Old Wine New Barrels: "Who Are The Mystery Girls?" 2003
Jeff Rubard
Hi. Although I'm not a regular visitor to this newsgroup, I'm a
not-too-distant neighbor of yours on the political spectrum and I'd
like
to discuss how some other leftists view "progressives". This isn't a
topic I would have thought necessary, but the nonstop W.-bashing
during
these last few years has made me wonder whether men and women of the
left ought necessarily to be "all on the same page", so to speak; and
whether there might be some men and women together who are worth
considering, but at this time are "off the map", as it were. First,
I'd
like to offer a little history of the big-P Progressive movement in
American politics of the early 20th century, and put a question to the
newsgroup as to what of Progressive values and political strategies
people can identify with.
To begin, the Progressive movement did not come out out of the
Republican, not the Democratic, Party; as many of you may know, *The
Progressive* was founded by the most prominent elected Progressive,
Republican Robert LaFollette of Wisconsin. Furthermore, Progressives
were responsible for the initiative systems that many states have
/including my own, Oregon, which had a very strong Progressive
Republican tradition up *into the 1980s*/, non-partisan local
elections,
and many other drives to make government clean, efficient, and
accessible to the common man. I put this question to you, but if the
answer is to be "Why, I'm for anything that will deal with
inequalities
of wealth in this country" I'm for the sentiment in a big way but I'm
afraid I can't agree with that characterization of Progressivism.
Although Progressivism was a proud tradition in many states West of
the
Mississippi, and shared space with the decidedly redistributionist
Populist and Socialist Parties, at bottom *it is not* about a right to
government aid deriving from popular sovereignty, but bureaucratic
reforms which obviate the need for redistributionist policies. If the
mayor of my town is not elected as the candidate of a party (as he in
fact is, although it is well-known he is a moderate Democrat), the
message built into the very system is that party affiliation counts
for
naught in dealing with civic government; and if laws enacted by the
legislature can be overturned by direct plebiscite (as they can), the
message is not that the common man's wishes are what goes (since the
initiative process is expensive and time-consuming) but that a small
class of government officials does not dictate what to this (somewhat
mythical) fellow concerning what is good for him. There is really
nothing about welfare or other social-assistance schemes in this
schema,
and I really do have to ask small-p progressives concerned about such
safety nets to consider from whence they sprung (namely, the labor
movement and socialist politics). But furthermore, there was another
element in Progressivism which is sometimes actively questioned by
contemporary progressives, namely a frank *veneration* of law and
order
as represented by clean government officials, including police.
We have heard much about /police brutality and corruption/ in recent
years, and perhaps this deserves close scrutiny for many reasons. But
one of the reasons "real reds" have always distanced themselves from
the
Progressive label is that this clean and efficient bureaucracy would
*target* radical leftists as possible subverters of the order; for
example, in nearby Portland the police had a "red squad" for many
years
which would watch black, socialist, and anarchist activists at work
and
at home for signs of illegal behavior. [!!] If such activities do not
disturb you, perhaps this is a sign of a shift in public opinion (I
know
I'm less opposed to monitoring than I was some years ago; and I'm a
very
extreme leftist, that is, opposed to many things). And if they do
not,
perhaps you should question whether you do in fact find them
objectionable, objectionable enough to *take serious action* rather
than
bemoan them.
I doubt this is the case, and considering that I am well to the left
of
most all of you I wonder whether some of your discontent is not
"idealist" in nature; perhaps you do not like the values of
contemporary
America, although you are ambivalent about any particular application
of
them. And in truth, this actually puts progressives close to the
Whites
of pre-revolutionary Russian life, romantic populists who wanted a
better
world without any kind of serious, painful, dangerous social struggle.
Actually, this is easy enough to sympathize with, and following the
Russian Civil War there was a great deal of loose talk by world
Communists about such elements. By contrast, most contemporary
radical
leftists (and left or "council" communists, who aim to capture what
was
of value in one particular moment of the Soviet Union) know a
progressive or three and find them to be thoroughly decent people
*when
political issues are not at stake*. But when politics comes into
play,
progressives often execute what communists call "hegemonic strategy":
they represent themselves as being as far left as one can rationally
be,
yet take over responsibility for "cheering on" radical leftists whose
views and life situations are actually quite different from theirs.
Thusly, the undefined progressive mass (called by some the "New
Class")
in American society takes the *autonomy* of the radical left as a
whole
away from it; they don't get credit for *what they are attempting to
do*, much less credit for what they actually have accomplished.
And this is a sticky wicket, although to be honest nobody else in
America would probably be too excited about any of the rad ideas
people
such as me have, it's really not too much for radicals to ask
progressives not to "bogart their actions". Unfortunately, the New
Party's scheme to make representative government more representative
is
unlikely to un-stick that. The New Party strategy of "fusion",
building
adequately representation for their party base by alternately
endorsing a Democratic or Green candidate or running their own, has
borne real electoral fruit -- *but* still manages to exclude quite a
bit
of the diversity of opinion at the grass-roots level, a source not of
"dissension" but of real strength for the radical left.
What can we give in return for consideration of such issues? Frankly,
not a hell of a lot; but for any radicals reading this, I would
encourage you to consider what was captured in the "White" vision of
society and discarded in the "Red" by necessity, namely preservation
of
culture (the good things in life). Fighting for or enjoying such
things
does not constitute a political act by itself, and although *1984* has
prompted Brother Rorty to encourage acts of random beauty,
aestheticist
conceits, as "experiments in democracy", I feel obliged to remind him
of
what Brother Kolakowski knows, namely that what is on endless trial in
modernity is not ironism but the thoroughly non-ironic solidarity
characteristic of industrial labor unions.
However, not everybody is in a position to need such solidarity, and
perhaps that's not a bad thing; so I would encourage radicals to
encourage progressives to mind *what exists that is of value*, rather
than resent consideration of what they cannot devote much time to
considering for the time being; and to engage in dialogue with such
people, such that they have a better idea of what the American
political
market will really tolerate.
Jeff Rubard
Jeff Rubard
Army replies ["Cracker,"...]:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKYALsp-sIg
Big Red Jeff Rubard
The Purpose of Philosophy
August 30 2009 [!!]
Now on to the actual, classical purpose of philosophy. As its Greek
name “love of wisdom” indicates, philosophy is a propaedeutic to
rhetoric: the purpose of “Socratic” or any other kind of philosophical
method is to teach you how to discourse, not opine or ordinate.
Philosophers are often very talented writers, but actual philosophy
always fails to satisfy the reading eye: there is never enough to it,
one wishes it was better, more understandable, more “practical” — and
then out of the reading-room, and on to the street. This is, shall we
say, intentional: as a result of attempting to gain “absolute
knowledge”, the experienced philosopher learns to have a taste for
quotidian life (though the parameters of this may vary with political
affiliation).
In fact, if we must have a “logical theory of philosophy”, we might
begin by categorically rejecting Nietzsche’s dictum “We shall never
get rid of God as long as we believe in grammar”. Philosophy is both
practised and practicing atheism, and a great work of philosophy is a
model of a new grammar for ordinary speech: right down to orthography,
the lessons taught by a standing work of philosophy (!) inform the
discourse of the succeeding period to a great degree. Unfortunately,
one cannot always be an enthusiast for the lessons taught: I myself
have rather less respect for Schopenhauer and Nietzsche than Simmel,
and rather more respect for Simmel’s “Kantian Marxism” than his
respect for them has allowed for some time, but worse cases do exist.
I would say that, from a “grammatological” perspective, the worst
philosopher of all time was the German Counter-Enlightenment *Denker*
Johann Georg Hamann, the “Magus of the North”. Part of Hamann’s magic
was getting you not to notice that his written German was atrocious:
the scansion of his pages is painful, indicating modesty forbids he
reveal the hidden wellsprings of his wisdom — however, when you begin
to consider his disgusting anti-humanist values, you forget all about
the fact his philosophical “targets” had something other than logical
proofs to treat as love letters (Although Schopenhauer himself
perfected the art of the “philosophical takedown”, his extensive
sentences contain something of an “implicit parody” of Hamann’s pro
lix).
Second worst “philosophical grammar”? That of Pascal, whose Franzh
fails to be, as per modern standards, “ironized for your protection”
and which can simply break off in midthought because the true reality
and aim of the Church is just such a pressing concern for all. Since
Pascal was such an important social and scientific figure, We all
would like to consider his theological philosophy of theology of
philosophy something more than a “self-swallowing snake of reason”:
however, really the truth of the matter is that Pascal’s philosophical
inadequacy reveals that bad philosophers teach us about the need for
new science: if all is so occluded that new concepts of probability
(i.e. modern statistics) have to be invented, the lessons learnable
from “J-C.” and the crew will perhaps not be the only ones necessary
for life: and maybe Hamann “jump-started” the modern science of
linguistics, even as a puzzled attempt to find out just what he was
saying.
The third worst philosophical writer of modern times is the German
mystic Jakob Boehme (the name was once written this way in America,
since republican Germans tended to use the umlaut and scharfes s as
little as possible). Boehme is absolutely unphilosophical:
Christianity, the experience of God in all its stages and phases, is
absolutely going to be enough for the Boehmian and any consideration
of classical legacies like “nature or creature” is not necessary. A
“popular favorite” among the piet here in the U.S. of A: however,
perhaps its “failure to thrive” worldwide led to something quite
wonderful — the establishment of the modern science of medicine, a
realization that saying “Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to
debauchery. Instead, be drunk with the Spirit” and other, lesser
homilies do not cure every ill and a promise of something more for
some.
Big Red Jeff Rubard
Comment?
Jeffrey Rubard
I've been 'bumping' the New York Dolls a lot recently.
Jeffrey Rubard
Jeffrey Rubard
(But it's a good band. Janelle Jarosz agreed.)