Salon Writer Takes Up Some Big History Just Written About Last Week, Right Here--
Salon Writer Takes Up Some Big History Just Written About Last Week, Right Here--
Literally one week after I posted my article on Newt Gingrich and his role in converting the GOP to a modern day Jacobin terror, which believes in their idea that only a violent bloodletting and the spectacle of mass executions can restore social order, (a reaction in the aftermath of the French Revolution) Salon writer Mike Lofgren publishes an article documenting how the right-wing Conservative "intellectuals" are and have been indeed a modern day Jacobin terror, and cites the little known philosopher Joseph de Maistre asserting that the figure of "the executioner" is the symbol of social order.
For those who have not yet read it, my article is prominently featured on my blog. I honestly don't know if this writer follows my blog, as does his colleague at Salon Chauncey Devega. Clearly he has some real historian's chops, and didn't just stumble onto the French Revolution as a parallel by accident. I will say that the universe has a certain curvature, which doesn't always bend toward justice, but helps bring together like-minded people who are pursuing justice, and notably does not submit itself to coincidences. People will often come to the same or similar conclusions about the significance of events precisely because these seemingly repetitive patterns of human social behavior are greatly evident.
Why is this important? Because if we can better understand how their minds work, (or don't work, as the case may be) it will help us to forecast what they might do, and when. The forces which in the past sucessfully imposed authoritarian dictatorships have repeatedly done the same kinds of things throughout history to attain power and to keep it. That pattern defies conventional labeling along the old "left vs. right" forms of ideological positioning. In fact, the arbitrary usage of the terms "left" and "right" to distinguish between so-called liberal and conservative political ideologies was merely the flukey outcome of the designated seating arrangement in the French Parliament after their Revolution turned into a bloodbath.
The strongest indicator of the relative historical illiteracy of Americans has been the simple fact that these types of movements demanding a "strongman" to lead in times of crisis have come and gone, again and again over centuries, yet still we are shocked and taken by surprise when they re-emerge in slightly different garb, doing almost the same things. This, I believe, is a negative function of our presidential system, that it has become acceptable for a majority of Americans to literally shut down our brains in between four year election cycles and show little interest in anything outside of jobs, family, entertainment, or local/personal issues. This, I'm afraid, is one way that dictatorships seem to happen out of nowhere, and are consolidated before we are prepared to recognize it. We are distracted. Sometimes by our own self-absorption, and sometimes due to "sleight-of-hand" trickery by skilled political and religious "magicians" who excel in demagoguery. But it only works with an audience or populace which is susceptible.
"Who gives a rat's ass about some obscure French philosopher and a bunch of rioters from 233 years ago, I can't pay my f**king school loans and my car just died?" becomes the question some might have in response to all of this. And that, frankly, is how we lose, because it's easier to just believe that "politics is a dirty business that is only about money, so I'm interested in the here and now...what are you going to do for me?" That is how too many of us think, and is why we are susceptible to dictatorships, because history itself is rendered too academic and impersonal. That is, until it comes into your house through the living room window, as it is right now in many places, including ironically France.
Fortunately, the American people have been triggered by recent events to be more inquisitive, more analytical, more engaged, and less susceptible to lies, because we are seeing events on a daily basis with no actual parallel. That is our new environment, and a leading factor which we have to work with. Don't give ideas short shrift. There is no "bottom line," only the end of a journey which is the beginning of new ones. The current realities require us to do some things which might force us to break some bad old habits. And what could be wrong with that?
C'est la vie, c'est la guerre, c'est la pomme de terre.
https://www.salon.com/2023/07/01/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-conservative-intellectual--only-apologists-for-right-wing-power/?fbclid=IwAR0PViJs198dtteYrnmZN3JhDQDCh1OknpCU_X75HHQaRhwJs77faAXeAwQ
