Book Burning

[littlefallsmets]

Probably when we threw off the chains of royal oppression across the sea, that we might be ruled by...

Our own locally-grown white male Protestant middle-aged landed gentry?

Probably when we pulled together as a country regardless of class race and gender to defeat the Nazis...

While throwing our own Japanese into prison camps and, afterwards, trying our damnedest to put women's and minority rights back into the Pandora's Box from whence they came?

Probably when we stood as one, in the face of the 9-11 tragedy...

And went shopping for bumper magnets while drone planes killed hoardes of dusky civilians that had nothing to do with it?

Yikes. The Money Spider and myself totally agreeing, if for different reasons perhaps.

EDIT:

Christ, that was horribly fuck*ng glib.

I think what I would mean to say is that... America's soul is in looking forward, not looking inward.

Our nation has been the least-bad in a world of horrible places not because we have had some kind of internal perfection but because we, much of the time anyway when the priests and the moneychangers did not rule so very much, kept striving forward toward the good and the better, kept trying to be better to each other.

Our soul is on the receding horizon of our understanding of how humans are supposed to treat each other and the pursuit of that ever distant goal.

Or at least it was. Fuck, I don't know.

If we're pretending to take people like Sarah Palin seriously, maybe we're lost.

[wombat]

Personally the idea of returning to America's past does not appeal to me. The past when people owned slaves? The past when women couldn't vote? The past when blacks had to drink from separate water fountains? I think we can do better than America's past.

[miles]

I kind of enjoyed the 90s.

[littlefallsmets]

I kind of enjoyed the 90s.

That was a show on VH1, right?

Starring Michael Ian Black and graphics.

[theinevitable]

wait, why didn't a democrat run on the slogan "I kind of enjoyed the 90s."

[littlefallsmets]

Prob'ly because a historical revisionist would somehow say all that was right about the '90s was caused by Reagan cutting the middle classes' throats by cutting the taxes for the rich or, to a lesser extent, Bush the Elder fixing the economy with some kind of Skull and Bones incantation.

[robot_god]

W. was in the stands at the Yanks Rangers game yesterday, I guess some nine eleven tribute or something and he looked awful.  Nasty skin wrinkled, death 11 on the neck (wildly appropriate), and a gray mustache so wispy a spider covets.  I almost barfed.

[Asherdan]

Friend, point me to the period in time of american history when there was this Glenn Beckian utopian expression of its soul? I keep hearing this language from Glenn Beck, but its never clear what we're "returning to" in his mind

Friend, do not ever again tie me or my sentiments in a sentence to Glenn Beck.

ALSO: You all missed the fuck*ng boat, idjits. I didn't mention shit about the past. I am about doing something new, that'sd every move is a new tradition.

Can we steal ideas from other places? Hell yeah. But the application of those ideas can be tempered by our extant American institutions, a new synthesis following the framework of our traditions rather than a tearing down or replacement with the thought and models of others.

Look boldly to the future and lead, not follow.

LOeave the cowards to eaten as carrion by the crows of history.

[Arachno-capitalist]

Friend, do not ever again tie me or my sentiments in a sentence to Glenn Beck.

ALSO: You all missed the fuck*ng boat, idjits. I didn't mention shit about the past. I am about doing something new, that'sd every move is a new tradition.

Can we steal ideas from other places? Hell yeah. But the application of those ideas can be tempered by our extant American institutions, a new synthesis following the framework of our traditions rather than a tearing down or replacement with the thought and models of others.

Look boldly to the future and lead, not follow.

LOeave the cowards to eaten as carrion by the crows of history.

This message brought to you by our proud sponsors at Canadian Mist.

[theinevitable]

It is a lot easier to "move into the future" if you are not stupidly resistant to doing things that already seem to work.

[Asherdan]

Whatever. Already seems to work is a bullshit proclamation, dig in hearty. Good enough is for tools. Better is the option you should be striving for.

ALSO: I just started in on the hooch. Didn't type so well earlier because I helped my brother split & stack three cords of wood.

To the crows with you all. See you in November.

[Lister]

I keep hearing this language from Glenn Beck, but its never clear what we're "returning to" in his mind

This is because Glenn Beck knows that the more general he is, the more people will agree with him and watch his show, and thus the more money he can get paid.

Gathering up the dissatisfied and reassuring them that their problems are, in fact, the fault of someone else who they know nothing about... it's been done before, because it works.  The good thing is it only works if no one remembers that it worked before.  The bad thing is not enough people remember it working before right now.

[Asherdan]

...the more people will agree with him and watch his show, and thus the more money he can get paid.

I like Lister's wrap up on this as I subscribe to the same motivations for most all talking heads.