Friends, today I share with you a very interesting article about Thomas Jefferson's idea that America should be led by a "natural aristocracy" of men (and possibly some women) of extraordinary virtue and merit. This elite should not be based on birth, of course, but on personal excellence. Well, that's all well and good, but who's to say who among us is virtuous, or wise, or talented, or naturally disposed to leadership? And, once someone has claimed the mantle of leadership, what's to stop them from ossifying the power structure, and jealously guarding their status and privileges and handing them on to their (potentially unworthy) offpsring? Not much, as it turns out. And, in the final analysis, should we be led by an elite at all? Isn't that "undemocratic", i.e. the very antithesis of what America stands for? So many of the key conflicts in modern America can be read as the establishment versus the people, or "expert-led" progressivism versus conservative populism, or (top-down) science versus (bottom-up) religiosity. I don't claim to have all the answers to these vexing questions, but it seems to me that we Americans are a long, long way from sorting out just who should be in charge, and why, and how. Granted, we all need leaders, but which leaders, and how shall they be chosen? Jefferson, I think, was naive in suggesting that this natural aristocracy would bubble up to the surface on its own. I submit that it's a lot more complicated than that!
https://blog.joelonsdale.com/p/jefferson-and-americas-lost-idea
In other news, Hamas has attacked Israel from its bases in the Gaza Strip, and the Israelis are reeling as they haven't since the Yom Kippur War of 1973. No doubt the IDF is very capable of bringing the matter in hand, but these developments cast into doubt the competence of Israel's political and military leadership -- and may also be a reflection on President Biden's recent decision to pay off Hamas' backers, the Iranians. DJT says that all this proves that Joe Biden has brought us perilously close to WWIII. Well, I dunno about that. If our opponents in WWIII are going to be Hamas militants, I'd say we're in pretty good shape. But if our opponents in WWIII are going to be nuclear-armed Russians, then the stakes just got a lot higher! Trump is right that only a fool could suggest that the world has grown more stable, peaceful, or prosperous since Biden took the helm in the USA.
https://www.newsmax.com/newsmax-tv/donald-trump-iowa-world-war-iii/2023/10/07/id/1137406/
Finally, here's some intriguing speculation on how life might...distribute itself about the galaxy. It certainly is one of, uhh, life's great questions: how prevalent is organic (or non-organic) life in the Milky Way? Who knows -- perhaps in the years ahead we may finally found out.
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20231006-how-life-might-hitchhike-its-way-through-the-galaxy
RAY TO DR. NICK
ReplyDeleteThe world has not been peaceful or stable since World War I. It has been less so since 1945 with numerous wars all over the globe. Certainly The Korean War and the Vietnam Wars come to mind, plus many others that most Americans are not even aware of. Many of these wars also had significant casualties. Here is a partial/small list:
The Greek Civil War 1945-1949
"Emergency" in Malaya 1948-1960
The Algerian Revolution 1954-1962
Portuguese Africa Wars 1961-1976
The Nigerian Civil War 1967-1970
The above are just a few. Remember there is always a war going on somewhere. A lot of the dead are women and children who get in the way.
Here is a war I should have mentioned, The Gulf War of 1979 to approximately 1990 during which Iraq and Iran managed to pile up the corpses, not to mention the wounded.
I'm not a military historian, so I make no claim to be an expert on military affairs. However, just a cursory look at world conflicts tells me there will always be wars.
Just thinking of all the many millions who perished in World Wars I and II is mind boggling.
Dr. Waddy from Jack: I think displaced Arab Palestinians have legitimate grievances against Israel but also as much against the Arabs and Iranians who have used them as pawns in their FUNDAMENTALLY antisemitic resolve to annihilate Israel. The medieval viciousness of this attack confirms the ancient, visceral hate which permeates this terribly enduring historical evil.. The trouble is: Since 1945,Jews have said "No more, "NEVER AGAIN" and they mean it. Misguide Christians!Cossacks, Stalinist
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DeleteIt is a fact that "NEVER AGAIN" refers to The Holocaust. However, after that event, most survivors elected to go to places other than what became Israel in 1948. With that said, don't forget that Arabs are also a semitic people.
Dr. Waddy from Jack:. . . misguided Christians, Cossacks, StalinIsts, Nazis and street level thugs and pukes: its all the same thing!
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: The middle eastern barbarians, shamed by Israel's superior civilization, cannot but react by bringing this incredibly durable anathema, this reason to doubt that human nature is fundamentally good, into our very time. My God: WWII has returned in Ukraine and pogrom. . . POGROM! . . .has recured!!
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy and Ray from Jack: Your remarks above have much merit. It seems that in this pogrom though that women and children, the hospitalized and the elderly, are enthusiatically and purposely targeted.These "fighters" are subhumans straight out of our darkest past.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: Thanx for posting the article about the possibility of interstellar mobility of life. The consummate wonder of what we have learned already through the objective exploration of space is beyond description.If another life awaits us when we pass, perhaps it will be one in which knowedge of cosmic phenomena is commonplace.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy, Ray, et al from Jack: Antisemitism is a somewhat misleading euphemism which certainly does not include hostility to all of semitic ethnicity. In common usage it has taken on a meaning synonymous with "hatred of Jews".
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: American democracy is an ongoing experiment. Lincoln, in the Gettysburg Address, recognized that the then over 80 years of the experiment had shown a need for a renewed and revitalized devotion to the ideals manifested in the Declaration of Independence especially and in the Constitution. The natural aristocracy of the truly talented and virtuous founding fathers wrought an unprecedentedly free nation but one with the undefendable injustice of slavery. It took civil war to expunge that inhuman institution. Today, we see political conflict unseen since before the civil war. But this one is caused by the aggressive rise of a yet historically condemned doctrine which excoriates our country and devotes itself to totalitarian " fundamental transformation" Political civil war now obtains. Will we be as fortunate in our leadership this time?In 1860 a leader with ability equal to that of the founding fathers and who knew the country did not need to be completely done over was miraculously available .The existential threat today is as profound as it was in1860. The ongoing experiment may fail.The presence of some kind of elite is probably inevitable in any polity.
ReplyDeleteRAY TO JACK
ReplyDeleteAfter reading your comments for some time now, I realize that your style of writing must be the tongues Pentecostal Christians are always talking about.
Dr. Waddy and Ray et al from Jack: Writing in tongues. That is a new one on me.I should think it would be awkward while reclining supine.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy and Ray from Jack: Why, my writing is readily discernable. A passing acquaintance with PreColumbian Mayan Courtly Dialect more than suffices.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy, Ray, et al from Jack: In Arthur C. Clarke's Childhood's End, Earth is supervised lightly by benevolent aliens. They interfere little but they do one day cause the audience at a bullfight to momentarily suffer the pain the bull experiences when he is impaled. Consequently, bull fighting is summarily discontinued. Those creatures who in response to Hamas' pogrom have brandished signs saying (forgive me) "death to Jews" and adorned with swastikas ,rate a similar experience. Perhaps a journey to the past featuring exposure to the very STENCH only of Auschwitz would raise even in these deadened souls some regret, some empathy, some vestigial humanity. Their wrong is beyond comprehension, I think and is in keeping with the inexplicably enduring horror of this historical curse. That it persists, in apparently full ferocity, to this day, is disturbing beyond measure.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: Continuing broadcast to the world of deeds of profound evil is promised by the events of the last few days and the prospect is horrid beyond reckoning. The Israelis must fully invest the Gaza Strip; no Israeli leader could refrain from this terrible responsibility. But should the subhumans who are doing this neopogrom do as they have said they would should Israel invest Gaza City, then,well, unthinkable offense to humanity, which no words can define,is at hand! God forbid!
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: The American academy has made haste to disgrace itself beyond measure with its tolerance of student groups which extol Hamas' pogrom. Don't know how widespread it is yet; I know if we learn of any of it at a state supported "university" in our NY state , we should make equal haste to urge our legislators to take action!The perpetrators will of course protest that their "academic freedom", a courtesy they deny to any who disagree with them, is being violated should any task them for this casual inhumanity. Lets face it; taken as a whole, our "universities" are a swamp of bigoted, antiintellectual antiamerican leftist ingratitude and stupidity. Sure, there are exceptions but the corruption of higher education is appalling and very dangerous to our civilization.
ReplyDeleteRaymundo, you're right that we have plenty of wars about, but these are small affairs compared to WWI and WWII. Also, the number of wars isn't really relevant to the proportion of the world's people dying in them. Ukraine, for instance, barely registers in the annals of deadly wars, even in recent times. By and large, I think you'd find that hunter-gatherers massacred each other at a much faster clip than we do.
ReplyDeletehttps://ourworldindata.org/war-and-peace
Jack, good point that the Palestinians have been abused by their fellow Arabs as much as by the Israelis. They are a cursed people, it would appear.
Jack, the Hamas thugs remind me of the ISIS brutes, and that's probably no accident. It will be fascinating to learn how these attackers were equipped, trained, and indoctrinated.
Jack, I would submit that these United States were indeed "done over" under Lincoln, and even more so under Reconstruction. You wonder why our Constitution is so threadbare? You can trace it right back to Lincoln's presidency!
Jack, you realize that, by accusing you of speaking in tongues, Ray was paying you the very highest of compliments, right? You're one step away from the angelic host!
Jack, sadly, it doesn't surprise me that so many people can and do celebrate the bestial acts inflicted on innocent civilians in Israel. Dehumanization is, alas, an all too human "art".
Sure, the Israelis can and will storm the Gaza Strip, and they will "clean out the barn", as it were, but what will happen to the millions of Palestinians in the long run that could possibly reconcile them to their fate? Or will Israel's actions simply sow the seeds of the next Arab offensive? I think it's important at times like these to think about the "endgame", no?
Dr. Waddy from Jack: The end game will come, I think, only if the curse of Jew hatred ends. The(to me)ncomprehensible extent, persistence and animal ferocity of that anathema, which obtains far beyond the Middle East, is the essential cause of the murderous antipathy shown Israel by much of the world. Territorial disputes, especially where both sides have just claims, are sadly commonplace. Why does this one generate such emotion?I think the Arab countries and Iran have cynically used the displaced Palestinian Arabs as a means to channel nothing as much as simple, base, Jew hatred. The existence within their midst of a clearly far better constituted civilization may play an ancillary role. I would welcome the views of those who know more about this than I do. What role might Islam play in this in this unending conflict?
ReplyDeletec hate show
Dr. Waddy from Jack: The subhuman "zero tolerance" for Israel's very existence, shown by so many Arab nations, motivates those savages among the Palestinians. I would expect they show thuggish "zero tolerance" for any dissent from this position in the Palestinian population. Also at work in this mess: the apparent lack of accomodation of Palestinians in neighboring Arab countries. Perhaps they fear Palestinian radicalism? Perhaps also long standing rivalries still obtain?
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddyfrom Jack: I look forward to discussing with you your view about the consequences of Lincoln's tenure. I rather think he adjusted to an unprecedented, rapidly developing situation in a way which continued the viability of a country which could have permanently flown apart with catastrophic results in the 20th century. Very interested in your comment on the Constitution - when we have the opportunity.
ReplyDeleteJack, since the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is both a reflection of, and a key cause of, modern anti-Semitism, especially in the Middle East, it's difficult to imagine how this horrific feedback loop can be cut short. In fact, I would assume that one of Hamas' central objectives in launching this attack was to provoke what some will consider a bloody-minded Israeli overreaction, and thus to ENHANCE anti-Semitism. And in all likelihood it will work too. Israel has, nonetheless, made a lot of progress in normalizing relations with a number of Arab states. We'll know a sea change is in the works if some of these states now back away from their commitments to Israel.
ReplyDeleteIn simple terms, yes, Lincoln held the Union together, by force, but he also expanded federal power enormously, effectively rendered the states subservient to the central government, and brazenly ignored the Supreme Court and the right to habeas corpus, when it suited him. I would go as far as to say that the modern, omnipotent state was born in the context of the U.S. Civil War.
Dr. Waddy from Jack: I think those Arab states which have somewhat normalized relations with Israel did not do so out of good will. They simply realized that Israel will not allow them to destroy it and they had to acknowedge that to do so would be wasted effort. I think modern antisemitism is a good old ancient garden variety continuance of a unique abomination. In saying this I do not wish to gainsay your observations on its modern manifestations but to me its just the same thing all the while.
ReplyDeleteJack, accepting Israel as an inevitability, and doing business with Israelis and treating the "Jewish state" as a peer, are not the same thing. I would argue that the Arab states that have recognized Israel have taken big risks, and frankly we can't guarantee that Israel's forward momentum in diplomacy will continue.
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