COLLECTIVE MADNESS
“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."
Doug.
ReplyDeleteAre the non-italicized portions of the BC comment @ 5/28/2008 01:14:00 PM yours?
Pfffft.
ReplyDeleteNever mind. That was David's post. And I have no idea who David is.
I was about to express my unbridled delight at Doug's effort to say something in his own words and at (some) length.
I continue to remain hopeful.
That Catholic Priest does know about responsibility of privilage. If one does not agree, best leave the Church he represents.
ReplyDeleteDoug.
ReplyDeleteD-o-u-g-.
David.
D-a-v-i-d-.
:)
Doug is non italicized.
I am swedicized.
David was King of Israel, after being a banditii and seller of protection. He had a son named Solerman, who had horses. And he bumped off his best warrior Urea to get at his girl, Bathsheebah, after eyeing her in the bath.
I must be losing it. I didn't notice the clerical collar, being mesmerized by the idiotic rhetoric. Where do these people come from?
ReplyDeleteTonite on C2C--
Investigative reporter Linda Moulton Howe will discuss dragonfly drone sightings, a pearl-colored sphere retrieved in Alabama, and a new cattle mutilation case.
There's more truth to be found here, than in that pulpit. Investigative reporting at its best.
After a discussion of acute trauma and its aftermath, Michael B. Sabom, M.D. mentioned the following concerning the validity of perceptions in a traumatic state--
ReplyDelete(an autoscoopic NDE is when you drift out of and usually above your body, and see stuff, like yourself and the surroundings)
"If the autoscopic NDE is a true 'eyewitness' account, then an analogy can be drawn between an eyewitness to a crime and an NDE'rs visualization of CPR(cardiopulminary resuscitation). In both situations, the pereson is afforded a brief glimpse of an unexpected and unfamiliar scene under stressful circumstances which frequently involves a "weapon"(a gun or knife in the case of a crime; a threatening instrument or procedure in the case of CPR).
Crime research has shown that witness confidence in the report correlates positively with the accuracy of recalled details(Bothwell, Deffenbacher, and Brigham, 1987). In my study, high confidence (for example, "it was realer than real", "clearer than normal vision", "this is no figment of my imagination") correlated positively with high accuracy of autoscopic NDE reports, compared to "reasonably confident" control group reporting, which correlated positively with inaccurate reports.
Crime research has also found that witness identification of the perpetrator of a crime in a lineup falls from 56% to 35% when a weapon is present. The weapon itself is accurately identified 91%of the time. This variance is due to a "weapon focus" phenomenon, with the weapon acting as a "salient-object attention distractor"(Kramer, Buckhout, and Eugenio, 1990). In my study, details recalled in an autoscopic NDE were heavily weighted, as in crime scene reports, toward "salient-object attention distractors", and in both situations such "attention distractors" were accurately described. Thus, the nature and content of NDE autoscopic accounts resemble those of true eyewitness reports.
Taken together, these results support the patient's claim that nonordinary perception of real events (that is, an autoscopic NDE) had indeed occurered."
Journal of Near-Death Studies Spring 2008 pgs 226-227
I thought this was interesting.
Yes, bob. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteMy dad reported such an out of body / death experience, were he saw himself, his mother and the doctor and staff, he was revived with soon afterwards.
ReplyDeleteIf you keep your eyes and ears open you will come across credible narratives of such things, right in your own home town. I have. Maybe in your own family, as Rat did.
ReplyDeleteI was going to declare this Cato Thursday. But, really, if anyone here isn't yet going there under their own steam, my efforts have been in vain.
ReplyDeleteBut did you know that there's a Hooters in Bogota (never mind hooters in Bogota, of which there are endless and commendable many)? Not terribly far from me, I just discovered.
I think this may alone answer cutler's query, "Why bother?"
Talking about writing books for money (that's why Shakespeare wrote plays, they say, for the bucks) Senator Craig has widened his activities and has been representing Idaho by writing a book himself, these last few months.
ReplyDeleteDon't buy it.
Lest Senator Craig may end up flush with success, a widely read man.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of same...
ReplyDeleteMy mother just concluded her chemotherapy and moves on to a brief schedule of radiation. An example to the rest of us whiners.
And I am homeward bound in...six weeks.
Homeward Bound
ReplyDeleteOne of the finest songs by Simon and Garfunkel
(One of my favorites, played by my father on Sundays while my mother was making brunch, is Cecilia. Never made the connection between the song's theme and St. Cecilia until last year.)
Doug.
ReplyDeleteD-o-u-g-.
David.
D-a-v-i-d-.
:)
---
"D-o-u-g- is a *four* letter work to TRISH.
TRISH is a TROLL."
D-o-u-g-.
A real piece of work he is.
ReplyDeleteWish your mother well, trish.
ReplyDeleteThe first 36 minutes of Rush's first hour today has more wisdom than the entire Cato Website.
ReplyDeleteJindal for Veep!
Big John has a misfortune,
8 years of Jindal saves the nation.
DOUG is a DICK!
ReplyDelete(36 min = the whole first hour minus commercials)
ReplyDeleteLooks good thus far, Rat. And God bless my dad. She couldn't do it without him.
ReplyDeleteWell. She could. But she wouldn't want to.
A BIG One,
ReplyDelete...but I type softly.
Me too, Trish, regarding your mom.
ReplyDeleteFew days ago a young woman in one of my apartmens had a baby boy. So today we took a big mega-box of wipes for the baby, and a neat toy for his older brother, about 3, was a box with various animals, when if you pushed the animal out came the appropriate growl, moo, neigh, bark etc. Dang, it was hard to give that up! Really authentic sounding. Elephants trumpeting, tigers growling...
Do you think there may be an alien inside?
ReplyDeleteYes, well wishes from me, also. Hope she stays strong.
ReplyDelete...probly had a chip implanted on the Mothership.
ReplyDeleteUp date on the latest cattle mutilation tonite on C2C. You haven't heard a cow moo until you've heard....
ReplyDeleteDo the aliens work over the cattle on the big ranches there, Sam?
Under Texas law, children can be taken from their parents if there's a danger to their physical safety, an urgent need for protection and if officials made a reasonable effort to keep the children in their homes. The high court agreed with the appellate court that the seizures fell short of that standard.
ReplyDeleteCPS lawyers had argued that parents could remove their children from state jurisdiction if they regain custody, that DNA tests needed to confirm parentage are still pending and that the lower-court judge had discretion in the case.
The justices said child welfare officials can take numerous actions to protect children short of separating them from their parents and placing them in foster care, and that Walther may still put restrictions on the children and parents to address concerns that they may flee once reunited.
Should be Returned to Parents
No, 'roos and snapadiles got them too busy at the moment.
ReplyDelete...but I type softly.
ReplyDeleteThu May 29, 09:18:00 PM EDT
Absolutely.
Your trademark.
Thanks, all.
ReplyDeleteLet's pounce on the Priest for awhile.
ReplyDeleteOr bemoan the state of the Catholic Church.
Israel negotiating with Syria
No aliens in the outback
ReplyDeleteBush is toxic
ReplyDeleteThe consistently unpopular president says history will judge him kindly, which may be the case. But McClellan’s book diminishes any prospect that Americans will view Bush favorably before Jan. 20, 2009.
...
So is Rove
Former Bush adviser Karl Rove has drawn rave reviews as a post-Bush commentator on FOX News. But according to McClellan, Rove was one of the major sources of turmoil in Bush’s second term.
...
Timing hurts McCain most
McClellan’s book is being released at perhaps the worst possible moment for McCain, as he holds a series of low-profile fundraisers with Bush this week. More importantly, the book comes out as McCain emerges from the shadows next week in a full-fledged general-election campaign after largely squandering a two-month window of Democratic infighting when he had an unobstructed bullhorn.
What Happened?
Sorry I haven't been keeping up, but best wish's to mom in any case, Trish.
ReplyDelete---
Wolf Howling Nazir Ali - The Collapse Of Chistianity Is Wrecking British Society
& Islam Is Filling The Void
OK, we can start HERE
ReplyDeleteVatican says they will excommunicate female priests. This is islameism. And not even good reading of the gospels, where Jesus is hanging sround the womem a lot of the time, and it is said(by some) that Mary Magdalene was the first witness to the resurrection.
Great idea, cutting an organization off from 50% of the talent of the species. They ought to let women be priests, and let the priests marry. Which would go a long way to clearing up the Bernie Ward problems(Bernie was a priest for awhile, accused of misconduct too) that have nearly bankrupted them.
It is said, but I don't know how true it is, that the celibate priest came into being as a financial measure, as the married priests would die, and the church would be on the hook for the wife and kids. That's the G. Gordon Liddy theory, I believe.
We could talk about birth control...and the cycle of poverty in some countries....
The rhetoric about a "clash of civilizations" and a "war on Islam" has found its way easily into Arab intellectual discourse, where it has taken solid root, along with other similar "concepts" (or what I'd rather call "non-concepts" -- like the term "terrorism" -- since they are extremely vague and yet ideologically loaded) that were manufactured in imperialist centers. So it becomes of extreme importance to ask: Is the "clash of civilizations" an independent topic or is it a camouflage term for a struggle that actually embodies something else?
ReplyDeleteFollowing the collapse of the socialist bloc and the end of the Cold War, two theorists arose to prominence with pronouncements on the "tendency" of the moment. The first of these is Francis Fukuyama, who spoke about the "end of history": the final and total victory of capitalism, accomplishing final stability, and the maintenance of capitalism as the ultimate socioeconomic system for humanity.
...
Fukuyama expressed an idealist metaphysical liberal ideology inspired by the capitalist state's "values, institutions, democracy, individual rights, the rule of law and prosperity based on economic freedom"1 -- more of a capitalist welfare state model where state-sponsored social security, health care, education, and reasonable labor rights are present as a social buffer. This model was presumed to continue and provide contentment for humanity.
The Delusion
Can a woman run Israel?
ReplyDeleteThey do have a pretty good precedent.
Olmert is in deep shit, sinking fast, under the weight of past behavior.
The decree was written by the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and published in the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, giving it immediate effect.
ReplyDeleteThe old office of the inquisition. The current pope was long the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
Soros is behind the publisher of the McClellan Book, also 6 other anti-Bush books.
ReplyDeleteThe prime minister is scheduled to hold security-related discussions Sunday morning, but it is not clear whether he will convene the security cabinet that day as well. The security cabinet generally meets on Wednesdays, but this coming Wednesday, Olmert will be in Washington.
ReplyDeleteOlmert, in a meeting with the heads of communities near the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, said that a decision was close, but he did not say exactly when it would be made.
"We know that the situation as it is cannot continue," Olmert said. "We are in the days of decisions on this issue, and will bring an end to the rocket fire - one way or another."
Gaza Truce
Best wishes to your mother, Trish.
ReplyDeleteSix weeks, huh? Back to the real world.
It's rather odd. whit.
ReplyDeleteThe "real world" it's not. It's just the mother ship.
And yet this isn't either.
Me, I'm just looking forward to soul-sucking heat and humidity back home. And a glass of cold, unsweetened iced tea.
Two weeks of "real world" and unreal world simulatneously.
ReplyDeleteI'm bringing back a shitload of lemons.
Diplomatic passport. That's what it's good for. : )
Could make a lot more w/a load of lemon pickers.
ReplyDeleteMaking lemonade out of a bitter situation.
(You can buy anything on a street corner here, except a lemon. Not for your life. Oh, and anchovy paste.)
ReplyDelete27% or so of the country supports Mr Bush, doug. The balance of the people read books, too.
ReplyDeleteMeans the majority think he is an incompetent oaf. You call him a traitor, while Scott, he just says Mr Bush was misled and decieved.
By his "Senior Staff", or so the reports lead me to believe, since I doubt I'll read the book.
Was Mr Bush misled, or was he the chief misleader?
We all know he was the Decider.
That we went to war in Iraq, because we could, seems to be more evident as time goes by. There was no long term strategy being implemented, it was just livin', day to day.
As Sanchez wrote, as Scott describes it and how Bremer's exchange of letters with Mr Bush concerning the disbanding the Iraqi Army and Bush's subsequent "wonder" about that certainly make a strong case for that perception being reality.
Bring back a lemon tree, and a lemon picker, and you've got it 'made in the shade'.
ReplyDelete...like the man with a hearing aide.
ReplyDeleteI'll take up CATO Thursday, or Friday at this point:
ReplyDelete"There is a whiff of hypocrisy here. Mr. Obama, who made $4.2 million last year and lives in a $1.65 million house bought with the help of the indicted Tony Rezko – and whose "elegant suits" and "impeccable ties" made him one of Esquire's Best-Dressed Men in the World – disdains college students who might want to "chase after the big house and the nice suits." Mr. McCain, who with his wife earned more than $6 million last year and who owns at least seven homes, ridicules Mr. Romney for having built businesses.
But hypocrisy is not the biggest issue. The real issue is that Messrs. Obama and McCain are telling us Americans that our normal lives are not good enough, that pursuing our own happiness is "self-indulgence," that building a business is "chasing after our money culture," that working to provide a better life for our families is a "narrow concern."
They're wrong. Every human life counts. Your life counts. You have a right to live it as you choose, to follow your bliss. You have a right to seek satisfaction in accomplishment. And if you chase after the almighty dollar, you just might find that you are led, as if by an invisible hand, to do things that improve the lives of others."
Although, I'm also partial to a comment below:
"Boaz was making a valuable point, until he ruined it with this last line. Of course, the "invisible hand" principle is accurate, but Boaz was not engaging in economic analysis. He was making a moral argument. He was stating that individuals have the right to pursue their own happiness. Period. Full stop.
But than Boaz starts to get scared, he so falls back upon a collectivist justification for all that individual happiness-seeking.
Please don't hurt me! It was all for the greater good, for the collective!"
to follow your bliss
ReplyDeleteThis phrase got popular when Joseph Campbell got popular. In Campbell's view though bliss can finally never end with material stuff, as the religions say, as a full human life isn't satisfied with that. Thus, he was fond of pointing out the Hindu practice of the successful man of family and world, giving it up at a certain point, leaving wife and family behind, and migrating to the forest, dressed in a loincloth, begging bowl in hand, there to watch the monkeys play and fight, and seek enlightenment.
In following one's bliss one should beware that the guiding light doesn't become a wandering fire, and burn the house, field and forest down.
"But did you know that there's a Hooters in Bogota (never mind hooters in Bogota, of which there are endless and commendable many)? Not terribly far from me, I just discovered.
ReplyDeleteI think this may alone answer cutler's query, "Why bother?"
Emotionally gripping, but also the sort of sentimentality that has the U.S. government overstretched throughout the world, enforcing, in your words, it's own version of the Brezhnev doctrine. Short road from this commitment, to that one, and that one...Meanwhile we tear ourselves apart and modify our government over contingencies on the other side of the world.
Of course, the willingness or unwillingness of a people to help themselves, goes a long way with me personally. In that respect, for what I know, I admire the Colombians as much as I scorn many of our supposed official 'allies.' But, that raises the question of to what extent checks, financial and blood, should be written out of the U.S. citizenry's account, simply for someone else's pet cause - Israel, Cuba, Colombia, Tibet, Taiwan, etc...Cue Washington.
I don't know the answer. Just saying, I wish it was that easy.
simply for someone else's pet cause
ReplyDelete- cutler
Is that what you think it is?
S'okay. Just askin.
You could at least name that someone.
ReplyDelete"In Campbell's view though bliss can finally never end with material stuff, as the religions say, as a full human life isn't satisfied with that."
ReplyDeleteWell, I'm certainly not homosapien economicus, either. The person probably doesn't exist. This being one of the reasons that economic determinists, marxist or capitalist, bewilder me.
Dreams, material or immaterial, are great. So long as they aren't projected or imposed.
"simply for someone else's pet cause
ReplyDelete- cutler
Is that what you think it is?
S'okay. Just askin.
...
You could at least name that someone."
Frankly, I was thinking of me. And any 'favorite people' or cause that I may have held in the past, or am partial to today.
I don't see it as a big flaw, however. Everyone has their issues and pet causes. The difficulty for policy makers is that not everyone has the ability to act on them like they do, even while they're supposed to represent others.
In that respect, I'm trying to figure out things in the odd chance I someday have such a responsibility.
---
No, I'm not coy with names when I want to make my point. No sense dancing around things.
I don't think, cutler, that we always do the best thing.
ReplyDeleteI happened to land where something worked out in our favor over along period of time.
And I'm very glad it has.
That is all.
Sec of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez (he of laptop fame) says the reason for the Cuban Embargo is that every time they were given a spare dime, their armed guys would show up in some other country to cause trouble.
ReplyDeleteIs stopping a commie takeover a "pet cause?"
Lawrence Wright is happy also.
ReplyDelete"Sec of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez (he of laptop fame) says the reason for the Cuban Embargo is that every time they were given a spare dime, their armed guys would show up in some other country to cause trouble.
ReplyDeleteIs stopping a commie takeover a "pet cause?"
I actually am working through a book about South Africa's border wars in the sub-Sahara, including its battles with the Cubans in Angola. It's fascinating really.
One of the possibilities I do not look forward to:
ReplyDeleteLaunching a major nation-building operation in Cuba simply to mollify a certain important voting bloc in Florida.
Lookin' for other ways to skin that cat, man.
ReplyDeleteWhen do you start at DIA?
ReplyDeleteThree weeks or so. Probably at a higher level than before due to the Master's. Still going through the system. So are you going to be stateside for a while?
ReplyDeleteIn the meantime I've got a stack of a dozen books and weight gainer to keep me busy.
ReplyDeleteTwo weeks, I think.
ReplyDeleteWhat directorate?
"weight gainer" ?
ReplyDeleteEmail inbound.
ReplyDeleteNevertheless, I'm off to bed.
!Vive Colombia libre!
Pretend the first one's upside down.
"weight gainer" ?
ReplyDeleteI lost 15 pounds during the two months I was on crutches.
Thanks, taking up Trish's tricks!
ReplyDeleteI'll just call you "skinny" until you tell.
Well, I was right, anyway!
ReplyDeleteWell, I'm certainly not homosapien economicus, either. The person probably doesn't exist. This being one of the reasons that economic determinists, marxist or capitalist, bewilder me.
ReplyDeleteDreams, material or immaterial, are great. So long as they aren't projected or imposed.
Marx was full of it. Try explaining the pyramids, or the stepped pyramids, or the cave paintings in Spain or France, or Black Elk's vision, or the Divine Comedy, or
Shakespeare, or a revenge opera, with the labor theory of value.
Try explaining the Elephant Bar with the labor theory of value.
Try explaing al-Doug and al-Bob with the labor theory of value.
ReplyDeleteYou'd come closer with the laborless theory of value.
You'd come closer with the laborless theory of no value.
ReplyDeleteWisdom of the ages. :)
ReplyDeleteOlbermann is crazy.
ReplyDeleteMurdoch staunchly defended the Fox News Channel’s “Fair and Balanced” motto as accurate, adding that even Bill O’Reilly “gives both sides all the time” — a remark that prompted laughs from the audience.
So why aren’t there more liberal voices on Fox News, Kara Swisher asked? Murdoch replied that he would hire a liberal voice if he could find one that was strong enough.
“Would you hire Keith Olbermann?” Swisher asked.
Murdoch’s response: “No, I fired him five years ago… He’s crazy.”
Don't be, cutler. Until and unless you have a reason to be. Honestly.
ReplyDeleteWhy do people do it? Because they want to know things other people don't.
Ain't nothin' wrong with that.
At all.
And trish, quite sincerely, knows nothing.
ReplyDeleteWisdom of the aged.
ReplyDelete