From Middle-East Perspectives: ‘What Are Erdogan’s Intentions After The Fall Of Afrin?‘
‘That said, it is interesting that Erdoğan keeps using the term “Ottoman” in much of his rhetoric – for decades the Turks have avoided the term, claiming that atrocities such as the Armenian, Assyrian and Greek genocides were not done by Turks, but the Ottomans. It appears now that is a distinction without a difference. His displays of the 1920 “national oath” map are not accidental – it is there for a reason.’
Sorry for the title, but I’m still thinking the resurgent Islamism and authoritarian populism of Erdogan, combined with the fires burning across the Middle-East, along with the revanchism of Putin’s Russia, and the relative weakness of European leadership, bears watching. It’s got me worried.
Via Stratfor via Twitter:
Read Stratfor’s latest Middle East assessment: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of a U.S. Pullout From #Syria. Want to see all the angles? Read Stratfor. https://t.co/WFttPuveL0pic.twitter.com/Chb7nNK19v
— Stratfor (@Stratfor) April 8, 2018
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Conor Friedersdorf at the Atlantic: ”A Dissent Concerning Kevin Williamson‘
Written from inside the publication:
‘Individuals participating in the public sphere, and publications that aspire to cultivate a broad civic dialogue, ought never slip into indifference to injustice or abandon moral judgments. But neither should they mistake tolerance for moral collapse. Much can be worked out by objecting to the objectionable in ways that do not foreclose the possibility of all cooperation. As citizens, if not as employees of any particular company, we are inescapably bound. And it is incumbent on all of us, even in our inevitable moments of pained outrage, to model how to work together.’
When you write for money, you have to make some compromises on principle; you’re part of an organization. You’ll have to plug other people’s work and placate the financial interests and readers of the magazine. More broadly, all of us are, subtly, and often imperceptibly, influenced by the people and environments through which we move.
My two cents regarding the fracturing of the political Left: The Atlantic, The NY Times, The New Yorker etc. have long published and endorsed various forms of progressive and radical politics, especially since the 60’s. Such politics traditionally came packaged with a commitment to the arts, the avant-garde, dissenting voices, liberal and sometimes even conservative establishmentarianism. In the past, there was more of a functioning establishment to react against.
As I see the world, pegging highest ideals and deepest moral thinking to Civil Rights activism, social justice, and various reactionary and collectivist political movements has caught up with these publications. There’s always someone more pure.
Just as there is a fractured and frustrated conservative movement and Republican party, there is a fractured liberal and activist Left and Democrat party. The Atlantic is plugged into much of that populist Left sentiment (irrationally anti-Trump).
Don’t be surprised when it happens: Many individuals on the Left will continue to subsume their own experiences into group identity, feeling perfectly righteous and justified as part of a mob swarming dissenters on the path to the better, or perhaps, the perfect world to come (speaking and acting for what they believe to be ALL women and minorities within group indentity and endless protest).
Kevin Williamson, and for that matter, Fridersdorf if he’s not careful, can easily become dissenters.
Heretics, even.
Via The Future Of Capitalism: ‘The Politics Of The New Yorker’
From The New Yorker: ‘Writing Powered By Amtrak’
Kevin Williamson At The National Review: ‘Whose Liberalism?’