From Becker And Posner: Posner On The Future Of Conservatism

December 7, 2008December 7, 2008 / chr1 / Leave a comment

Posner’s post here. (Scroll to Becker’s)

Posner states:

“The defeat of the Republican Party in the November election is widely thought to signal the decline of conservatism in the United States.”

But don’t confuse the Republican party with conservatism, Posner reminds.

I won’t. Especially after what George Bush has done to fiscal responsibility (deep down I think he’s quite socially liberal…a sign of the times?). I’m also quite skeptical of what Barack Obama may plan to do to liberalism…but I’m willing to give him a chance. Posner goes on:

“For myself, I would be happy to see conservatism exit from the political scene–provided it takes liberalism with it. I would like to see us enter a post-ideological era in which policies are based on pragmatic considerations rather than on conformity to a set of preconceptions rooted in a rapidly vanishing past.”

Whoa…that’s interesting but pretty radical. Hail to the post-ideological era!

He finishes with:

“But the point I particularly want to stress is that the recent failures of conservatism are not a vindication of liberalism. Both can fail, and as long as the failures are recognized, the United States can do fine.”

Point taken. Are they actually failing? Are we failing them?

See Also:From George Will on Stephen Colbert: “What conservatives say is that we will protect you against idealism.”

From Newsweek: Fareed Zakaria On What’s Possible For Obama And American Foreign Policy

December 4, 2008December 4, 2008 / chr1 / Leave a comment

Full article here.

“Strategy begins by looking at the world and identifying America’s interests, the threats to them and the resources available to be deployed. By relating all these, one can develop a set of foreign policies that will advance America’s interests and ideals.”

And he finishes with…

“Ten years from now, the world will have moved on; the rising powers will have become unwilling to accept an agenda conceived in Washington or London or Brussels. But at this time and for this man, there is a unique opportunity to use American power to reshape the world. This is his moment. He should seize it.”

There is some healthy dispute as to what those ideals are…

From Bloomberg.Com: Nancy Pelosi Says “Bankruptcy Is Not An Option”

December 3, 2008 / chr1 / Leave a comment

Full post here.

Apparently because Pelosi and the political interests she represents as House Speaker can’t really seem to broaden their vision to see this as an option? Is this really we are as a country?

Here’s a brief 2:00 min explanation by Bill Ackman of Pershing Square on why the GM bailout is likely a bad idea:

Adam Kirsch In The New Republic On Slavoj Zizek: The Deadly Jester

December 1, 2008October 31, 2009 / chr1 / 1 Comment

Full review here. (updated)

American political thought is often suspicious of European leftist intellectuals like Zizek (wikipedia) and Bernard Henri-Levy. There are some good reasons to be suspicious, of course, of the effect such deep thinkers potentially have on the many social, intellectual and philosophical British-American traditions they sometimes comically fail to understand. Perhaps Kirsch is a little too suspicious, though. In fact, it seems that in Europe it’s often as easy to tap into anti-American sentiment as it is to tap into anti-communist and socialist sentiment here in America.

Kirsch wants to point out that behind much of Zizek’s thought is…well…communism, socialism and Marxism.

“When Zizek turns up speaking the classical language of Marxism-Leninism, he profits from the assumption that the return of ideas that were once the cause of tragedy can now occur only in the form of farce.”

And perhaps Zizek’s delivering them with the hyperbole that a public intellectual trapped in and suspicious of his role as a public intellectual (you never understand my depths, but I have my moral duties!) does. Perhaps not, though. He goes a little further:

“This ontology of revolution raises some questions. On several occasions, Zizek describes the “utopian” moment of revolution as “divine.” In support of this notion he adduces Walter Benjamin on “divine violence.” “The most obvious candidate for ‘divine violence,'” he writes in Violence, “is the violent explosion of resentment which finds expression in a spectrum that ranges from mob lynchings to revolutionary terror.”

Kirsch wants to point out the dangerous possibility of violent revolution that Marx advocated (always worth pointing out I think) mixed with Benjamin’s Marxism/Jewish and religious mysticism. A nod to terrorists (and terrorism…?)

I might add that perhaps from Hegel, and to Marx’s understanding of Hegel in The Communist Manifesto, there is a lot of transposed Christian metaphysics…a metaphysics re-arranged with somewhat secular aims for the industrial world, but also a metaphysics harboring a similar pursuit of the transcendant.

Have Zizek’s and Bernhard Henri-Levy’s depths been sufficiently addresssed? Is it good enough for you?