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."
It's been a really long week.
ReplyDeletePeace out.
Oh, and kudos on the music.
ReplyDeleteBlogger Teresita said...
ReplyDelete"BHO is giving Israel no reason to stand pat, they're gonna hit Iran, and Iran is gonna shut down the Strait of Hormuz, and oil is going to $200"
my, my, now wouldn't that play right into the Ruskie's hands?
Who were the Irgun, but Russians.
ReplyDeleteWhile most of the immigrants to the Levant in the last 20 years were from Russia.
And, as mat told us, not even considered to be "real" members of the sect by their truly Orthodox.
The Russians may be crazy, but they are not stupid, either.
They are supporting both sides of that fight.
Fanning the flames from both ends.
Avigdor Lieberman, mat's favorite politician, and the Foreign Minister is a Russian.
ReplyDeleteYep, the Russkies would come out Really, really Good.
ReplyDeleteThe world price of their oil would skyrocket, and they could make some more money by shipping gasoline to Iran by pipeline (although, I'm not exactly for sure they have enough gasoline refining capacity to make it all that big of a deal.)
IEA Chief Economist: We're, basically, up (Shit) Creek w/o a Paddle.
ReplyDeleteI've always been crazy
ReplyDeleteCan get to sleep, but can't stay there.
ReplyDeleteWaylon, perfect sounds for a guy like me.
Can't tell you how many hours, days, weeks, months, years, I spent listening to Willie Nelson and Waylon, out there on the John Deere tractor, which was really pretty quiet, and had a damn good tape deck.
Here's the thing about our bard.
He hardly ever came up with anything new.
"Romeo and Juliet" for instance, was an old poem, handed down from Italy, from about 100 years before.
And I think it probably goes back further that that.
Most of these poems are expressions of deeper movements in the society.
In our bard, there are a couple of movements one can see, deep rhythms.
One is young upstart spring pushing out old man winter. You see this all through the history plays.
It's under the surface, but there, every time.
Another is though, a push to a higher level, a burst upward.
I think our R and J lovers represent this. It's an old old story too, the glimpse gotten of a higher world, particularily if the heros and heroettes are o so poignant young lovers. It doesn't quite go over so well if the protaganissts are a couple of old farts. This pretty much puts Rufus and me out of the running to be heros in a romantic tragedy. I don't mean Rufus and me, I mean Rufus and his wife, and bob and his wife! Tain't fair, but it is the way it is. Though this is just ageism, another prejudice.
So, because of social circumstances, and mistakes, they have died, our R and J. But they have seen a higher world, got a glimpse of it, and while they may be divided in life, they are united in death.
If you are optimistic, you take this seriously. If you are pessimistic, you laugh it off.
How does this tie in with the Bible?
Because I think it is too a glimpse of a higher and better world.
While in R and J the glimpse is gotten through human sexuality, leading to love, leading to the glimpse of the higher, an old European tradition, in the Bible, mostly, the glimpse is gotten through another kind of revelation, when a bush speaks to a man, as the their old image is.
While I respect the Bible, really love it, I'll take my own Melody, if she will speak to me, if she'll have me, rather than a bush, speaking to me. Melody won't demand I take my shoes off in her presence, though she may make some demands about my pants. :)
Though I love and respect the other tradition.
Of course, both traditions are so entwinned now, with mutual fertilizing, back and forth, that really they are practically one.
When Beatrice has taken Dante up to the higher reaches, her gaze turns from him, his gaze from her, as they both are overcome by a divine light.
I think both our old European and old Jewish traditions are true. Our Native American ones too. But they hadn't come to writing their traditions down.
Thanks anon, for that
Waylon, brought back memories.
There was an old Chinese guy, Chuang-tze, a master, who once dreamed he was a Swede. Upon awakening, he wondered whether he had been a Swede, dreaming he was Chinese.
ReplyDeleteIsn't that a wondeful statement by Waylon? "But I can say I've never intertionally heart anyone"
ReplyDeleteDamn Good.
intentionally, dammit
ReplyDeletehurt, for christsake
ReplyDeletewhy is it that as you get older, you get better at rhymes, and such things, but you can't spell a damn thing?
You know all the poetry and literature, the law, all the rest of it, the deep meaning, but you have to rely on your wife to write your letters?
They gotta be good at somethin.
ReplyDeleteSposed to be a replay of Willie Nelson concert on Maui coming up pretty soon on Sirius internet radio.
ReplyDeleteSarah Palin vs. Barack Obama: The approval gap silently shrinks to a few points
ReplyDeleteRelated items:
What to watch for in Sarah Palin's future.
Democrats going berserk over 'Going Rogue'
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGTDRztaCCw
ReplyDeleteNot Willie.
It's early, isn't it?
ReplyDeletejes, senora, usted es para arriba temprano,
ReplyDelete