Bush is First President to Speak at U.S. Merchant Marine Academy Graduation

That President Bush was the first sitting U.S. President to speak at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy graduation was indeed historic. It was something for which many have worked and lobbied for quite some time. When I graduated from the Academy in 1991, our commencement speaker was Vice-President Dan Quayle. Until now, he had been the most high profile commencement speaker in Academy history. Now, finally, Kings Point (the Academy is located in the village of Kings Point, NY, and, much like "West Point" is used to refer to the U.S. Military Academy, "Kings Point" is used to refer to the USMMA) is no longer the only one of the five federal academies to not have had the President of the United States speak at a graduation.

Although President Franklin D. Roosevelt spoke at the opening of the academy in 1943, Bush is the first commander in chief to address a graduating class.

"I know that a presidential visit to Kings Point has been a long time in coming," Bush said at the start of his remarks on the school's football field under a blazing 85-degree sun. "I hope it's worth the wait."

He joked with the midshipmen that they had "braved the Jamaican beef patties" of the school cafeteria and "survived the restriction musters that come with missing the train back from Manhattan."

Merchant mariners have long played a vital role in the nation's maritime industry. Kings Points graduates work as deck officers aboard container ships, oil tankers, passenger cruise ships and other vessels. Others are engineers in shipbuilding companies and work in a variety of port operations, including security.

The approximately 250 graduates received bachelor's degrees in marine engineering or marine transportation and a merchant marine officer's license. They are required to spend five years in the maritime industry and eight years in the U.S. Naval Reserve as payback for a free college education. About 25 percent satisfy their obligation with a five-year active duty military commission.

A unique aspect of the education at Kings Point is the so-called "Sea Year" _ internships in which students are placed on working commercial vessels including container ships, oil tankers, passenger liners, and military vessels ferrying supplies to war zones.

"Today Kings Point is still the only one of our five service academies that sends its students into theaters of war," Bush noted. "For that reason it is the only academy authorized to fly a battle standard."

Kings Pointers do have a proud history. Cadet-Midshipmen (as they were called at the time) served on vessels during WWII, and some went down with their ships. Engine Cadet Edwin O'Hara is probably the most well-known--the Academy's gymnasium is named for him--and was one of the many Merchant Mariners whoe received the Distinguished Service Medal for his actions. There were also Cadets among the Merchant Mariners who were POWs during WWII. Cadet-Midshipmen like O'Hara have served in every major conflict since WWII, up to and including operations in support of the Iraq War. They also provided assistance in the aftermath of 9/11 by using watercraft from the Academy to ferry survivors and aid workers to and from the World Trade Center site.

Despite the accomplishments and dedication of both its midshipman and graduates, there has always been a general feeling among us "Kings Pointers" that USMMA was the "stepchild" of the 5 academies and that we had gone unrecognized. In recent years this has changed, thanks in large part to the belated recognition of the contributions the Merchant Marine to the Allied cause during WWII.

By simply attending the 2006 USMMA graduation, President Bush did more for the moral of Kings Pointers past and present than any of the kind words he said. The Academy motto is Acta non Verba, "Deeds not Words". We Kings Pointers pride ourselves on letting our actions speak for us and yesterday, President Bush did the same.

Other Links:
American Merchant Marine at War
American Merchant Marine Museum

Conservativism, Populism, Nationalism, Patriotism

It looks like the conversation concerning the relationship between conservatism and populism (which I've mentioned here and here) continues, and now nationalism and patriotism have been dragged in. What follows is just an effort to tie some different strains of the argument together--however tenuously--for some future consideration. (There's a lot to chew on here, and I can't hope to do it in 5-minute breaks from work!)

Rod Dreher (the Crunchy Con) comments about a David Brooks (TimesSelect) piece. As Dreher notes, Brooks believes we may be seeing the emergence of two new political movements, populist nationalism and progressive globalism. Here's Dreher's summary of Brooks:

Populist nationalists (PNs) would be "liberal on economics, conservative on values and realist on foreign policy." The gist of their politics, in Brooks' words, is: "We are the ordinary, burden-bearing people of this country. We are the ones who work hard and build communities. It's time for us to come together and recognize that our loyalty to our fellow Americans comes first."

....On the other side are the progressive globalists (PGs), who "would be market-oirented on economics, liberal on values and multialteral interventionists in foreign affairs." Brooks cites John McCain, Mitt Romney, Hillary Clinton, Rudy Giuliani and Mark Warner as examples of this orientation. PGs are inspired by economic globalism, "technological dynamis and cultural diversity." They want to build international institutions to share the prosperity. Trade needs to be opened up, not shut down, and new policies must be put into place to manage the flow of people across borders, not close them off. We have to make our economy more flexible, and work together internationally to solve global problems....

"Politics is becoming less about left versus right and more about open versus closed," Brooks concludes (Jim Pinkerton talks about the same conflict under the labels "universalism vs. nationalism."). It's pretty obvious that crunchy conservatism lands squarely on the populist nationalist side of the divide.

Ross Douthat also weighs in and thinks that the elites have been pretty good at staving off populism by co-opting a few hot-button, populist causes now and then:

I think Rod underestimates the power of the elite consensus in American life. Populist nationalism is too, well, popular to be ignored by politicians, but for roughly the last hundred years of American history an overlapping, interlocking series of elite classes has done a truly remarkable job of co-opting and controlling populist sentiment - and I'm skeptical that this will change that much in the new century.

Douthat thinks that Christophere Lasch is the most important read on this topic (The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Liberty, reviewed here for National Review by Judge Robert Bork). Meanwhile, Douthat's fellow blogger Reihan thinks that what is actually ocurring is a splintering among the elites.

Noah at Gideon's Blog has an interesting "Iron Triangle" theory about the Democrats and Republicans.

Republican

Nation === Liberty === Virtue


Democrat

People === Equality === Merit

He also wonders if his formulation can stand up to the nearly entrenched, Euro-style categorization of a Left and Right in America, which he doesn't think is entirely applicable to the American polity.

In Europe, Charles Kupchan sees populist movements leading to a reemerging nationalism in various countries and Andrew Stuttaford gives an acute example in Germany. Finally, Jonah Goldberg mentions that historian John Lukacs made a distinction between nationalism and patriotism:

John Lukacs has many great observations about the differences between patriotism and nationalism. The difference, to me and I believe to him, is that nationalism is rooted in the mystic concept of a nation — most famously in blood and soil — while patriotism is rooted in adherence to a creed or doctrine. A patriot in the Weimar Republic was considered a traitor by most nationalists, for example.

My brain is having a hard enough time considering the possible changes in America's polity, much less adding in changes in Europe. Obviously, nationalism and patriotism often intersect, but that would me a statement such as "My country, right or wrong!" could be viewed as more nationalistic than patriotic, right? I wonder if what's floating underneath the surface is a return to older forms. Or maybe those forms are always there and they don't change: we just keep renaming them.

UPDATE: 6/20/06

NRO's John Miller, in response to a mention about Lukac's take on nationalism (which is derived from George Orwell's, apparently), offers his take, to which Jonah Goldberg responds that Orwell wasn't talking about nationalism as we understand it today, but of "identity politics."

Morris Berman is Hung Up on America's Impending "Dark Ages"

Here's a candidate for some Bad History. The New York Times' negative review of Morris Berman's Dark Ages America: The Final Phase of Empire explains:

'Dark Ages America' begins as a grim prophecy of decline and fall, citing four traits shared, he says, by the late Roman Empire and the United States today, namely, 'the triumph of religion over reason,' 'the breakdown of education and critical thinking,' the 'legalization of torture' and declining respect and financial power on the world stage.

This isn't the first time Berman has compared America to the last days of the Roman Empire. Back in 2000 he wrote another book, The Twilight of American Culture, that also received a negative review in the Times (by, Alexander Star, editor of Lingua Franca) :

Berman compares the predicament of contemporary America with that of the Roman Empire in its final days. Just like Rome, the United States suffers from an increasing gap between rich and poor, a teeming bazaar of eccentric faiths and a general dumbing-down of the collective intelligence... Despite all of America's entrepreneurial ''dynamism,'' a new dark age is falling.... he tells us that [during the Dark Ages] ''the intellectual disciplines of distinction, definition and dialectic'' were lost...

I'm only going to address the newer book (I included the bit from the second just to show that Berman likes to beat this particular horse) and I'm also going to ignore the American half of Berman's hyperbolic (I believe) comparison.

The first thing to note is that it was only the Western Roman Empire that "fell" as Berman believes. The Eastern half did pretty well (as Byzantium) for another 1000 years or so. In fact, if you're bored already: stop reading. What I just wrote is the most important take away point.

The reasons for the "fall" of the Western half are many, including a weakened political system and failed tax system. One potential causal force that has certainly lost favor is that of a military "Barbarian invasion." Yes, there are still aspects of it that are entirely appropriate, but it's no longer simply crossing the Rhine in A.D. 406 followed by Attila 50 years later and it was all over for Rome. Instead, many argue that the Western Roman Empire essentially assimilated itself away.

Now to deal with Berman's list of 4 reasons for the fall of Rome. Hmm. The "triumph of religion over reason"... please see the point about Byzantium. Seems like they lasted for 1,000 years as a religious empire.

Second--and related to the first--the bit about the "breakdown of education and critical thinking." Well, the first thing that comes to mind is that it was because of the same church that Berman finds so despicable that the philosophy of Aristotle was rescued. Ever hear of Saint Thomas Aquinas?

Third, the "legalization of torture". I confess, I'm not sure what he means by that one. He could be alluding to the Spanish Inquisition that ocurred 1,000 years after the fall of the Western Roman Empire, but who knows? Besides, refresh my memory: wasn't there a guy named Jesus who, along with two other fellas, was crucified by the Roman Empired circa A.D. 35? Or is crucification not torture? Or does Berman's timeline for the "fall" begin sometime after Caesar and before Marcus Arelius?

Then there is the last bit about Rome's declining respect and influence. Well, the respect for Rome declined so much that the various Barbarian kingdoms that cropped up tried to mimic it as much as possible (at least initially). They copied Roman law, tried to use Latin, adopted the Roman Catholic religion and a myriad of other things. Of course (again), there was still quite a bit of respect for and influence felt from the Eastern Roman Empire!!!!

To be fair, all of this is a bit snarky and only based on one review. I guess the main point I'd like to make is that any use of the "Fall of Rome" has to take into consideration the fact that the wealthier, more politically and militarily stable half of the Roman Empire managed to "hold on" for another 1,000 years.

Conservativism Doesn't Mean a Rejection of the Future

In "America's Romance with the Future," Martin Walker offers a warning that America may be losing its way based on his analysis of the current state of the national (and personal) debt, education and other factor. He begins and ends the piece with two anecdotes regarding the future of America:

The thing that got you into this classroom today is belief in the future, a belief that the future can be better than the present and that people will and should sacrifice in the present to get to that better future. That belief has taken man out of the chaos and deprivation that most human beings toiled in for most of history to the point where we are today. One thing will kill our civilization and way of life—when people no longer have the will to undergo the pain required to prefer the future to the present. That is what got your parents to pay this expensive tuition. That is what got us through two wars and the Depression. Future preference. Don’t ever forget that.

{Georgetown University professor Carroll Quigley, who taught future President Bill Clinton}

And:

The prospect really does frighten me that they may finally become so engrossed in a cowardly love of immediate pleasures that their interest in their own future and in that of their descendants may vanish, and that they will prefer tamely to follow the course of their destiny rather than make a sudden energetic effort necessary to set things right.

{Alexis de Tocqueville in Democracy in America, vol. I (1835)}

Both men, at different times, appreciated the American spirit, but saw danger on the horizon. But it is important to note that neither was saying that we should change for change's sake. Put another way, they aren't saying that a better future means the total dismantling of all that is good during the present.

Perhaps a little Edmund Burke would help. Burke also believed that we owed both our ancestors and our progeny more than what we had received.

One of the first and most leading principles on which the commonwealth and its laws are consecrated, is lest the temporary possessors and life-renters in it, unmindful of what they have received from their ancestors, or of what is due to their posterity, should act as if they were the entire masters; that they should not think it among their rights to cut off the entail, or commit waste on the inheritance, by destroying at their pleasure the whole original fabric of their society; hazarding to leave to those who come after them a ruin instead of a habitation--and teaching to these successors as little to respect their contrivances, as they had themselves respected the institutions of their forefathers. {Edmund Burke, "Reflections," Works, II, p.366-67 in Russel Kirk's The Conservative Mind, p.44--yeah, I cribbed it!}

Burke advocated prudent change and didn't think conservatism meant stasis and that life could be a permanent, antiquanarian bliss. "We must all obey the great law of change," he said, "It is the most powerful law of nature, and the means perhaps of its conservation." The type of change he advocated was gradual, one that moved slowly so as to neither cause resentment in those who had benefited--or were simply used to--the old ways nor to stoke the newly lit fires of power within those who gained from the change.

The Historiography of the Early Midde Ages and National Homogeneity

Götz Aly (via Ralph Luker and Dale Light) writes that it's time for a "complete overhaul of the historical contextualisation of the Holocaust" and points to the work of Raul Hilberg ("The Destruction of the European Jews") and Jacob Burckhardt ("The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy"). As a medievalist, Aly's reference to Burckhardt's work caught my eye and called to mind something important about the historiography of the Early Middle Ages. According to Aly:

[Burckhardt] showed, and he still shows today, how Europe freed itself from the tightly woven veil of "faith, illusion and childish prepossession."

Admittedly, the twentieth century forces us to assume that on the path towards emancipation, the Europeans succumbed to their own modernity, falling victim to more than just a new illusion. In World Wars, in revolutions and also in peace treaties, they put two old ideas into bloody practice: national and social homogenization. (emphasis in original)

Aly goes on to discuss the good and bad aspects of this homogenization in modern European history and his effort to re-contextualize the Holocaust is important. More on that later. My immediate interest lay in the tangential topic of how the contemporary influence of the "national and social homogenization" of the early to mid- 20th century is revealed in the historiography of the early middles ages.

The first important point to make is that the concept of a homogenous people did not originate in the 19th century with the disciples of Ranke or Hegel. The ancient Roman writers Pliny the Elder, Tacitus and Ptolemy already had classified "other" peoples with whom they came into contact in a generic sort of way. In short, there has always been a tendency to homogenize (or generalize) about a society different than one's own. Yet, that is only part of the story. It was the ancient's method of assigning specific identities to the variety of Germanic groups that attracted the attention of the modern historians. (I'm going to focus on the Germanic peoples, who were but one of many groups of "others"--lest we forget Caesar and his Gauls--because I'm most familiar with that particular historiography).

Working from ancient sources, the 19th century historians mined written sources and oral tradition for linguistic evidence to set various Germanic tribes in time and place. According to Patrick Geary (Myth of Nations, p. 16), the impetus for this research was the compilation of the Monumenta Germaniae Historica (MGH). Unfortunately, the conclusions derived from the research behind the MGH, which relied heavily on classifying people according their language family, led to the derivation of various historic nationalities based on this new "scientific" evidence. This new evidence was used--and ultimately misused--by eager archaelogists and the new field of ethnoarchaeology was born. Gustaf Kossinna was at the forefront of these efforts.

Malcolm Todd explained that (The Northern Barbarians, p. 20-21) the centerpiece of the ethnoarchaelogists' theory was an idea of ethnic homogeneity that allowed them to link particular people mentioned in the classic works of Pliny, Tacitus, and others to both the work of the philologists and to specific archeological finds. By determining through philology where a people lived, the ethnoarchaeologists assigned the relics found in those areas to those pre-identified groups. Perhaps Christopher Wickham (Early Medieval Italy, 68) best explained the flaw in this theory, writing,

A man or woman with a Lombard-style brooch is no more necessarily a Lombard than a family in Bradford with a Toyota is Japanese; artifacts are no secure guide to ethnicity.

Nonetheless, the goal of those like Kossinna was to provide continuity from ancient sources, through the middle ages, and to their own time by providing "historical evidence" to buttress claims of a sort of natural right to nationhood. Kossinna’s method convinced himself and others that the Germans had been an ethnically homogenous people from the Bronze age through the Roman Iron Age.

Using this evidence, a race of people, whose forefathers could claim bloodlines from ancient times, would be justified making a legitimate claim to a specific geographical area, even if it lay outside the current borders of a defined nation. Thus, a viable foundation for the establishment and expansion of an ethnically homogenous nation could be made and this fed into the hyper-nationalism that swept Europe and was used to such nefarious ends by the Third Reich during the Second World War.

In the years immediately following World War II, an understandable reaction within the historical community occurred against this nationalistic, ethnically homogenous interpretation. Initially, some historians disclaimed any such thing as a Germanic culture prior to 100 B.C. Subsequent scholarship has since determined that there did exist a traceable Germanic culture during the Iron Age. However, the idea of of an ethnically and culturally united Germanic people is no longer supported.

[SIDENOTE: For instance, as Todd explained in Everyday Life of The Barbarians (p. 10), archaeology has shown that the Celts and Germans were not so ethnically distinct as portrayed by Tacitus and Caesar and that the Rhine as a dividing line between the two cultures was not only misleading, but it obscured a third people who were neither Celtic nor Germanic, though they were culturally similar to both.]

This brings us back to Aly's piece, which explains how the Holocaust--while not the first example of ethnic cleansing in Europe--serves as a "touchstone" for the subsequent "ethnically and socially motivated mass mobilization and 'cleansing'" in Europe. As I've explained, historians have for the most part disavowed the scholarship that undergirded the ideology of a nationhood based on a historically homogenous society. However, the concept of an a priori, historically self-contained, ethnically and culturally consistent nation remains central to the historical narratives of many European nations.

As Aly explains, a new historiography that links the various occasions in which different European nations attempted to purify their societies would highlight the inherently false structure of the perpetually and naturally homogenous society. Hopefully, it would lead nations down the path toward dealing with the "other" in their midst in a different way.

Every nation has its own cultural mores which contribute to a society's sense of self (so to speak) and sovereignty. A nation's willingness to embrace people of different cultures (who are there legally, of course!) by both accepting their differences and helping them to understand the expectations that their new society has of them can only make itself stronger.

Remembering Nathanael Greene

The Providence Journal has been running a series (including sources!) on the life of Rhode Island's Revolutionary War General Nathanael Greene (it's now up to part 10). The series coincides with the recent completion of publication of the Greene Papers (it took 34 years and $4 million) by the Rhode Island Historical Society. Further, the ProJo is distinguishing itself as a very history-friendly paper. The Greene series comes on the heals of an impressive series about Rhode Island and the slave trade.

Finally, it appears as if General Greene may well be the next subject for a David McCullough book. First, there was a story in a small local newspaper--the Warwick Daily Times, story not available on line--that reported that McCullough had been in contact with a research librarian at Providence College concerning General Greene. McCullough was also the keynote speaker at the RIHS History Makers gala and had used the Greene Papers for his recent book on George Washington. Could he be turning to them again to write a biography of Greene? Alexander Hamilton would have thought Greene deserved such recognition:

"For as high as this great man stood in the estimation of his country, the whole extent of his worth was little known," said Alexander Hamilton, the country's first secretary of treasury, in 1789.

Greene, the Warwick native who had fought back the British armies in the South during America's fight for independence, would be remembered, as "this consummate general, this brave soldier, this steady patriot, this virtuous citizen," Hamilton said.

One final note: the RIHS also stated that they would like to put the papers online at some time in the future.

Compare--don't equate--historical events

Ulf Zander (translated by Phil Holmes):

Through concrete examples in the form of more or less manifest analogies between then and now and parallel sequences of events the users of history wish to legitimise their own policy and discredit that of the opposition. The past is then taken into service in a biased way on the basis of current need. The history users try to equate—not compare—then and now. (Emphasis mine)

Bennett's America: The Last Best Hope

National Review has an interview with Bill Bennett about his new popular history book, America: The Last Best Hope. Here are a couple things from the interview that piqued my interest.

The contemporary conflict between the West and radical Islam seems to have prompted Bennett to delve deeper into the historical relationship between Muslims and the West and how that relationship affected America in particular. He acknowledges some of his insights may be considered "politically incorrect":

Radical Islam or Militant Islam was trouble for us from before day one. The European empires go west because they don’t want to deal with these guys in the east. Jefferson’s war against the Barbary pirates was taken up after more than one million Europeans had been made slaves by Muslim traders. John Adams was opposed to the war, by the way, saying prophetically that if we fought these militant Muslims we’d be fighting them forever.

I'm not sure if Bennett's preemptive categorization of his treatment of the history of the tension between Islam and the West is a case of him forecasting the kind of negative reaction he expects to get regarding that portion of the book or if he is merely setting up a straw-man. I guess I'll have to wait for the reaction itself. Nonetheless, to my knowledge, Bennett may be the first to emphasize (if that's indeed what it is) the relationship between Islam and America in a popular history. He deserves credit for that.

Refreshingly, Bennett tried to provide a bit of levity, too:

I’ve tried to find really funny, really memorable lines. Try this for example, General Sherman said “Grant stood by me when I was crazy and I stood by him when he was drunk. Now we stand by each other always.” Great quote. Funny. Bracing. Uplifting. How about two more in connection with Teddy Roosevelt? Joe Wheeler, an ex-confederate officer, was chasing retreating Spaniards in 1898 somewhere near San Juan Hill: “We’ve got the damn Yankees on the run!” he yelled at his men. But it was former Sergeant Buck Taylor of the same war who, when later campaigning for Roosevelt, said to crowds: “He kept every promise he ever made to us, and he will to you as well. He led us up San Juan Hill like sheep to the slaughter, and so will he lead you.”

If Bennett's humorous examples are sprinkled throughout, I for one will be happy. Funny things do happen in history, after all.

When asked who his MVP of American History was, Bennett replied:

Well it’s Lincoln and Washington, no surprise there. But, in my top-ten, maybe top-five, I put Frederick Douglass—a guy I didn’t know that well before. You know I don’t the think the left likes Douglass, and I don’t think the right and the center have given him his due. I hope I have.

Bennett's comments about Douglass are also interesting and encouraging and may point to the first recorded instance of a conservative engaged in revisionism! (Just kidding).

To conclude, he also explained why he thought America--slavery and all--was indeed the "Last Best Hope":

The question there is “compared to whom?” [Patrick] Moynihan said, “Am I embarrassed to speak for less than a perfect democracy? Not one bit. Have we done terrible things, yes we have.” But as Lino Graglia says, “In the long story of inhumanity and misery that is history, the American achievement is high, and unique.” By the way, if we are such a bad place, as many have it today (and some have always had it), why are we flooded with people who want to come here? With students, I talk about “the gates test.” I say, you want to find out whether a country is good or not, give it the gates test: when you raise the gates, which way do people run? In or out? In America, when we raise the gates, the people flood in. Even with the gates down, they flood in, as today’s headlines make plain. People all over the world have been voting for America with their feet, for a very long time.

Finally, I suspect that Bennett tells both the good and bad of U.S. history, but doesn't allow the instances in which America has fallen short of its founding ideals to overshadow the ideals themselves or the continued attempt to live up to them.

As a preview, he has been releasing excerpts from the book (in place of his columns) over the last couple weeks: America: The Last Best Hope; Jefferson's crisis; Preserving our federal union. It is with a portion--indeed, perhaps the very premise-- of the second excerpt ("Jefferson's Crisis") that I disagree with Bennett. But more on that later.

Peterman's Guide to Excellence

It's now official: yesterday I graduated from Providence College with an MA in History. The commencement speaker was actor John O'Hurley ('76 grad), though he's probably better known asthe Seinfeld character J. Peterman, the over-the-top, mail-order clothing outfitter with a famous catalogue (and subject of at least one apparently scholarly piece). O'Hurley's address had it's humorous parts, but the most important was THE PETERMAN GUIDE TO THE EXTRAORDINARY LIFE:

An extraordinary life, as I've come to understand it, has three simple elements. And these elements are common to everyone who has ever taken that journey. An extraordinary life is a life of Achievement, a life of Meaning, and a life of reflection.

Achievement begins with imagination. If you only take one thing from this precious time we have together today; remember this -- what you imagine has value. What you imagine has value. It is as tragic as it is true, but the greatest plans on earth still lie in the minds of people who still think that everybody else has a better idea than they do. Dream large, dream small, but trust what you imagine, because what you daydream about is what you are supposed to do. What you imagine is one of the only ways God can talk to you.

When you trust what you imagine amazing things happen. You become willing to make the leap to achieve what you imagine. I say "leap" because nothing worth achieving is ever close at hand. It's always farther away than a comfortable reach. It involves risk. But, believe me, if you leap the net will appear. When you leap, the net will appear.

When you learn to value what you imagine, you will also learn to finish what you start. You will take the ball across the goal line. You will put the ball through the hoop. You will put the puck in the net. As you will soon experience, the world is littered with ideas that were dropped at the five yard line. The world that you are inheriting is too competitive, too uncertain, and too hair-triggered to place any value in half hearted attempts. Choose to be a champion because a champion always closes the deal.

But Achievement alone, does not an extraordinary life make. Achievement, alone, is not enough. Hollywood and the rest of entertainment world are filled with people who seem to accomplish much, but live lives that are otherwise without much value, except for their ability to fill the pages of magazines that seem to dedicate themselves weekly to their confusion.

An extraordinary life has meaning, and meaning comes only from love. Love for another, love for God, and love for yourself. When we learn to love another we experience the joy of selflessness because we extend ourselves for their good. When we love God we experience the gift of humility, and the comfort of knowing that we are never alone. When we love ourselves, and perhaps this is the toughest kind of love, we learn that we are a gift. We protect that gift and avoid destructive behavior. We develop a sense of humor about ourselves and the world around us. As G.K. Chesterton so poignantly wrote, "Angels fly, because they take themselves lightly"

The final aspect of the extraordinary life is what makes it all worthwhile, and that is perspective. You have heard people tell you "Never look back, always look forward." I say, nonsense -- always look back and as often as you can. It is the only way you know how far you have come. Like today. That half-look over your shoulder at the child you were and the person you've become, and all that you have achieved in between is your story, your history. The enjoyment of that progress will make you appreciate all those who were part of your story -- your parents, your family, your friends, your teachers and places like Providence College.

And from your appreciation will come what is perhaps the greatest virtue of the extraordinary life -- and that is generosity. You will give back, because you know you have been given so much.

So there you have it -- the Peterman Guide to the Extraordinary Life. I invite you to consider it and make it your own. But I will share this one thought -- the moment that I realized the choice of an ordinary life or an extraordinary life; the day that I realized what I imagined had value, that if I leapt, the net would appear, that I must finish what I start; the day that I realized that there is only meaning in who we love and how we love; the day that I realized that by looking back over my shoulder was the only way I could ever see how far I've come; that was the day that I began the slow, deliberate walk to this podium, because until then, I had nothin' to tell ya'.

Sons of Providence, American Archetypes

I previously noted that Charles Rappleye's Sons of Providence : The Brown Brothers, the Slave Trade, and the American Revolution, about the roles played by John and Moses Brown during the Founding period, had been well received here in Rhode Island. Since then, the book has also received a positive review in the N.Y. Times.

Last night Rappleye wrapped up his month-long book tour at a book signing hosted by The Rhode Island Black Heritage Society and the local NAACP chapter (ed-page not loading, but here's a cached version) at Providence's historic Benificent Church. Both I and my colleague Andrew Morse (we both contribute to another blog) were invited to attend by local political reporter (and Charles' brother) Bill Rappleye.

To keep the summary brief, Rappleye has concluded that Rhode Island and New England in general had a much larger part to play in the slave trade than most people realize. In the Brown brothers, Rappleye found good examples of two of the divergent notions of freedom and democracy that were developing in our nascent nation. John Brown embodied the free-market, capitalist archetype who privileges property rights and his right to make money. Moses Brown-- especially after the death of his wife and subsequent conversion to Quakerism-- embodied a more egalitarian world view with an emphasis on devotion to his fellow man (though his fortune helped him promote this view).

Predictably--given the subject matter and the audience--the post-presentation Q&A was much broader than just a discussion on the Brown brothers and their relationship.

There was some discussion over the reticence of various members of the Brown family to acknowledge their role in the slave trade. Rappleye disclosed that, while some members were reluctant, others were very helpful to him in his research. Allusion was made to Brown University's investigation (by the University Steering Committee on Slavery and Justice) into the role that the slave trade played in its founding. Also mentioned was the reluctance of the John Brown House to acknowledge that its namesake had been a slaveholder at all. Rappleye pointed out that while the Brown family and Brown University may have some "blood money" on their hands, the fact of the matter was that it was also the Brown family who produced one of the first effective abolitionist leaders in the person of Moses Brown.

Andrew and I had a chance to talk to Rappleye after the formal discussion and he explained how John and Moses are sort of the archetypes of the prevalent American ideologies of freedom and liberty even to this day. He also said that much of the debate between the brothers could be chalked up to good old fashioned sibling rivalry. Finally, he also provided a useful analogy: that slavery was the engine of the global economy at that time, much as oil is today.

I hope to finish reading the book soon and expect to offer more thoughts at some point. In the meantime, Andrew has up his review over at Anchor Rising.

Here are some other stories related to both Rappleye's book and the controversy surrounding Brown University. First, from the Brown [University] Daily Herald is an account of book signing at Brown University, a report on Brown's "nuanced" past, a story about waiting for the report of the Steering Committee on Slavery and Justice and a story about a Brown family member who is writing her own version of the family history. Additionally, the Providence Journal had a series on the Rhode Island slave trade, with The Unrighteous Traffick- Part 5, "Brown vs. Brown: Brothers Go Head to Head" being the most relevant to this topic. Finally, The Unrighteous Traffick- Part 6, "Living Off the Trade: Bristol and the DeWolfs" is about another Rhode Island family that was heavily involved in the slave trade.

The Founders are Blogging!

Some guys who call themselves The Founders are all blogging about current events. Here's George, Alex, Ben, Tom, John and Jim. Interesting reading, though they seem a little, well, old-fashioned.

Cook's "Endeavor" Located?

Marine archeaologists have been poking around Newport, RI for a few years now. Part of the motivation has been to determine whether or not Captain Cook's Endeavor may have met a rather inauspicious end as a Revolutionary War era British transport that sank off of Newport. Originally, two of these transports had been located, but now that more have been found, the chances that the Endeavor is among them has increased.

Searching Newport Harbor for historic treasure, the Rhode Island Marine Archaeology Project has located the remains of four more shipwrecks dating back to the Revolutionary War.

The discovery gives Rhode Island the right to boast that it has the "largest fleet of Revolutionary shipwrecks" in the world, according to D.K. Abbass, director of the Rhode Island Marine Archaeology Project. The ships are believed to be part of a private fleet of 13 British transport ships sunk during the war, said Abbass.

Previously, RIMAP had discovered two shipwrecks in the harbor. Now that six have been located, it is increasingly likely that what is down there is the 13-ship fleet that included the Endeavour, which Capt. James Cook sailed to Australia on his trip around the world between 1768 and 1771, said Abbass...

Here is more (if a bit dated) information from RIMAP's website regarding its efforts to locate the Endeavor, and here is a more scholarly explanation.

How American Idol is Like Politics

John Podhoretz (sub. req'd.--free) explains how the American Idol voting patterns can teach us--particularly the young, I'd add--about regular old politics.

The number of votes seems to remain remarkably constant (this year, somewhere north of 40 million) week to week. This indicates the same people continue to vote each week. It also means that the people who voted for the contestant who was kicked off go ahead and just choose somebody new to vote for.

This is a direct parallel to the presidential primary process. In the early primaries, candidates who do poorly usually drop out of the race, leaving those who would have supported them in other states high and dry. Those supporters then have to pick somebody else among the surviving candidates to vote for.

This winnowing process allows the most appealing candidates to pick up steam by adding new voters to their cadre of supporters. And as they do so, the field continues to be winnowed, until finally there are only one or two candidates left standing. The single-issue candidate, the flash-in-the-pan, the guy who has one fantastic debate - they may all have their moments, but in the end, the candidate with the most broad-based appeal will usually win.

And this is what explains Chris Daughtry's stunning loss this week on "American Idol." He has a distinctive voice and distinctive appeal. The problem is that he never broadened his base very much. If you liked him from the start, you stayed with him - which is why he remained solidly among the top contenders through most of the show's run.

But if you didn't much like his sound when there were still 9 contestants remaining, you weren't suddenly going to decide you liked his sound when there were only 4 remaining.

The key to winning "American Idol" isn't being overwhelmingly popular in the early stages. The key is having a sound that makes it possible for you to pick up votes from people whose favorites have gotten booted off the show. Because if you don't get those votes, somebody else is going to get them.

Whoda thunk? American Idol as a modern Civics class!

"Decline and Fall of the Roman Myth"

The Celts were more sophisticated than the Romans in some aspects. Celtic culture and history isn't my area, except where it bumps up against the Early MA Germans. What both didn't give us--and what Rome did--was a written record. That, as they say, has made all the difference. Until now.

It has been easy to underestimate Celtic technological achievements because so much has vanished or been misunderstood. Of course, it was thoughtless of the Celts not to leave us anything much in the way of written records — they should have known that the lack of books putting forward their own propaganda would weight the evidence firmly in favour of the Romans.

Western society’s enthusiasm since the renaissance for all things Roman has persuaded us to see much of the past through Roman eyes, even when contrary evidence stares us in the face. Once we turn the picture upside-down and look at history from a non-Roman point of view, things start to look very, very different.

I'd also add that doing away with assumptions of ethnic and cultural homogeneity is also crucial (cf; Patrick Geary's work). All this and more can be found in Terry Jones' (yup, the Python one) new book Barbarians.

Beware of Conservative Populism II

Urged on by John Derbyshire and an anonymous reader, Johah Goldberg revised and extended (a bit) his column on conservative populism.

Derb- I think you nail it on the head. I agree with you entirely that populism invariably yields a kind of elitism. The left has tried for centuries to obscure this point. Because populists claim to be speaking for "the people" and because they pursue redistributionist economics, the left eagerly ignores the elitist nature of the regime. One need only look at Castro's Cuba and its fawning, sweaty-palmed sycophants in the west to see this phenomenon on full display. Castro is on the side of "the people" and therefore his police state is entirely justified. Meanwhile, someone like Pinochet — who was hardly without sin — allowed a civil society to develop while avoiding redistributionist policies and is therefor one of the all-time villains according to the left.

Fascism addressed this contradiction honestly. It was objectively and proudly populist while at the same time fascists openly argued for an elite cadre of superior, if not super, men who would run the country. The Leninists had a similar argument with all that avant-garde of the proletariat and whatnot.

In America, I think a big, big, big part of the problem is the permanent civil service bureaucracy which is naturally sympathetic to big government and parties that champion big government. These governmental elites, in collusion with academia and the "helping professions," take it upon themselves to find new ways to "run" the society (These groups, as John O'Sullivan has ably demonstrated are rapidly migrating to the global stage — he calls them transnational elites — where they are trying to turn the UN and various NGOs into post-democratic institutions). Whenever a political movement arises — like American conservatism — which challenges the elite-bureaucracy's authority they are accused of working against "the people" and the "downtrodden." Just look at all of the silly things people say about John Bolton. Journalists are key to this process because they share the bureaucratic elite's vision of both government and the masses.

I think in this sense our biggest disagreement is semantic, if that. I think the best way to look at this elite is as a secular priesthood. But that's a conversation for later.

D.B. Light has some thoughts about the long term ramifications, too.

The rise of a technocratic/bureaucratic "New Class" is a well-documented phenomenon [for a Marxist take on the process see this; I favor Eric Blair's description of the new class in 1984 -- "The new aristocracy was made up for the most part of bureaucrats, scientists, technicians, trade-union organizers, publicity experts, sociologists, teachers, journalists, and professional politicians."]. In the context of American history the emergence of this class is associated with the "Progressive" political movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; in the cultural realm it is associated with the rise of "modernism." The political and cultural influence of this "New Class" grew through the first half of the Twentieth Century and it came to dominance in the middle decades of the century. By the 1980's it was in decline and in recent years that decline has been precipitous.

Through this period of decline the liberal wing of the Democratic party has served as the primary political expression of the new class. Its decline parallels the fortunes of that class. Today it is under assault from both the far left and the right.

Most of the new class's recent opponents have styled themselves "populists," "libertarians," or "small-d democrats". But, as Jonah notes, such movements have the potential, indeed the historical tendency, to establish new elites as problematic in their own way as the ones they seek to displace...

Both "populism" and modern "liberalism" are terms appropriate to the modern era which is rapidly disappearing. Neither is adequate to represent the current state of becoming in the political realm. What we need is not further critique of the past, but a new terminology and a new set of organizing principles adequate to the emerging political and cultural landscape. "Post modernism" will simply not do. I welcome any suggestions.

I left a comment suggesting "Neocrats" as a term for the leaders of this undefined, nascent movement, though I'm not entirely happy with it. At least it's a start. I'll put some more thought into what such a political ideology could be called.

Beware of Conservative Populism

Jonah Goldberg--noting that conservatism was born in Edmund Burke's reaction to the populism of the French Revolution--explains why the recent conservative populism that has been expressed in both the immigration debate and in opposition to th Dubai ports deal should be considered carefully.

I think [the immigration and ports controversies are] useful illustration[s] of the problem with populism. Being on the wrong side of “the people” is automatically seen as betrayal, rather than mere disagreement. I’d been bee-bopping and scatting against liberal populism and no one cared; when I was skeptical about an issue conservative populists treasure, I was inundated with pronouncements about the glories of people power.

Second, I’m not trying to say that conservatives who resort to populist arguments are crypto-left-wingers or anything like that. But I do believe that the logic of populism can be corrosive if not held in check. One need only look at Pat Buchanan to see how completely it can eat away classically liberal views.

That said, I think populist rhetoric and passion can be healthy in small doses. After all, sometimes elites and their institutions are arrayed against the people; 2+2=4 when people say it does and when people say it doesn’t, and it isn’t any less true when it’s being frantically chanted by a mass of people. I understand that political protagonists must sometimes show they have an authentic connection with the people they represent; I have an abiding faith in the goodness of the American people, and I think William F. Buckley’s populist flirtation, encapsulated in his observation that he’d rather be governed by the first 2,000 names in the Boston phonebook than by the faculty of Harvard University, was absolutely right and proper. But you will note that he believed in the concept of governing per se; he implicitly (and explicitly elsewhere) accepted the Burkean view that our representatives owe us their judgment, even at the occasional expense of popular will and, often, in defiance of popular passion.

John Derbyshire complemented Goldberg and asked him to be "Fair and Balanced" and do an "equally scathing piece" on elitism. To which Goldberg responded that, sorry, he actually liked elitism, rightly understood.

Elitism... in the words of William Henry, means "some ideas are better than others, some values more enduring, some works of art more universal. Some cultures, though we dare not say it, are more accomplished than others and therefore more worthy of study."

We talk of elite athletes, elite scientists, elite craftsmen, or elite soldiers, and everyone understands that these people are simply better, more expert at what they do than the rest of us. It is only when we get closer to those realms where experts have decided to bend every fact and twist every standard — in an effort to mend the bruised egos of backward nations and boutique domestic victim groups — that "elite" becomes pejorative. This is a tragedy, because conservatism will become meaningless if, in an effort to displace the current elite from its perch, we embrace the notion that nobody has a right to that perch.

Right now, the word-elite of journalists and academics are the ones asking, "Who are we to judge?" This elite is the one incapable of discerning the difference between a bone through the nose and the moon launch. It is this elite which says that the canon isn't worth reading; that the Constitution is a fig leaf for white racism; that the Enlightenment wasn't worth the trouble; that freedom and democracy are just "abstractions"; that beauty is just so much lookism....The task, for conservatives especially, is to fire the teachers and journalists who believe that a bone through the nose is equivalent to a moon launch — not to eliminate altogether the positions they should rightly hold.

Immigration Debate: Same As Before?

Michael Powell argues in "U.S. Immigration Debate Is a Road Well Traveled" that, well, history is repeating itself.

The bitter arguments of the past echo loudly these days as Congress debates toughening the nation's immigration laws and immigrants from Latin America and Asia swell the streets of U.S. cities in protest. Most of the concerns voiced today -- that too many immigrants seek economic advantage and fail to understand democracy, that they refuse to learn English, overcrowd homes and overwhelm public services -- were heard a century ago. And there was a nub of truth to some complaints, not least that the vast influx of immigrants drove down working-class wages.

...Advocates of stricter enforcement argue that those who came a century ago were different because they arrived legally...Peggy Noonan, a former speechwriter for President Ronald Reagan, wrote about her Irish forebears in a Wall Street Journal column: "They waited in line. They passed the tests. They had to get permission to come. . . . They had to get through Ellis Island . . . get questioned and eyeballed by a bureaucrat with a badge."

But these accounts are flawed, historians say. Until 1918, the United States did not require passports; the term "illegal immigrant" had no meaning. New arrivals were required only to prove their identity and find a relative or friend who could vouch for them.

Jonah Goldberg disagrees and believes that some important differences between then and now is being left out:

But there are real differences... The first difference is that we never shared a 2,000 mile long border with Germany, Italy or Ireland. A second is that we did not have a generous welfare state when those immigrants came here. A third is that Germans, Italian and Irish ideologues never dreamed of claiming that American soil rightly belonged to their nation. I can think of others, but I think those will do for now. I'm not arguing for a specific policy by mentioning these facts, but I think it's silly for people to pretend the issue with Mexican Americans is perfectly analogous to previous eras. There are important similarities and there are important differences.

Sons of Providence

Sons of Providence : The Brown Brothers, the Slave Trade, and the American Revolution by Charles Rappleye has been getting some positive reviews here in Rhode Island and is also garnering some critical acclaim nationwide. This past weekend, Rappleye was interviewed on a local TV station. (Incidentally, his brother--Bill-- is the political reporter for the same station, a fact they made clear).

One important point Rappleye brought up is how much slavery was accepted at the time as just being a normal state of things. The most interesting observation he made was that slaves were the equivalent of oil today: slave power was the back bone of not only the American economy but also the economies of the European powers of the day.

Of Genghis Kahn and a Horde of RINO's

Ralph Luker has called attention to an incident in which he took issue with my usage of the term "RINO" within the context of a Conservativenet discussion (threads 8-11 contain the entire, larger discussion) regarding RI politics and Sen. Lincoln Chafee.

Ralph said that:

As a charter member of the Republican Left and a proto-RINO, I blanched at and objected to Marc's use of the term [RINO] as the stigmata those of us to the left of Genghis Khan and David Horowitz must bear these days.

While noting the irony of Ralph taking exception to the usage of RINO while implying that anyone to his right is akin to Genghis Khan, here's a bit more on the subject.

Here's where I mentioned the "R" word (with some context):

I agree that it is unrealistic to attempt to achieve some sort of conservative purity within the Republican Party, especially in a liberal state like Rhode Island. But it is certainly not delusional for a party's base to want to elect someone closer to them on the issues, is it? For example, Sen. Chafee was the only Republican Sen. to vote against Justice Alito and then only after all of the other votes were counted (so to speak). Of the so-called moderate Republicans, he is by far the most liberal. When having the luxury of looking at RI from afar, it's easy to think that RI Republicans should be content to even have 1 Republican in Congress--even if he is a "RINO"--and that any attempt by them to get a more conservative candidate is too risky.

To which Ralph replied:

Readers at Conservativenet surely understand that the label "RINO" is obnoxious, an excuse to create a Republican Party in which dissent is not even tolerated. I am surprised, perplexed and disappointed that my friend Marc Comtois uses it. I have yet to label him an un-Republican.

The title of the the discussion thread--"the Galluping Rino Syndrome"--was not created by me, which--among other things--I explained to Ralph in my response:

First, let me say that, as I understand it, this is "Conservativenet" and not "Republicannet" and though the intersection of conservatism and Republicanism is obvious, they are not necessarily one and the same. As such, I don't mind if Ralph decides to label me an un-Republican so long as he doesn't call me un-conservative!

I'm a big boy, spent a stint in the Merchant Marine and have been called much worse. But the thickness of my skin isn't the issue, I guess. I was unaware that "RINO" was so offensive (incidentally, I only mentioned it in "scare quotes" once and I didn't provide the title to this post thread). I was also unaware that usage of the term carried with it the implication of the stifling of internal party debate characterized by Ralph.

I understand that the usage of such shortcut terms is often done to marginalize dissident voices within a group. Additionally--despite the convenience of using such shortcut terminology--it is probably also intellectually lazy to fall back on such terms....

Mea culpa, Ralph.

Now I'll get back to the Mongol Horde.

Jumping to Conclusions

We've heard Iraq War commentary, second-guessing and "what-if" scenarios from historians and generals and now retired general and historian Robert H. Scales (a 1966 graduate from the United States Military Academy who holds a Ph.D. in history from Duke University)--inspired by reading Cobra II--offers up his own "what-if" scenario (via Michael Barone). He does so to emphasize his real point that retired generals and other war commentators are being too quick to make "final" evaluations about a War that is still being fought:

Of course there was no such book [as Cobra II] written [during World War II]. There were no calls for impeachment, dismissal or relief. None of this happened because military men of that age understood war as the most unpredictable of all human endeavors. Our grandfathers realized that unlike lawyers or doctors, soldiers practice their craft infrequently and often get it wrong at first. Thus, even the greatest military men make mistakes that all too often cost lives.

Sure, soldiers of that era carped about the human shortcomings of their leaders but they kept their own counsel because they realized that there was, first and foremost, a war to be won. They forgave the difficulties experienced by an army that had no choice but to learn to fight by fighting, the most wasteful form of education in the art of war. And they came home to a grateful nation sure in the confidence that they had done their part to destroy a great evil. . .

Let's take a page out of the book not written by the greatest generation. Pull some punches and breathe into a bag for awhile. I believe that it's OK for commentators to challenge general defense policies and programs in wartime. I do that quite often. But just as a book written at Christmas time in 1944 might not have offered a meaningful picture of the course of World War II, any commentary on the course of this war might be off the mark just now.

In the interest of winning this war we all must defer judgments about the efficacy of our wartime leaders to the wisdom of the American voters and the 20-20 hindsight of historians like me...after our soldiers and Marines come home.

Globalization is Causing Tribalization

RALPH PETERS notes that globalization may indeed be ocurring for the 21st century aristocrats, but it is also reinforcing tribal identity among the masses.

Rather than making the masses feel connected (on the Internet or otherwise), the tempest of forces we lump together as "globalization" leave men and women around the world feeling threatened and disoriented. In consequence, they turn to what they trust: exclusive identities, local beliefs and fundamentalist religion...

And:

What the globalist prophets are witnessing isn't the convergence of the masses for a chorus of "We are the world," but the rise of a new, globe-spanning aristocracy. . . . Just as yesteryear's aristos did, today's nobility of wealth and culture see themselves as above nationality. Patriotism is fodder for the peasants (unless it can be exploited for profit). They have far more in common with business partners across the globe than with the guy who fixes their plumbing. They intermarry across borders and forge alliances based on their own interests - as the Tudors, Valois and Medici did before them.

Brown University and Slavery

Joshua Zeitz reviews Charles Rappleye's new book, Sons of Providence: The Brown Brothers, the Slave Trade, and the American Revolution:

The story of the Brown brothers has assumed new importance in recent years, as Brown University—the Ivy League institution they helped build, and which bears their name—has impaneled a committee of administrators and faculty members to investigate the relationship between the university’s early financing and the Brown family’s profit from the slave trade. Although the Sally’s mission proved a dismal failure, it seems likely that John Brown experienced at least some financial payoff from his other ventures in the trade, and since he and Moses both gave freely of their personal fortunes to help jumpstart what was then called Rhode Island College, many at the university are eager to arrive at a full moral accounting of the institution’s origins.

Rappleye does more than just tell an important story. He does a fine job of demonstrating how the rhetoric of the Revolution, with its references to colonial “enslavement” at the hands of the diabolical British parliament, compelled many men like Moses Brown to rethink the morality of actual slavery. Also he reminds readers that slavery was at the time a national, not sectional, problem. Indeed at one point in its colonial history, Rhode Island’s sea merchants were importing more than two thirds of all the African slaves who arrived in North America.

Rappleye’s book has lasting importance today, as does the Brown family legacy. Look around Providence and you can still see the streets—Bowen, Angell, Hope—that bear the names of the book’s characters. Or visit the stately red-brick administrative building, University Hall, that Nicholas, Moses, and John Brown financed in 1770. There presides Ruth Simmons, the first African-American president of an Ivy League university. She sits at the helm of a college that may have been built partly on the sweat and tears of her ancestors but whose transformation over the years testifies to the long sweep of Rhode Island’s, and America’s, history.

Spanish Version of US National Anthem

I'm for using common sense on this whole immigration thing, which includes not conflating immigration with "illegal" immigration. Primarily, I say that the U.S. has the right--as does any sovereign nation--to determine their immigration policy. That being said, the decades of ambivelance has left us with a mess. As such, I think first we fix the borders, then we deal with the illegals in a pragmatic way while keeping in that we're a nation of immigrants and that there was no "illegal" until relatively recently, but neither was there a social welfare system back then, etc.

But now there's something that has really got me riled up. A Spanish language version of the U.S. national anthem was commissioned by the U.S. government!!!

In 1919.

HA!

Academic Left and White Guilt

Todd Gitlin wrote an autopsy on the Academic Left, but David French makes an important point:

[Gitlin's] opening [paragraph] is a temper-tantrum version of a common argument against the conservative academic freedom movement. “If, after 40 years of leftist campus activism, there is a Republican president, Republican congress, and a conservative Supreme Court, how could you possibly argue that the academy matters?”

In fact, this argument is sometimes even used by conservatives to dismiss the relative importance of campus radicals. Yet it ignores an essential truth: The academy is not—and has never been—particularly effect[ive] at partisan politics (i.e., winning elections or individual legislative battles). Its strength lies in its ability to influence long-term cultural trends.

Could an example of this influence be found in their attempt to "Vietnamize" every war by playing on what Shelby Steele calls "white guilt"?

I call this white guilt not because it is a guilt of conscience but because people stigmatized with moral crimes--here racism and imperialism--lack moral authority and so act guiltily whether they feel guilt or not.

They struggle, above all else, to dissociate themselves from the past sins they are stigmatized with. When they behave in ways that invoke the memory of those sins, they must labor to prove that they have not relapsed into their group's former sinfulness. So when America--the greatest embodiment of Western power--goes to war in Third World Iraq, it must also labor to dissociate that action from the great Western sin of imperialism. Thus, in Iraq we are in two wars, one against an insurgency and another against the past--two fronts, two victories to win, one military, the other a victory of dissociation.

The collapse of white supremacy--and the resulting white guilt--introduced a new mechanism of power into the world: stigmatization with the evil of the Western past. And this stigmatization is power because it affects the terms of legitimacy for Western nations and for their actions in the world...

Anti-Americanism, whether in Europe or on the American left, works by the mechanism of white guilt. It stigmatizes America with all the imperialistic and racist ugliness of the white Western past so that America becomes a kind of straw man, a construct of Western sin. (The Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo prisons were the focus of such stigmatization campaigns.) Once the stigma is in place, one need only be anti-American in order to be "good," in order to have an automatic moral legitimacy and power in relation to America. (People as seemingly desperate as President Jacques Chirac and the Rev. Al Sharpton are devoted pursuers of the moral high ground to be had in anti-Americanism.) This formula is the most dependable source of power for today's international left. Virtue and power by mere anti-Americanism. And it is all the more appealing since, unlike real virtues, it requires no sacrifice or effort--only outrage at every slight echo of the imperialist past.

UPDATE: Caleb McDaniel takes Steele to task for flawed logic.

Democracy's Dumbing Down Effect

Nicolas Tenzer doesn't think today's mass media is doing democracy any favors (What? With so many people getting their "news" from comedians or People? Who cares if it's not true? It's so entertaining and funny, it's so ironic...) He pulls out the Tocqueville to help prove his point:

For Tocqueville, democracy’s systemic effects could lead citizens to deprive themselves of reasoned thought. They could pretend to judge events and values on their own while in reality they would merely copy the rough and simplified opinions of the masses. Indeed, what Tocqueville called the hold of “social power” on opinion is probably strongest in democratic regimes — a view that foretells the growth of modern-day demagogy and media manipulation.

Tocqueville believed that there are no effective long-term constraints on this tendency. Neither local democracy nor small societies, neither governmental checks and balances nor civil rights, can prevent the decline of critical thought that democracy seems to cause. Schools have the power to be little more than enclaves from the corrosive strength of social influences on how the mind works. Similarly, while Tocqueville thought that pursuing virtue as the ancients did, or having a religious faith, could sometimes elevate the soul, both conflict with the democratic ideal if they become officially prescribed in public life.

In this sense, Tocqueville’s intellectual heirs include the neo-Marxist theorists of the Frankfurt school, as well as Hannah Arendt, all of whom feared above all the disintegration of reason in modern societies. Indeed, the French philosopher Marcel Gauchet named a recent book Democracy Against Itself. The democratic way of life, these writers argue, tends to destroy original thought and to suppress “high” culture, yielding a mediocrity that leaves citizens vulnerable to democracy’s enemies.

But, while history is replete with murderous regimes applauded by cowed and deceived masses, the greater risk for democratic nations is that their citizens withdraw into apathy and short-term thinking for immediate gratification. The past — despite rituals that seek to commemorate historic moments — is obliterated by an addiction to the now and the new. Even the supposedly well-educated ruling class is subject to this bewitchment. The essential problem of the democratic mind is its lack of historical consciousness.

Do the defects of democracy really mean, as Tocqueville claimed, that resigned pessimism is the only — realistic but unsustainable — path open to us? I don’t think so. There are means to fight against what might be called today’s growing “democratic stupidity”.

The first defence is to push for an educational system that really forms critical minds, namely through the (nowadays) largely neglected subjects of literature, history, and philosophy. If an informed and critical citizenry, that democracy requires, is to be formed, our schools must stop pandering to the latest popular fads and begin to sharpen the analytical capacities of students.

The biggest impediment to such an education is the mass media, with its tendency to cultivate superficiality and amusement. Many people nowadays spend more of their lives watching television than they do in classrooms. The passivity that mass media encourages is the polar opposite of the active engagement that democratic citizens need.

Milbloggers

Strategypage ("The News as History") military blogger Harold Hutchinson writes in TCS Daily:

Milblogger efforts have shown that the landscape has changed greatly from Vietnam. As Steve, who blogs at Threatswatch, pointed out, the Tet Offensive was a military defeat for the North Vietnamese, but the victory by American forces on the battlefield was taken away by misreporting from the media of that time. Today, such misreporting will not go unchallenged, as there is a check against the MSM.

The milbloggers largely agreed that this is the major difference between the War on Terror and the Vietnam War. This time, the people who know the facts and the good news stories have the ability to get them out without the filters of the major mainstream media outlets, changing the terrain of the information battlefield. This shift in the terrain has helped keep the United States from completely losing the war on the home front.

Helping to prevent such a Vietnamization of Iraq is only one of the milblogger contributions. And while most milbloggers (like Hutchinson, or Steve of Threatswatch or Blackfive) are generally positive about the War in Iraq, some--Chris Bray comes to mind--are not and have been allowed to express as much. Perhaps this is because the insight provided by men and women involved in the Iraq War or the GWOT--whether on the front lines or not--is worth having. In short, blogging has allowed soldiers to write modern day equivalents of To Hell and Back, With The Old Breed or even Catch-22 in "real-time." I think that the American public has been well served by the milbloggers and could benefit even more if the MSM did a better job of consistently bringing us such personal stories from Iraq.

Grumbling Generals in Preemptive Run for Cover?

James Pinkerton thinks that the generals calling for SecDef Rumsfeld's head may be trying a c.y.a. maneuver in case H.R. McMaster decides to write another book. Maybe, but given some of his past writings and his current involvement in Iraq, I'm not sure if Sec. Rumsfeld is the one he'd be going after.

The Euston Manifesto

The Euston Manifesto calls for a new progressivism.

We are democrats and progressives. We propose here a fresh political alignment. Many of us belong to the Left, but the principles that we set out are not exclusive. We reach out, rather, beyond the socialist Left towards egalitarian liberals and others of unambiguous democratic commitment. Indeed, the reconfiguration of progressive opinion that we aim for involves drawing a line between the forces of the Left that remain true to its authentic values, and currents that have lately shown themselves rather too flexible about these values. It involves making common cause with genuine democrats, whether socialist or not.

It even has something to say about History:

12) Historical truth.
In connecting to the original humanistic impulses of the movement for human progress, we emphasize the duty which genuine democrats must have to respect for the historical truth. Not only fascists, Holocaust-deniers and the like have tried to obscure the historical record. One of the tragedies of the Left is that its own reputation was massively compromised in this regard by the international Communist movement, and some have still not learned that lesson. Political honesty and straightforwardness are a primary obligation for us.

But this is probably the important context that inspired the Manifesto:

The founding supporters of this statement took different views on the military intervention in Iraq, both for and against. We recognize that it was possible reasonably to disagree about the justification for the intervention, the manner in which it was carried through, the planning (or lack of it) for the aftermath, and the prospects for the successful implementation of democratic change. We are, however, united in our view about the reactionary, semi-fascist and murderous character of the Baathist regime in Iraq, and we recognize its overthrow as a liberation of the Iraqi people. We are also united in the view that, since the day on which this occurred, the proper concern of genuine liberals and members of the Left should have been the battle to put in place in Iraq a democratic political order and to rebuild the country's infrastructure, to create after decades of the most brutal oppression a life for Iraqis which those living in democratic countries take for granted — rather than picking through the rubble of the arguments over intervention.

This opposes us not only to those on the Left who have actively spoken in support of the gangs of jihadist and Baathist thugs of the Iraqi so-called resistance, but also to others who manage to find a way of situating themselves between such forces and those trying to bring a new democratic life to the country. We have no truck, either, with the tendency to pay lip service to these ends, while devoting most of one's energy to criticism of political opponents at home (supposedly responsible for every difficulty in Iraq), and observing a tactful silence or near silence about the ugly forces of the Iraqi "insurgency". The many left opponents of regime change in Iraq who have been unable to understand the considerations that led others on the Left to support it, dishing out anathema and excommunication, more lately demanding apology or repentance, betray the democratic values they profess.

Those Grumbling Retired Generals

So, it seems that some retired Generals are grumbling about SecDef Rumsfeld and his (which really means the President's) policies. Paul Merengoff notes:

Griping ex-generals are always with us. President Clinton certainly had his detractors among the military brass, and not just retired brass. If I recall correctly, the MSM tended to attirbute this phenomenon to the neanderthalism within the military. In any case, the existence of griping generals, without more, means little. The "more" is a close analysis of the substance of the griping. This seems largely lacking in the MSM accounts.

Wretchard, Victor Davis Hansen, Rich Lowry and Dafyyd ab Hugh have all attempted to provide some substance. Dafyyd chalks the grumbling up to two things: the generals are mostly men who earned their stars under President Clinton and--more likely to my mind--they have a fundamentally different conception of how to wage war. Wretchard also touches upon this latter point while current JCS Chairman Gen. Peter Pace disputes any sort of muzzling.

A New Nativist Movement?

Glenn Reynolds:

[T]hough labor unions have a lot of influence within the Democratic Party, they don't have the votes anymore. Just as Republicans are caught between their business-oriented constituencies (who want cheap labor that doesn't talk back) and their grassroots constituencies (who don't like illegal immigration), so too are the Democrats caught between two constituencies of their own [labor and immigrants (broadly defined)].

The more I think about it, the more this looks like fertile ground for a third party to emerge. Who will it hurt more? The Republicans, or the Democrats? I'm not sure. Perhaps it will shake things up in general.

Reynolds may be onto something, and I can't help but look at the past and wonder if a new nativist movement is afoot. I doubt very much any such movement will rely on the same sort of racist, anti-Catholic (for instance) rhetoric of the 19th century. I also expect that those pro-"any"immigrant groups will attempt to portray anti-illegal immigrant groups as the 21st century equivalent of the aforemntioned 19th century nativists (even more than they already have).

If Reynold's is correct, than any such party would by definition have a pretty narrow agenda that would probably only appeal to certain sections--both geographically and ideologically--of the population. I'm not knowledgeable enough to define what such a coalition would look like, but I think--and this is no profound insight--that the Southwest would provide a geographical center for any such movement. Given that, perhaps Arizona Congressman J.D. Hayworth (R) could be an attractive candidate to such a movement, though he'd probably run as a Republican.

Immigration Debate Euphemism

Walter Williams:

Being a relatively land-rich and labor-scarce nation, immigration has always been good for our country. Plus, for most of our history, there was a guarantee that immigrants would come here to work. The alternative was starvation.

With today's welfare state, there's no such guarantee. People can come here, not work and not starve because the welfare state guarantees that they can live off the rest of us.

At the heart of today's immigration problem is its illegality. According to several estimates, there are 11 million people who are in our country illegally, mostly from Mexico. Many people, including my libertarian friends and associates, advance an argument that differs little from saying that people anywhere in the world have a right to live in the United States irrespective of our laws or preferences.

According to that vision, American people do not have a right to set either the number of people who enter our country or the conditions upon which they enter. Some of the arguments and terms used in the immigration debate defy reason. First, there's the refusal to call these people "illegal aliens." The politically preferred term is "undocumented workers," which is nothing less than verbal sleight-of-hand. After all, I, too, am an undocumented worker.

Thomas Sowell

Immigration is yet another issue which we seem unable to discuss rationally -- in part because words have been twisted beyond recognition in political rhetoric.

We can't even call illegal immigrants "illegal immigrants." The politically correct evasion is "undocumented workers."

Do American citizens go around carrying documents with them when they work or apply for work? Most Americans are undocumented workers but they are not illegal immigrants. There is a difference.

The Bush administration is pushing a program to legalize "guest workers." But what is a guest? Someone you have invited. People who force their way into your home without your permission are called gate crashers.

Jay Ambrose:

Some years back, when we talked about foreigners sneaking into our land in contravention of the law and then setting up camp for years and years, we called them illegal aliens -- which, of course, is exactly what they were. . .

But some were unhappy with the word choice. They worried that the phrase was insulting, because, you see, another definition of alien is a "creature from outer space," and besides, the word as an adjective can also denote strangeness.

English, as we all know, is a language full of words with multiple meanings, and except in poetry and jokes, we mostly manage to understand that one meaning of a word does not somehow color another of its meanings. But politics was at work here, not lexicography, and those harping on the issue would not be appeased until most media outlets were calling illegal aliens "illegal immigrants," and later "undocumented workers," and finally -- in a surprising number of cases -- just "immigrants."

Then the word manipulators sprang their trap -- so to speak. When members of Congress proposed laws to regain control of who resides in America, foes acted as if they were betraying something fundamental in America's traditions. According to them, these lawmakers were picking on immigrants -- and aren't we a nation of immigrants? Didn't all of our ancestors or we ourselves come from other lands, and doesn't this fact mean we should embrace all these other immigrants?

Choosing Security over Freedom

Charles Krauthammer writes about "the strangest revolution the French have ever produced" (referring to the under 25 year-old strike in France) and notes that:

...it is not just a long way from the ideals of 1789. It is the very antithesis. It represents an escape from freedom, a demand for an arbitrary powerful state in whose bosom you can settle for life.

Usually, the freedom vs. security dichotomy has been put forth by the left or right with regards to the War on Terror and the Patriot Act. This is the first time I've seen them used in such a way.

Medicinal Stoicism in the Middle Ages

Providence Journal columnist (and M.D.) Stanley M. Aronson writes about medical care in the Middle Ages:

Medicine in the 14th Century was a struggling secular enterprise, standing in opposition to both the widely held reliance upon religious healing and the stoic acceptance of the world as it is. Certainly the power of the saints to heal was commonly accepted, and many religious pilgrimages were motivated, at least in part, by the desire to cure illnesses that everyday medicine had not cured. Stoicism, in the centuries following the Dark Ages, offered an intelligent avoidance of those things that might harm one's body, while impassively affirming the inevitability of life's travails, ailments, declines and death. It was primitive preventive medicine, quite stoical, which, to this day, offers some merit.

Even back then, it was a good idea to stay away from the sick if you wanted to stay healthy. See, even in the "Dark Ages," a little common sense could save your life.

History Carnival 28

Patahistory is hosting History Carnival 28 and my post "A Positive Historical Baseline" was both selected (thanks to Nathanael at Rhine River) and excerpted. It is grouped with a post by Ms. Cornelius: What does it mean if NCLB wants to leave history behind? So, while I'm worrying about the "type" of history being taught, Ms. Cornelius is worrying if history will even be taught! An excerpt:

History is not targeted by any high-stakes tests. Does that mean that history doesn't count? Should history class merely function as an outpost to teach language arts and math and science? These are things I cover incidentally in my classes, but by no means do I believe that my sole purpose is to help kids pass federally mandated tests outside my subject area, much less IN my subject area, were they to even exist. That kind of education is a poor excuse for an education.

Yes, it is. However, I *thought* that I had heard that History will eventually be included in NCLB testing, though it appears that different states require (such as North Carolina) standardized History testing as part of their Adequate Yearly Progress evaluation of High School students. (Thanks to Ms. Cornelius for pointing out the difference between state and NCLB!) Instead, it looks like the federal government continues to rely on the NAEP test for History.

My "Unusual Experience"

C.H.L. George writes that "Studying for a Ph.D is a bit like teaching English abroad, working on an oil rig or being in the merchant navy. It is an unusual experience that does change the way that people think and behave. " Hmm. Well, I've done a Master's Thesis (which I tried to treat like a dissertation) and was in the U.S. Merchant Marine for a few years. What does that say about the way I "think and behave"? (via PTDR)