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."

Sunday, September 24, 2006

Lewis & Clark, an American Icon Skunked by the BBC


The article begins in a perfunctory report on the US celebration of The Lewis and Clark Expedition, but their smug left wing agenda and political correctness oozes to the surface in their choice of published comments. And talk about comment moderation, I can assure you they NEVER publish any from 2164th. I wonder why? I publish one, actually the first one out of the box. Grab a box of kleenex and give it a big "boo hoo."

"I am a student at Lewis and Clark Law School in Portland, Oregon, where Lewis and Clark are celebrated daily. I have trouble with the constant praise of their journey. This is because they could not have survived without the labor of their slave, York. Although he was a part of the expedition, his name is absent from almost every account of their adventure, including this article. This lack of acknowledgement of York's contributions, or even his presence, is a sad extension of America's Eurocentric portrayal of it's history. 200 years ago, Americans didn't see Blacks as human beings. Today, they choose not to acknowledge Black contributions in the founding of our nation. Not only did the expedition open the West to the genocide of the indigenous peoples, it was done with slave labor. Hardly a cause for celebration."

Sara Bagheri, Portland, Oregon

24 comments:

  1. Where does one stop, with this sort of deconstruction? What *isn't* in the end an act of volition?

    Oh--wait--there's one thing that isn't oppressive (no, not the crucifixion--obviously Jesus was on a power-mad ego trip): that one thing is--"being a victim".

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  2. but Sara Bagheri has no imagination: what about poor old Lewis & Clark? Who gave them that oppressive desire to sacrifice safety and comfort in order to go explore the unknown? Mother Nature, that's who. Wot an oppressive slave-driving bitch she is.

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  3. I suspect that Sara is a well intentioned but poorly educated and thoroughly indoctrinated young lady. On the other hand, she may be left-wing, anti-zionist movement.

    I also suspect that the agenda behind the "dumbing down" of American education is to make a generation ignorant of historical fact.

    A year after 9/11 the self proclaimed "black elite" gathered in Philadelphia for a greivance session entitled something like "Black America: One Year after 9/11." What a bunch of whining, greviance mongers; not an original thought among them and no clue what they would do with America after their "revolution."

    The goal of historical revisionists is to discredit the "Man", create chaos in society and install themselves in the vacuum. The lie of "White Mans' Genocide of the Indigenous Native" is just a small part of the overall campaign against Western Civilization. Political Correctness, Cultural Diversity, hate crimes legislation, and the myth about Separation of Church and State are just a few tools in the leftists bag of tricks.

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  4. How about a future post about that Whit? ..."The lie of "White Mans' Genocide of the Indigenous Native" is just a small part of the overall campaign against Western Civilization. Political Correctness,"

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  5. Nature is a power struggle. That's what Nature "is".

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  6. Anyone who's ever run out to the two-holer at six in a Mo morning, in February will tell you that Mother Nature is just a "Fucking" Bitch.

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  7. Speaking of Nature, Europe is doing some interesting stuff using hybrid African grasses and Sorghum for energy.

    It's the Germans, of course.

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  8. They did a lot with synthetic fuels--as they were called then--in the latter years of WWII. Methanol injection and what-not kept the Luftwaffe competitive to the end, in "localized" actions.

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  9. Jim Cramer just savaged I mean 8savaged* the ethanol stocks last Thurs or Friday. But, not just the stocks, the corn biz as fuel, altogether, he simply witheringly scorned. gad, the politics around the subsidy, it's hard to know what's what. i think the disconnect is cramer is talking about efficiency comparisons in the present moment, where backers of corn ethanol are looking out a ways into the future.

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  10. I'm still holding my ADM, so, not buying cramer all the way. he *is* undeniably adding to the "mkt-risk", tho.

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  11. Buddy, I don't particularly like (in fact, I very much dislike) the "ethanol" stocks. It's a commodity. Alkyhol is alkyhol. I don't see any way to get advantage by scale. ADM "IS" Different. It has a "World-Wide" Transportation, processing, and Research operation.

    Wall Streeters hate ethanol because there's no way for them to make much money off of it.

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  12. As far as the subsidies go, they're "tiny" compared to oil.

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  13. The big ethanol stocks--like VeraSun and Pacific Ethanol--are good companies--the problem is that the speculators simply overhyped the stock expectations. Old story, the smart folks end up with the greedy folks' money.

    Right--ADM is only a few percent ethanol--it's sorta 'self-hedged'.

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  14. In the end, after you get through calculating BTUs from sunshine, and the ham and eggs the farmer ate for breakfast it boils down to one thing. WITHOUT SUBSIDIES: ethanol can be pumped (profitably) into your car for $1.25/gal. Now, with the engines presently available, it becomes a "good" deal when unleaded is selling for $1.75/gal, or more.

    This will all get better as technologies, and feedstocks, improve. We're probably looking at ethanol being profitable at $1.00/gal in a few years, and engines that make it competitive when Gasoline is $1.10/gal, or so.

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  15. Remember, the above figures are for NO SUBSIDIES.

    The current subsidy is $0.51/gal. We're talking about 2.5 Billion this year. I don't think it would be hard to show that oil is getting much more subsidization than that.

    Also, remember one thing. We're paying farmers more than that to keep land OUT OF PRODUCTION. To that end, the meager subsidies that ethanol is receiving will to some extent pay for themselve.

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  16. "Subsidy" is not automatically a dirty word, anyway. It's an efficient way to stimulate needed activity, to jump-start the invisible hand. The word--like so many--has been twisted in the politics.

    usually a simple sector tax-relief, anyway. not exactly a giveaway, merely a decision to take-away less.

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  17. sara,

    he wasn't "their slave". he was the slave of Merriweather Lewis.

    He is mentioned in the Corps of Discoveries annals..do more research
    grade F

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  18. And what about the guts and brains it took to cut loose from all supply and all hope of rescue, and launch on a years long, no-turn-back trip into the Great Unknown--and then, and THEN, make it back successfully, mission accomplished?

    Not a word to that, Sara?

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  19. And, were a million or so natives granted some sort of right to a Hemisphere that now feeds and houses billions, simply because they migrated to it before the next folks? Did a few thousand Plains Indians need the entire middle third of North America for their Happy Hunting Ground, while Europe filled into a diseased starving ghetto? WTF?

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  20. The Lewis and Clark Corps of Discovery was one of the finest achievements in our history.

    Once they had reached the Pacific, through great trials and tribulations, Lewis and Clarke, who were in full command allowed the entire Corps to vote on where thay wanted to winter.
    They allowed Sacajawea to vote,a n Indian girl, they allowed York to vote, a negro slave. These two acts predated the legal entitlements of those acts by more than 170+ years ..yet they allowed it when it was their call.
    They lost only one man in the entire party during their trek,a nd he died of "billious fever", probably appendicitis.
    York was treated as an equal on the journey and was more than treated as an equal by the various Indian tribes he copulated with at their demands.

    Sara, please don't try to rewrite history. You've neither the intellect nor facts to do so.

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  21. And, were a million or so natives granted some sort of right to a Hemisphere that now feeds and houses billions, simply because they migrated to it before the next folks?

    Granted rights? I know I always get in trouble for making statements of moral equivelence but it always struck me as funny that the "right" of "private property" only goes back to the 1800s or so...after the land was safely in the hands of the white folks. It seems to me it's not the tribes who need to be "granted" rights, but the other way around.

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  22. My point was, what could grant any rights? What can grant any rights now? Like Black Elk said, "White man's medicine is stronger than ours". Had it been the other way around, there's been no dispute. Today's white man's property rights extend only to the point he can defend them. Like someone said, the jungle is no farther away than a couple of missed meals.

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  23. But I guess we can tote the sin around til the end of time. Got that damned apple thing in Garden of Eden, too, and a lot in between.

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  24. "If one wants to think of real explorers think of the folks that came across the Pacific earlier on with rafts or whatever they used"
    ---
    That would be me.
    And Sonia.
    The Adam and Eve o'the Pacific.
    Part the Hair,
    Surf the Waves.

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