Jack, your column today, especially your last paragraph and final line, have resonated strongly with my own emotional reactions to the "revelations" of journalists' deep dives into MAGA-mania. Remember that a 100 IQ is purportedly the median IQ of the tested pool - meaning that there are as many people below that average as there are above it. I think we have located the lower pool. "It's great to be a Delta; I wouldn't want to be an Alpha." Just need to roll out the soma. (Hat tip to Aldous Huxley.)
Back to the main point. The sadness and pain with which I watched the January 6th madness clearly comes through here in your last few lines. Over the past 50+ years of my political consciousness, my sense was that while we as a country and society have a way to go, at least we were moving in the correct direction - toward respect, dignity, equal and meaningful opportunity, and yes, actual freedom for the many categories of persons who have struggled for recognition and survival. This past decade or so, culminating in the entire DJT fiasco, has demonstrated to me, however, that while the arc of history may bend toward justice, it is a "fitted" line, derived from regression analysis, smoothing out sometimes wild fluctuations along that arc, and that we are heading into a deeply low point in one of those fluctuations unless we reassert ourselves to stop it and reverse it. Regardless of that realization, watching hordes of screaming extras from Idiocracy attacking the US Capitol with mayhem and obstruction on their collective mind, cured my naivete, as it did yours, regarding the threat facing the rational majority of this country. The "to do" list has to be wide ranging to restore sanity to (or limit the effectiveness of) this dangerous segment of our society. There are many who are laboring at those oars, including you, and (not to be Captain Obvious) much work to be done. Hopefully, the media and the people will see clearly and soon that, as Rachel Maddow has been known to say, "One of these things, (here, the R party) is not like the other." The complex motives and failures of imagination and recognition (born of an ignorance of even recent history) are combining to raise rather than ameliorate the threat, diluting the strength of the "disinfectant" qualities of sunlight by filling the sky with clouds of misinformation and naive analysis. Many of the press reports and analyses of Hitler's speeches and actions in the 1930s did the same disservice to their readers. Keep up the good work Jack - it should be at least some comfort that you are on the right side of history.
The thing about being on the "right" side of history is that one never really knows about that until the history is written, yeah? And that's usually long after the protagonists have become fertilizer. There's an old proverb- Native American, I believe- that says, and I'm paraphrasing, "A wise man plants trees whose shade he knows he will never live to enjoy."
You and I will be long gone by the time this Sturm und Drang plays out and the dust settles, if indeed it ever does. I do what I do for two reasons:
1. It helps to maintain my sanity in a very insane time, and
2. This is what I can do, what I can add. Too many people throw bombs and leave the scene of the crime. In my own sometimes twisted way, I hope I can try to introduce some calmness and sanity.
Hopefully, I succeed more often than I fail. 🤷🏻♂️ 🤗
John Dewey quipped somewhere (I could look it up, I'm just not going to) something to the effect, "You will sooner ween a miser from his hoard than a man from his most cherished beliefs." My own variation on this ("Herstein's First Law") is, "Never underestimate human capacity for denial."
As a clarification to my first comment, we need to avoid confusing the segment of MAGA crazies with the bulk of our rural fellow citizens who have been screwed by political representatives (state and federal) over the past few decades. See White Rural Rage. They still need to rise above the culture war idiocy, but that is the result of cultural/emotional vulnerability, not stupidity. When they join the MAGA crazies, they are only perpetuating their own misery. Yes, they bear responsibility for the misuse of their agency, but there is a chance that they can be reached. Dems have to reestablish presence in those currently abandoned red areas, concentrating on locally critical issues, however, or there will be no one there offering a personal dynamic and pushback. See Jess Piper's Substack.
Jack, your column today, especially your last paragraph and final line, have resonated strongly with my own emotional reactions to the "revelations" of journalists' deep dives into MAGA-mania. Remember that a 100 IQ is purportedly the median IQ of the tested pool - meaning that there are as many people below that average as there are above it. I think we have located the lower pool. "It's great to be a Delta; I wouldn't want to be an Alpha." Just need to roll out the soma. (Hat tip to Aldous Huxley.)
Back to the main point. The sadness and pain with which I watched the January 6th madness clearly comes through here in your last few lines. Over the past 50+ years of my political consciousness, my sense was that while we as a country and society have a way to go, at least we were moving in the correct direction - toward respect, dignity, equal and meaningful opportunity, and yes, actual freedom for the many categories of persons who have struggled for recognition and survival. This past decade or so, culminating in the entire DJT fiasco, has demonstrated to me, however, that while the arc of history may bend toward justice, it is a "fitted" line, derived from regression analysis, smoothing out sometimes wild fluctuations along that arc, and that we are heading into a deeply low point in one of those fluctuations unless we reassert ourselves to stop it and reverse it. Regardless of that realization, watching hordes of screaming extras from Idiocracy attacking the US Capitol with mayhem and obstruction on their collective mind, cured my naivete, as it did yours, regarding the threat facing the rational majority of this country. The "to do" list has to be wide ranging to restore sanity to (or limit the effectiveness of) this dangerous segment of our society. There are many who are laboring at those oars, including you, and (not to be Captain Obvious) much work to be done. Hopefully, the media and the people will see clearly and soon that, as Rachel Maddow has been known to say, "One of these things, (here, the R party) is not like the other." The complex motives and failures of imagination and recognition (born of an ignorance of even recent history) are combining to raise rather than ameliorate the threat, diluting the strength of the "disinfectant" qualities of sunlight by filling the sky with clouds of misinformation and naive analysis. Many of the press reports and analyses of Hitler's speeches and actions in the 1930s did the same disservice to their readers. Keep up the good work Jack - it should be at least some comfort that you are on the right side of history.
Thanks for the kind words, Rod.
The thing about being on the "right" side of history is that one never really knows about that until the history is written, yeah? And that's usually long after the protagonists have become fertilizer. There's an old proverb- Native American, I believe- that says, and I'm paraphrasing, "A wise man plants trees whose shade he knows he will never live to enjoy."
You and I will be long gone by the time this Sturm und Drang plays out and the dust settles, if indeed it ever does. I do what I do for two reasons:
1. It helps to maintain my sanity in a very insane time, and
2. This is what I can do, what I can add. Too many people throw bombs and leave the scene of the crime. In my own sometimes twisted way, I hope I can try to introduce some calmness and sanity.
Hopefully, I succeed more often than I fail. 🤷🏻♂️ 🤗
John Dewey quipped somewhere (I could look it up, I'm just not going to) something to the effect, "You will sooner ween a miser from his hoard than a man from his most cherished beliefs." My own variation on this ("Herstein's First Law") is, "Never underestimate human capacity for denial."
Robert Kagan in a WaPo Op-Ed today goes further, and argues that these people consciously despise the principles of equality (and yes, I wrote that as a plural on purpose) upon which the country is founded. I posted it as a "gift" article on facebook, should anyone care to read it: https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=pfbid08NaTqCADxkA92pCCRo72mgJ83aQaGwM7y2ZqrkjHnpEeh8kCSdAQuyz6REKXuqUnl&id=100070946867928
Minority equality anywhere is a threat to White hegemony EVERYWHERE....
As a clarification to my first comment, we need to avoid confusing the segment of MAGA crazies with the bulk of our rural fellow citizens who have been screwed by political representatives (state and federal) over the past few decades. See White Rural Rage. They still need to rise above the culture war idiocy, but that is the result of cultural/emotional vulnerability, not stupidity. When they join the MAGA crazies, they are only perpetuating their own misery. Yes, they bear responsibility for the misuse of their agency, but there is a chance that they can be reached. Dems have to reestablish presence in those currently abandoned red areas, concentrating on locally critical issues, however, or there will be no one there offering a personal dynamic and pushback. See Jess Piper's Substack.