Gehryville




DisneyMuzakHall (Gehry)


Whoa.

Snitch Trek

""""Born in El Paso, Texas to Eugene Edward Roddenberry and Caroline Glen, Roddenberry spent his boyhood in Los Angeles, California, where his family had moved so his father could pursue a career with the Los Angeles Police Department. Following in his father's footsteps after high school, Roddenberry took classes in police studies at Los Angeles City College, and headed that school's Police Club. In that role, he was a liaison with the FBI, thanking them for sending speakers and securing copies of the FBI Code and publications for club use, and took fingerprint records of the college community for the FBI's Civil Identification Division."""""

Roddenberry

Narcissists-on-Drugs

"Progressive rhetoric has the effect of concealing social crisis and moral breakdown by presenting them as the birth pangs of a new order." (Lasch)

Christopher Lasch, now mostly forgotten, wrote some interesting essays comparing the authentic tradition of the 60s to the inauthentic and bogus tradition of the 60's. The authentic tradition implied certain political and ideological viewpoints, such as opposition to the violence of the Vietnam war. Whether one agreed or not with the protesters, 'Nam was a defining event. The protesters consisted not only of hippies on drugs, but included some fairly serious intellectual heavyweights--say JKGalbraith, Bertrand Russell, Chomsky. Quite a few "mainstream" religious people protested the actions of Nixon and Kissinger as well. Obviously there was a certain liberal perspective to the 60's counterculture, but that perspective did not equate to marxist orthodoxy, usually, though marxism was a part of it.

The inauthentic related to the flash, the noise, the excess, the drugs. Perhaps some of the escapism was needed. The novelist Ken Kesey, for instance, one of the brighter members of the counterculture, wasn't the most sinister person who ever existed (his "Cuckoo's Nest" could be read as anti-statist left, really), and one likes to think that some good came out of the rock and roll gonzo. Nonetheless some definite Bad came out of the 60s counterculture. Drug abuse itself in a sense seems to symbolize the 60s'--and 70s-- excess and narcissism (if not the contemporary form): the proverbial American stoner might have vaguely protested the 'Nam war, but that was not his central concern. He was concerned, with, well, Drugs (or in 70's-Speak, "sex, drugs, and rock n roll"--Porno, Inc. arguably one of the swampflowers of 60s-style politics).

Lasch asserted that sort of druggy narcissism was not really progressive or even liberal in say the FDRish sense, but indicative of a type of shallow, libertarian type of escapist. Lasch, sort of an Adorno-lite for American consumers, may be too much the social realist for contemporary cyberia, yet he seems mostly correct in regards to narcissism, and his points, say in regards to drug use, still have some force. (He thankfully avoids the politics via character assassination preferred by contemporary PunditBots of left or right as well).

Drug abuse, especially of crack and meth, remains as much a problem as it did for the 70s era of Lasch. While we oppose the Nancy Reagan sort of approach, and agree that there are some grounds for legalizing marijuana (say a type of licensing for sane, intelligent citizens), legalizing hard drugs would be, like, a really dangerous stupid policy. Gangsters do not require easier access to hard-drugs to fuel their violent crime, or to keep them illiterate (for that matter, they don't need booze either-- given a "slippery slope" of booze, and its causal relation to crime, legalized narcotics would most likely increase crime as well). Additionally, those people, even some "liberals", who have been exposed to drug-fueled gang-violence (whether via crack or meth) generally change their mind about the "peace and love" schtick of the 60s, and their naive views of the drug culture.

One blogger-narcissist aka Demonweed often waxes at length about his desire for legalization of ALL drugs. Apart from his windy, fact-less, self-indulgent prose (and the wannabe-"Barry Goldwater-radical" has yet to learn to avoid the 1st person), DW has little or no concern with the facts of narcotics abuse, and its relation to crime and violence. Contingencies has neither time nor interest for a full-scale DrugCrime research project, but merely some familiarity with the facts of drug-abuse and its relation to crime will demonstrate the stupidity of a decriminalization policy.

(Here's some of Demonweed's pop-moral relativism: "I believe murder should be illegal because living in a society where it was legal would put a real damper on happiness, productivity, et al. The fact that most religions condemn it is a happy coincidence, not proof of infallible wisdom." Yes, serial murderers--say Cho--- are not really wrong or evil, they just interfere with the par-tay! Demonweed of course overlooks the basic objection--brought up by any semi-bright Joe Varsity type at the Kegger BS session--- to this sort of subjective, stoner-humanism: what if people actually approve of a Cho, and get off on his acts? (or for that matter, Stalin, or Hitler, etc.). Some deviants are pleased by Cho's or Columbines. So those acts are acceptable, according to DW's own lightweight utilitarian code, at least if approved by consensus (tho' it's unlikely Demonwind knows Bentham from his bong)).

The Demonweed sort of escapist doesn't concern himself overly much with the societal ills resulting from drug use, of course. He wants his dope, like he wants his MTV. So he can summon up some trite "Don't tread on me" libertarian-baptist-schtick, and thereby think he has proven something: it's all about Freedom, man!---of course, gangstas on crack are not too concerned with the Freedom of the old ladies or white kids they rob at the mall (nor is Demonweed, a freeper-on-drugs, really). The Demonweed sort of "hedonist rightist" should be required to reside in say South Central LA where hard drugs such as crack are a normal way of life. Demonweed would unlikely be representin' too much in his Uncle Tom fashion following a few weeks in some 'jects run by Crips or Vineland boys.

What is a lie to a pragmatist? (Cont. retrofit).


Pragmatists, idealists (at least some), mystics, and postmodernists generally assert that truth is not a matter of confirming some alleged facts, "out there", in an objective, empirically-knowable world. There are various differences between these groups, but it doesn't seem unreasonable to suggest that they uphold some version of William James' concept of pragmatism: that truth always has some relation to usefulness, whether that truth relates to the sciences, social sciences, humanities, etc. The pragmatist indeed prides himself on his ability to see "truth" as somewhat provisional.


Old-fashioned Truth


(However, the "is" means inclusion--class membership---and not equality (which would be bi-conditional) nor cause. I.e, "All prime numbers are included in the set of natural numbers." So it's a conditional, really (as Frege translated it, I believe). Moreover Aristotle's Square works dandy with modern predicate-logic as well, ala universal and existential quantifiers, or with summation signs for the I and O). The "syllogistic" then outlines the rules of inference for various forms created from this template. )

The Cash Value of Truth model has of course been criticized, and not without reason. While in some contexts--say medicine--utility would seem to be critical (--testing the functionality of a pharmaceutical, say)--in others, whether history or law, or various social sciences, any modifications of the actual facts to fit some ideology might conceivably result in highly unethical situations. Some naive AGW advocates, to take a contemporary instance, argue that while Gore's eco-movie, An Inconvenient Truth, may not be completely correct in terms of the science, good--or "awareness"-- will come out of the movie and Gore's celebrity Green status. GW Skeptics, including professional scientists, on the other hand allege that Gore not only manipulated and exaggerated the dangers, but in some cases made flat-out errors, as with the "hockey stick" chart of supposed rising temperatures.

(Traditional pragmatists such as James or Peirce would have unlikely agreed to that sort of deception, anyway: proceeding via Jamesian terms, the authentic pragmatist (or pragmaticist) would require experimental evidence (i.e. chem. lab) of CO2 substantially increasing radiation (heat) before giving his assent to the AGW hypothesis, and would probably not agree to mere GW "models" based on shaky inferential evidence regarding temperatures.)

Bertrand Russell noted a few potential problems entailed by "utopian pragmatism" in regards to John Dewey's philosophy of education. If the pragmatist's goal is to create a harmonious community, or even harmonious classroom, or "well-integrated self,"---or hip ecotopia--- then it would seem the pragmatist might "shape" facts (say historical, scientific, or economic facts, or even literary narratives) to fit his pedagogy--making the students see the world through rose-tinted glasses, more or less (or perhaps green-, or red tinted glasses, in green or marxist indoctrination centers). Various theologically-oriented pragmatists might do the same with religious texts: Paddy McMuffin might grant that he cannot verify Scripture, but he insists it's good for you, regardless.

Assuming the that "fact-shaping-process" (mendacity, in old-fashioned terms) resulted in a harmonious community and well-balanced individuals (or even a supremely efficient proletarian State), then pragmatists would grant, it would seem, that the right thing had been done. And other sorts of similar absurdities, possibly Orwellian, resulting from pragmatism (or any ideology where truth is solely a matter of functionality) across the board could be realized. The documented crimes against humanity of stalinism or fascism could be eliminated from history curriculums because they are too negative; or some eco-bureaucrats suppress scientific evidence disproving a politically-correct model of global warming because it's considered too threatening to their own eco-political vision. AS Russell realized, politics should never override historical or scientific facts, regardless of the visions of bureaucrat-pragmatists.

Fear ye the Pandybat...............

"""""The soutane sleeve swished again as the pandybat was lifted and a loud crashing sound and a fierce maddening...pain made his hand shrink together..."""" (POTAAAYM, J.J.)

"""""Pendebat in cruce, / He was hanging on the cross...." (Augustine)

Consensus Science: the Al Gore Truth-process


Just as a show of hands in a high-school classroom (how many think Answer A is right??) will not necessarily establish the right answer to an algebra problem, the truth of Global warming will not be decided by a poll. Science is NOT done via consensus: it’s a matter of confirming a given hypothesis via experimental proof. (No shit, perhaps you are thinking--say it to Big Al).

Einstein himself wrote on this topic when his first papers on the experimental confirmation of relativity were not accepted by "peer reviewed" scientific journals. Obviously, that a majority of experts might mostly agree on the global warming hypothesis does not itself confirm the hypothesis (except maybe to Al Jr., who managed a D+ in "Physics for Dixiecrats" at Haw-vard).

Contrarian views do quite often prevail in science: most victorians held to Screeptural views and considered Darwinian evolution the most horrid, blasphemous idea in the world, and Darwin's theory was not accepted for many years, either among society or scientists (and still is not with many biblethumpers--or koran-thumpers). Newtonian mechanics, accepted as truth for 2+ centuries, was substantially modified by special and general relativity, though Einstein's theories were considered odd at the time (contrarian or "fringe" in blogspeak).

Of course GW is not close to Newtonian mechanics: the theory has not really been established (i.e. the basic claim that increases in anthropogenic CO2 in the atmosphere leads to global warming has not been conclusively established--that is, assuming that present and historical temperature data itself is accurate! Gore of course doesn't know margin of error from the margin on his NASDAQ stock). A consensus does not even exist among global warming "experts" to the degree that Gore suggested, and a consensus of climate modellers does not equal a consensus of atmospheric scientists. GW experts merely offer probabilities and estimations, not certainties or truths (though YES, the IPCC research should be seriously considered): though that did not prevent Al Jr. from presenting GW as established, and "true" theory. See this site for some effective debunking of Gore/AIT (which is not the same as the IPCC report anyway):

Edelman/AIT

How to lie and be PC: the New Worlds way.



Nearly as amusing as Al Jr.'s green buffoon-act are his defenders when challenged---not only challenged via Crichton or the rightists (some of the rightists are as bad as Gore), but from sober rationalists and scientific researchers. Merely to question the dogma causes nervous breakdowns among many of the Gorean faithful. Additionally, even if some IPCC claims turned out to be accurate, Al ain't the person to be selling those claims. Let's have Dr. Hug and Rancourt debate the IPCC climate-modeling "experts".

For instance, look at this thread, led by a Wordpress cyber-liar, McMax of New Worlds:

Gore/Peaceprize

Note that the mere mention of Crichton and GW skeptics causes....palpitations!..... among the faithful. ID politics, pure and simple. Just call Crichton a neo-con, or nazi, or suggest it, and his arguments have been dismissed. Here's a typical little NewWorlder liar, one INS-o-motya, in action:

""""My reaction when I read Krugman's column this morning was, I'm pretty confident that the Michael Crighton-hugging right-wingers were crazy enough before Gore showed up to drive them even further over the edge."""

Yes, Dr. Crichton, a real Harvard graduate and with far more scientific credibility than Goreco, is crazy and rightwing as are his followers, and Al Gore, flunkie, hawk, scientifically incompetent dixiecrat should be considered correct. Nearly stalinist in terms of efficiency and deception--or perhaps like Mormon (and New Worlds has a distinct Mormonal flavor--search for O.S.Card and, like, BerthaRon). Skeptics of GW: they are wrong because they ....don't pay homage to St. Gore! Pathetic. What did WB Yeats say about middle-class peasants incapable of reason? "Base born products of base beds............."

Al ain’t exactly Einstein

Big Al, peacemaker, managed like a few D+s in “natural science” back when his rich redneck daddy paid for his beer-drinking at Haw-vawd:

“”"”"at Nonpartisan Half Sigma digs up an old story on Gore’s grades at Harvard and feels robbed: “Gore…had a D+ average in his two ‘Natural Sciences’ classes (which seem pretty bogus to me, kind of like ‘rocks for jocks’). Half Sigma has Bs or B+s in two semesters of Chemistry and two semesters of Physics at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (before he transferred to an Ivy League undergraduate school). What does this mean? It means Half Sigma is more qualified to talk about gases in the atmosphere than Al Gore. Someone should give me a Nobel Prize.”"”"”

Phuck, even we here at Contingencies, humble computer geeks and logico-ontologists, out-GPA and out-science Big Al the Green Dinosaur. Maybe Al should have to run through Avagadro's Number problems: then see how he does, and if can't pass it, return the Prize................

Al/Slate

Alex C. on Al G.

"Al Gore's Peace Prize"
By ALEXANDER COCKBURN

""""It's As Ridiculous As If They'd Given Goebbels One in 1938""""

"""""Put this one up on the shelf of shame, right next to Henry Kissinger's, or the peace prize they gave to Kofi Annan and the entire UN in 2001, sandwiched between the UN's okay for the bombing of Serbia, the killing of untold numbers of Iraqis, many of them babies and children in the years of sanctions, and its greenlight for the bombing of Baghdad in 2003. In 1998 the Nobel crowd gave the prize to Medecins Sans Frontieres, whose co-founder Bernard Kouchner is now France's foreign secretary urging the bombing of Iran. Like Gore, Kouchner was a rabid advocate of the dismemberment of the former Yugoslavia and onslaughts on Serbia.""""

We are not worthy. Cockburn realizes that Gore, like Hillary, is "Them." Perhaps Gore no longer has as much "Them" as a Dick Cheney's Them, but Them nonetheless. Clinton/Gore phucked up. That's the Res Ipsa Loquitur of Democratic politics of the last 15 years. They could have done great things, implemented reforms, taken on the corporate and financial oligarchies. Instead, Bill-Al decided to play it safe, accomodate, move to the right, while increasing bureaucracy (though in some cases, Clinton/Gore cut needed infrastructure--Gore in fact slashed funding for environmental research). Gore's the role model for like liberal protestant-stoners everywhere who think if software executives and IT barons just start to recycle and eat tofu everything will be kosher.


Gore's new greenish turn is more or less calculated and corporate as well. Global warming rates as a pseudo-issue compared to peak oil, to war, to nuclear weapons problems, to theocracy. The Inconvenient Truth was more corporate-sponsored liberalism. What's more, Al fails to mention all the decent arguments why CO2 is not the culprit.

""""The most often cited reconstructed global average temperature curves (themselves somewhat tenuous, see below) show increases in global mean temperature of approximately 0.5-1 C in the last 100 years. Let us compare this to the extremes of temperature to which humans routinely adapt. Humans have thrived in every possible ecological niche on the planet, from deserts to tropical forests to the North Polar Regions, since well before present technological advances. These environments show mean temperature differences of as much as 50 C or more. Many of these environments also show day to night and seasonal differences of as much as 20-50 C. A sudden 0.5-1 C increase in mean annual temperature (not spread over 100 years) would be imperceptible to any human and indeed could barely be detected using all of the methods of the modern scientific enterprise."""""

Rancourt

And that's no Freeper: but a Canadian scientist, and green showing the BS of Gore's pseudo-environmentalism. The temperature curves themselves are problematic: the margin of error could possibly be sufficient to show that the supposed rises in temperature due to CO2 (natural or anthropic, Al?) are negligible. Phuck Al Gore, that phony corporate lackey.

Teddy A. in da House.

Adorno: old-school marxist who detested both western capitalism and stalinist bureaucracy. A classically-trained musician (violinist, ah believe) Adorno also wrote some interesting things on the "culture industry", and how popular entertainment de-sensitizes consumers all over the globe. TA was a proverbial snob, though one still interested in socialist reform. His writings are often rather speculative, and Karl Popper was not entirely mistaken in criticizing Adorno (and most of the "structural" marxists) for his somewhat hasty conclusions and generalizations: i.e. many european scholars are not too keen on empiricial evidence, and verification. At the same time the Frankfurt marxists called the Popperians and positivists on their lack of any meaningful politics, their innate skepticism, and their subservience to the monarchy of Capital.

""""""The frame of mind to which popular music originally appealed, on which it feeds, and which it perpetually reinforces, is simultaneously one of distraction and inattention. Listeners are distracted from the demands of reality by entertainment which does not demand attention either.

THE NATIONAL ANTHEM!



The notion of distraction can be properly understood only within its social setting and not in self-subsistent terms of individual psychology. Distraction is bound to the present mode of production, to the rationalized and mechanized process of labor to which, directly or indirectly, masses are subject. This mode of production, which engenders fears and anxiety about unemployment, loss of income, war, has its "non-productive" correlate in entertainment; that is, relaxation which does not involve the effort of concentration at all. People want to have fun. A fully concentrated and conscious experience of art is possible only to those whose lives do not put such a strain on them that in their spare time they want relief from both boredom and effort simultaneously. The whole sphere of cheap commercial entertainment reflects this dual desire. It induces relaxation because it is patterned and pre-digested. Its being patterned and pre-digested serves within the psychological household of the masses to spare them the effort of that participation (even in listening or observation) without which there can be no receptivity to art. On the other hand, the stimuli they provide permit an escape from the boredom of mechanized labor.""""""



Full O'Sound and Fury, dewd

TheListener/Adorno

"""""The emotional listener listens to everything in terms of late romanticism and of the musical commodities derived from it which are already fashioned to fit the needs of emotional listening. They consume music in order to be allowed to weep. They are taken in by the musical expression of frustration rather than by that of happiness. The influence of the standard Slavic melancholy typified by Tchaikovsky and Dvorak is by far greater than that of the most "fulfilled" moments of Mozart or of the young Beethoven. The so-called releasing element of music is simply the opportunity to feel something. But the actual content of this emotion can only be frustration. Emotional music has become the image of the mother who says, "Come and weep, my child." It is catharsis for the masses, but catharsis which keeps them all the more firmly in line. One who weeps does not resist any more than one who marches. Music that permits its listeners the confession of their unhappiness reconciles them, by means of this "release", to their social dependence."""""


This seems quite rich and suggestive: ""Emotional music has become the image of the mother who says, "Come and weep, my child." It is catharsis for the masses, but catharsis which keeps them all the more firmly in line."""

The emotional catharsis of schmaltzy sad music then sort of reinforces the consumer's own misery--their own status as losers. Yass Teddy. However, there is kitschy melancholy (like Tchaikovsky, as TA notes, or all sorts of pop "gothic" music), and there is authentic melancholy--late Scriabin, Chopin, Bach organ concertos, a bit of Satie, Bill Evans playing Autumn Leaves. In terms of narratives, there are soap operas, mafioso dramas, tearjerkers; rather more powerful and perennial are Macbeth and Othello, or EA Poe, Shelley, etc. The authentic melancholy concerns not only one individual or one family's tragedy, but a nation's tragedy, a continent's tragedy---a corpse-strewn battlefield, and rats taking lunch break.

Nietzsche reflects on his one time pal, Wagner.

".......Wagner represents a great corruption of music. He has guessed that it is a means to excite weary nerves,—and with that he has made music sick. His inventiveness is not inconsiderable in the art of goading again those who are weariest, calling back into life those who are half-dead. He is a master of hypnotic tricks, he manages to throw down the strongest like bulls. Wagner's success—his success with nerves and consequently with women—has turned the whole world of ambitious musicians into disciples of his secret art. And not only the ambitious, the clever, too ... Only sick music makes money today; our big theaters subsist on Wagner...."

Das stimmt. And Fritz was at least as decent an ivory-tickler as RW. Wagner's far more Xtian than pagan; rather, Xtianity, filtered through norse myths. Heroics, the militarism, anti-semitism. Nietzsche realized what a bombastic, pompous, bourgeois, loud bore RW could be. Most modern germans detest that crap, and would prefer Satie. The American hicks who flock to Wagner shows in the Gay Area or El Lay are mostly just opportunists, sort of scots or irish mafiosos. Conspicuous consumption, as Veblen called it: they generally know nothing about German kultur or musick.

Wagner's mostly the Beer Barrel Polka with some ornamentations. Advanced Oom pah pah …..Be assured Bach and Beethoven laugh at Fieldmarshall Wagner somewhere beyond–as do all the great russian and french composers.


Mark Twain was no fan of the Wagnerian spectacle:


""""I have witnessed and greatly enjoyed the first act of everything which Wagner created, but the effect on me has always been so powerful that one act was quite sufficient; whenever I have witnessed two acts I have gone away physically exhausted; and whenever I have ventured an entire opera the result has been the next thing to suicide."""""""


Heh heh.

The case for mocking religion/Hitchens

This is an oldie of Hitchens, but in some sense the essay hasn't received the recognition it deserved. Anyone who values certain cultural practices of Western democracy--movies, music, wine or liquor, or Sausage McMuffins--should be aware that the Prophet's code forbids nearly all forms of entertainment (as well as the booze that you and a significant other might imbibe while enjoying Debussy...... or the Grateful Dead).

"......Islam makes very large claims for itself. In its art, there is a prejudice against representing the human form at all. The prohibition on picturing the prophet—who was only another male mammal—is apparently absolute. So is the prohibition on pork or alcohol or, in some Muslim societies, music or dancing. Very well then, let a good Muslim abstain rigorously from all these. But if he claims the right to make me abstain as well, he offers the clearest possible warning and proof of an aggressive intent. This current uneasy coexistence is only an interlude, he seems to say. For the moment, all I can do is claim to possess absolute truth and demand absolute immunity from criticism. But in the future, you will do what I say and you will do it on pain of death.

I refuse to be spoken to in that tone of voice, which as it happens I chance to find "offensive." ( By the way, hasn't the word "offensive" become really offensive lately?) The innate human revulsion against desecration is much older than any monotheism: Its most powerful expression is in the Antigone of Sophocles. It belongs to civilization. I am not asking for the right to slaughter a pig in a synagogue or mosque or to relieve myself on a "holy" book. But I will not be told I can't eat pork, and I will not respect those who burn books on a regular basis. I, too, have strong convictions and beliefs and value the Enlightenment above any priesthood or any sacred fetish-object. It is revolting to me to breathe the same air as wafts from the exhalations of the madrasahs, or the reeking fumes of the suicide-murderers, or the sermons of Billy Graham and Joseph Ratzinger. But these same principles of mine also prevent me from wreaking random violence on the nearest church, or kidnapping a Muslim at random and holding him hostage, or violating diplomatic immunity by attacking the embassy or the envoys of even the most despotic Islamic state, or making a moronic spectacle of myself threatening blood and fire to faraway individuals who may have hurt my feelings. The babyish rumor-fueled tantrums that erupt all the time, especially in the Islamic world, show yet again that faith belongs to the spoiled and selfish childhood of our species.""""""

Hail Eris! (google for mo')

Movin' like a shadow above

"How then do you become Napoleon? There is always one escape: into wickedness. Always do the thing that will shock and wound people. At five, throw a little boy off a bridge, strike an old doctor and break his spectacles -- or, anyway, dream about doing these things. Along those lines you can always feel yourself original. And after all, it pays! It is much less dangerous than crime."

(George Orwell offers some insights into the politics of surrealism and Dalí).

Johnny the Recanter.

Edwards said, about 2 years ago, he was wrong on the Iraq war:

"Almost three years ago we went into Iraq to remove what we were told -- and what many of us believed and argued -- was a threat to America. But in fact we now know that Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction when our forces invaded Iraq in 2003. The intelligence was deeply flawed and, in some cases, manipulated to fit a political agenda.

It was a mistake to vote for this war in 2002. I take responsibility for that mistake"

Edwards deserves some credit for admitting his "mistake" (if a mistake it was). On the other hand, when you think about it, the implications of that mistake are staggering. If Bushco manipulated intelligence to the degree that some of the "recanters" suggest, or created false pretenses for large-scale war, Bush and his cabinet should be facing trial for very serious crimes. Murder for one. It's entirely reasonable to put the leading US Dems on trial as well for collusion of some sort.

Additionally, while we here at Contingencies respect Edwards for his recanting, we recognize a certain shoddy BS quality to it. That's a great faux-pas, obviously, that cost the lives of thousands, and billions of dollars. (that's not to say the allegations of misrepresentation have been proven to be true--though millions of people seem to think they are true). The admission of guilt on the Iraq war then appears nearly confessional, a type of political atonement--Johnny Recanter comes clean! A self-effacing quality plays well in the liberal Simulacra--Edwards enters the cosmic Rehab, is healed, forgiven, and Moves On. Justice not really a concern, and indeed "square", man.

Notwithstanding the atonement hustles (and subtle ad populus, really), politicians like Edwards are not ordinary citizens. The Dems would have known much more about this than Jane Q. Pubic does: they would have been briefed by the military, intelligence, CIA, etc. So it's not like they get a 15 minute run-down on the situation and say thumbs up or not to an invasion (if that's it, they definitely should be on trial).

The democratic politicians were involved in the process leading up to war for months. Edwards may have recanted; on the other hand, that recanting might be more like, "I recant" ("but really know much more about this then I let on").
Dems could have voted against IWR (some did, like Boxer). They could have raised a stink, filibustered, etc. Then, having learned there was deception, pressed much harder for investigations--and legal action ( some World Court--or Russell Tribunal---sort of panel). Assuming that Bushco used deception, false pretenses, misrepresention to justify the Iraqi war effort, the pro-war Democrats are, I believe, party to that deception. So voting for Hillary, or even Edwards, arguably, implies voting for a war criminal.

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Click for ~Gott

He is risen



St. BZ.