From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Sat Apr 30 2005 - 20:00:42 BST
Mark, Ant, Arlo, Platt & all MOQers:
Ant McWatt said:
I don't see why a pragmatist philosophy would need even any justification to
discuss any political issue. ..It was a noble ideal in Socrates' time that
political leaders would be more wise and just if they thoroughly studied the
Good and intellectual values such as truth and justice and it remains so
now...
dmb says:
Yes. Exactly. Thank you. Entire chapters of LILA are dedicated to sorting
out our political struggles. And why not hold on to that ancient ideal? We
can face the ugly facts of history and understand what power does and is. We
can be cynical and world-weary and STILL recognize that it would be BEST if
political leaders were philosophers and were genuinely guided by principles
rather than pride or profit.
Ant added:
The attempt to deny the close relationship between philosophy and politics
is a misguided project to re-define philosophy on MOQ Discuss to make it an
insipid talking shop of the Anglo-American (whitish) middle classes.
dmb says:
Its downright silly to assert that politics should be off the MOQ table. To
exclude it from philosophy in general is even worse. The founding principles
of the US were produced by the political philosophers of the European
Enlightenment. Why would anyone want to re-write that history or otherwise
deny such a reality? Surely we have here indentified an obscure species of
anti-intellectual bullshit.
Mark Steven Heyman said:
....But I'm not picking on Nixon alone. If they were tried under the rules
of Nuremberg, every American president since the end of WWII would be
hanged...
flabbergasted, Platt replied:
That's an idea of such low quality it requires no response.
dmb says:
What Platt means to say is that he can't bear to imagine the idea. What
Platt means to say is that he doesn't want to believe such a thing could be
true, that the mere suggestion causes him severe emotional distress. It
can't be true because it'll hurt his feelings. And anyone who says its true
is a NAZI Marxist anti-Semite. (Pssst. Don't tell Platt that Chomsky is
Jewish. Let's see how far he digs the hole this time.) That's why the USA
cannot be compared to any other nation or regime on earth. Its special. In
Platt's Rockwellian America, "all the men are strong, all the women are good
looking and all the children are above average" and don't you dare say
otherwise!
This is how patriotism works and patriotism on steriods is fascism.
This kind of deliberate refusal to confront or otherwise face the facts of
history makes honest political analysis impossible. So the assetion that
there can be no "moral equivalance", that America is somehow special, is
another type of anti-intellectual bullshit. Once you learn about its
shape-shifting nature of this poop, you'll see that the place is just
covered with it.
Seriously.
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