse.
Now I am taking stuff like the Hamas covenant, the protocols and Nazi/Iron Guard stuff as a starting point but I would love any examples in English that you might 'recommend' that show the changes i.e. the Zionist euphemism, the neo-protocols narrative, world control and conspiracy.
I'm looking for primary sources, preferably quite focussed (anti-Semites tend to be both remarkably foccussed and rambling simultaneously). I've already started (oh lucky me) on the Joe Quinn and SPSC stuff, but any help would be most welcome
Please post any links or ideas
Many thanks
SR (Stu)
I'm currently doing a project for the tail end of my BA. It will comprise of a reader of primary sources with commentary. The subject I've decided is the recent evolution of anti-semitic discourse.
Now I am taking stuff like the Hamas covenant, the protocols and Nazi/Iron Guard stuff as a starting point but I would love any examples in English that you might 'recommend' that show the changes i.e. the Zionist euphemism, the neo-protocols narrative, world control and conspiracy.
I'm looking for primary sources, preferably quite focussed (anti-Semites tend to be both remarkably foccussed and rambling simultaneously). I've already started (oh lucky me) on the Joe Quinn and SPSC stuff, but any help would be most welcome
Please post any links or ideas
Many thanks
SR (Stu)
Finally, a vast conspiracy of Lefties actually gets results....
Hat tip CT
'How many socialists do you know who lost millions in the recent stock market crashes? Just as I thought—none—and that’s not only because you don’t know any socialists. The truth is that we, the Socialist International Conspiracy, not only saw this coming, we are the ones who made it happen. The plan took shape during a particularly intense criticism/self-criticism session at our 2000 annual convention in a booth at an Akron IHOP. … we would focus on destroying capitalism, hedge fund by hedge fund. First, we selected a cadre of crusty punks from the streets of Seattle, stripped off their Che t-shirts, suited them up in Armani’s and wingtips, and introduced them to the concepts of derivatives and dental floss. Then we shipped them to Wall Street with firm instructions: Make as much money as you can… send it out to make more money by whatever dodgy means you can find – subprime loans, credit default swaps, pyramid schemes … Spend your own earnings in the most flamboyantly gross ways you can think of—$10,000 martinis, fountains of champagne – so as to fan the flames of class resentment. … we could not have inflicted such massive damage to capitalism if we hadn’t also planted skilled agents in high places within the government and various quasi-governmental agencies. Phil Gramm … will be getting a Hero of Socialism award … If you happened to have… noticed an impeccably dressed elderly man poking around under rocks, that was a certain Federal Reserve Chairman, looking for his weekly orders from the central committee. … After months of studying the candidates’ economic plans, we have determined that one of them, and only one, can be relied on to complete the destruction of capitalism. With high hopes and great confidence, the Socialist International Conspiracy endorses John McCain!'
All hail the march of the Wreckers!
Tuesday, 21 October 2008
America the Insecure....
Over on Norm Geras' blog, he is running a series of posts by Samuel Fleischacker on the I/P conflict. I suggest it to anybody as a finely constructed argument and generally very alluminating. However in the latest post, Samuel makes the following assertion -
'Nationalism' is the name of a kind of political ideology, and it's not a synonym for 'patriotism'. (The United States, where people trumpet their patriotism all the time, is not a nationalist country at all: in fact few people here understand the idea.) It is a distinctive view of politics, according to which a primary purpose of government is to express and maintain the culture of a particular group'
This is, to my mind, a false conclusion. America is deeply nationalistic. The rituals and symbols of the Nation are deeply ingrained within society and culture. Indeed nationalism as an ideology in America is so successful, it has no antithesis i.e. Liberal or Socialist Internationalism. Local identities such as the states themselves are given gravitas by proclaiming their (unique) deep rootedness within American tradition and the mythical essence of Americanism. The integration of the melting pot required on entrance the primacy of American identity and loyalty. This nationalism, proudly liberal, is at the core of much American self-perseption, from Isolationists, cutting off the new Jerusalem from the corruption and strife of the Old World to the prophets of America's global mission, spreading the blessings of Liberty to those beyond the pale.
To give a topically example and to further my own pet theory of (soft) social scission, recent annoucements from the GOP's presidental campaign and it's surrogates have made a classical nationalistic case. Nancy Pfotenhauer divined a gap between an increasingly democratic northern Virginia and 'real' Virginia, that is one that is solid McCain territory. Thus there is a false Virginia, polluted, and a real one, that remains pristine.
Sarah Palin has developed a ongoing narrative between this dictotomy of Real and false. She adds more texture. The real is made of small towns, is kind, faithful, independant and hard working. Whilst she is clever enough not to spell out the antithesis of this that logically includes large urban areas, they are deeply 'anti-american'.
Such 'anti-americanism' has been taken up by a obsure representative, Michele Bachmann, to colour not only Obama but the entire Democratic party as an un-part of the nation.
Notice the terms are vague, what consists Americanism, what are the lines of demarcation between good and bad, what is to be done with such deviants is left unclear. This, to be fair, is the sound of the culture war reaching its climax, it's logical end. Faced with a seemly certain collaspe of both their political power and public repudiation of their philosophy, Republicans have sought to raise the stakes. The terms by which they have are unmistakably Nationalist.
I am very pro-american. Jokes about the stupidity of 'em yanks erks me as much as the French Military victories one (VERDUN, AUSTERLITZ, ROCROI, you fucking idiots). However, I know that there is more to that great nation that some spiel about manifest destiny, rugged individualism and the cult of the Cowboy. America is not defined by one narrative, that of cod-theocracy and ruthless capitalism. It is too large and too dynamic. The Socialist party of the US was one of the largest working class movements in the world, just behind the German SDP, it encompassed a naive but still powerful dream of a free yeomanry and of community. American as a label is big enough for Bill O'Reilly and Eddie Vedder, Ann Coulter and Ani Difranco, Joe the Plumber and Ralph Stanley. My nation was not just Robert Peel, it was also Fergus O'Connor, it is not just Richard Littlejohn but Dave Osler. I submit with Nationalism, like all political ideologies and recreational drugs, moderation is everything
For some righteous mirth on the subject, please check out Jon Stewart's take on http://www.thedailyshow.com/ (go to videos and look for the 20th Oct show - One of his best)
'Nationalism' is the name of a kind of political ideology, and it's not a synonym for 'patriotism'. (The United States, where people trumpet their patriotism all the time, is not a nationalist country at all: in fact few people here understand the idea.) It is a distinctive view of politics, according to which a primary purpose of government is to express and maintain the culture of a particular group'
This is, to my mind, a false conclusion. America is deeply nationalistic. The rituals and symbols of the Nation are deeply ingrained within society and culture. Indeed nationalism as an ideology in America is so successful, it has no antithesis i.e. Liberal or Socialist Internationalism. Local identities such as the states themselves are given gravitas by proclaiming their (unique) deep rootedness within American tradition and the mythical essence of Americanism. The integration of the melting pot required on entrance the primacy of American identity and loyalty. This nationalism, proudly liberal, is at the core of much American self-perseption, from Isolationists, cutting off the new Jerusalem from the corruption and strife of the Old World to the prophets of America's global mission, spreading the blessings of Liberty to those beyond the pale.
To give a topically example and to further my own pet theory of (soft) social scission, recent annoucements from the GOP's presidental campaign and it's surrogates have made a classical nationalistic case. Nancy Pfotenhauer divined a gap between an increasingly democratic northern Virginia and 'real' Virginia, that is one that is solid McCain territory. Thus there is a false Virginia, polluted, and a real one, that remains pristine.
Sarah Palin has developed a ongoing narrative between this dictotomy of Real and false. She adds more texture. The real is made of small towns, is kind, faithful, independant and hard working. Whilst she is clever enough not to spell out the antithesis of this that logically includes large urban areas, they are deeply 'anti-american'.
Such 'anti-americanism' has been taken up by a obsure representative, Michele Bachmann, to colour not only Obama but the entire Democratic party as an un-part of the nation.
Notice the terms are vague, what consists Americanism, what are the lines of demarcation between good and bad, what is to be done with such deviants is left unclear. This, to be fair, is the sound of the culture war reaching its climax, it's logical end. Faced with a seemly certain collaspe of both their political power and public repudiation of their philosophy, Republicans have sought to raise the stakes. The terms by which they have are unmistakably Nationalist.
I am very pro-american. Jokes about the stupidity of 'em yanks erks me as much as the French Military victories one (VERDUN, AUSTERLITZ, ROCROI, you fucking idiots). However, I know that there is more to that great nation that some spiel about manifest destiny, rugged individualism and the cult of the Cowboy. America is not defined by one narrative, that of cod-theocracy and ruthless capitalism. It is too large and too dynamic. The Socialist party of the US was one of the largest working class movements in the world, just behind the German SDP, it encompassed a naive but still powerful dream of a free yeomanry and of community. American as a label is big enough for Bill O'Reilly and Eddie Vedder, Ann Coulter and Ani Difranco, Joe the Plumber and Ralph Stanley. My nation was not just Robert Peel, it was also Fergus O'Connor, it is not just Richard Littlejohn but Dave Osler. I submit with Nationalism, like all political ideologies and recreational drugs, moderation is everything
For some righteous mirth on the subject, please check out Jon Stewart's take on http://www.thedailyshow.com/ (go to videos and look for the 20th Oct show - One of his best)
Wednesday, 15 October 2008
In Memorial
I've been busy with uni stuff so my posting habits have gone southwards, but I'm working on a few things to be up soon
However I have received some very sad news
Prof. Detlef Muhlberger, a lecturer at my university, passed away. A fine and insightful historian and despite a somewhat taciturn (and stereotypically teutonic) character, always willing to give time and thought to his student's worries and concerns. His work was of remarkable importance in the analysis of fascism, particularly the NSDAP. His advocacy of the Volkpartei thesis brought a great deal of light on the genesis and dynamics of the Nazis and his analysis of the output of the The Völkischer Beobachter is now the standard work on the Nazi press.
He will be missed and my thoughts are with his family
A list of his works:-
(ed.), The Social Basis of European Fascist Movement (London/New York/Sydney: Croom Helm, 1987) ISBN: 0-7099-3585-4
Hitler’s Followers. Studies in the Sociology of the Nazi Movement (London/New York: Routledge, 1991) ISBN: 0-415-00802-6
The Social Bases of Nazism, 1919-1933 (Cambridge: CUP, 2003) ISBN: 0-521-80285-7
Hitler’s Voice: The Völkischer Beobachter, 1920-1933. Vol. 1: Organisation & Development of the Nazi Party (Oxford/Bern/Berlin/Bruxelles/Frankfurt am Main/New York/ Wien: Peter Lang, 2004) ISBN: 3-906769-72-0 US-ISBN: 0-8204-5909-7
Hitler’s Voice: The Völkischer Beobachter, 1920-1933. Vol. 2: Nazi Ideology and Propaganda (Oxford/Bern/Berlin/Bruxelles/Frankfurt am Main/ New York/ Wien: Peter Lang, 2004) ISBN: 3-906769-72-0 US-ISBN: 0-8204-5909-7
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