Last Night's Debate: a comment (and a change in hiatus policy)

I want to go back to the roots of weblogging a bit. While I'm on hiatus here, I'm still reading and commenting at a number of other blogs. Some of those comments are -- if I may say so myself -- substantial, and I want to keep them in my own space. So I'll be, periodically, possibly even rarely, reproducing a comment I make elsewhere, with a link to the original post as a way of broadening the discussions and keeping track of my own writing.

In an open thread at Ozarque on the lastest Obama-Clinton debate, I wrote this:

I read the transcript (it's faster, for me, and body language doesn't do that much for me, most of the time), and -- aside from sharing the apparently common desire that we find people who are actually serious about politics and policy to serve as moderators -- I was unimpressed. I don't think either of them said anything suprising. I think the Clinton campaign is struggling for results, and the candidate reflects that with complaints about process, fairness, tactics. I think the Obama campaign is trying hard to find a comfortable zone in the uncomfortable gray area between taking a high road and effectively attacking, and some of that struggle was clearly on display.

My concern, at this point, is a strategic one: I want a Democrat to win in November. I'm actually uncommitted to either Clinton or Obama: neither one really has a resume or proposals that are decisively better (and proposals are rarely enacted as-is anyway; if there's one thing I haven't seen in politics in a long time it's realistic discussions of how platforms might become reality), and both are likely to lead moderate and effective administrations. Both camps need to realize that there's a possibility that they might lose, and both camps need to realize that there will be a merging of the campaigns into the general election, and both camps need to know, and act like they know, that one of them will have to stand up and support the other one (and I'm not even talking about the possibility of a VP deal!). Both of them make some noises like they understand this, but they also are maneuvering in ways which make this less likely to work out. Clinton, in particular, has been disturbing me with her much more of a scorched-earth style.

You can comment here, or join the discussion over there. (Ozarque has a large and very smart commentariat: I recommend going over there, frankly. My commenters are brilliant, of course, but few....)

Colors and Textures, discoveries offered without explanation

Quotations from Tosh #1: V. H. Gailbraith

One book I've been using in my senior Historiography course is John Tosh, ed., Historians on History, a reader on major trends and debates. I'm going to continue my quotations series with some material from that. Some of the posts will be from a single chapter; others will collect quotations from multiple chapters. As before, I'll highlight lines I really like.

---

"History is, or ought to be, the least authoritarian of the sciences (if that is the right word). Its essential value lies in the shock and excitement aroused by the impact of the very ways and thought of the past upon the mind, and it is for this reason that actual original documents - themselves a physical survival of that past - exercise such fascination upon those who have caught something of its secret." -- V.H. Galbraith, An Introduction to the Study of History (1964), cited in Tosh, ed. Historians on History, p. 20.

"The lectures and the textbooks are a necessary preliminary, a grammar of the subject; but the purpose of all this grammar is to lead the student himself to the sources, from the study of which whatever power our writing and talking has is derived. Where this object is not achieved, we have failed." -- V.H. Galbraith, An Introduction to the Study of History (1964), cited in Tosh, ed. Historians on History, p. 20.

"To live in any period of the past is to be so overwhelmed with the sense of difference as to confess oneself unable to conceive how the present has become what it is: it is, above all, to regard the study of the original sources not as a preliminary drudgery to the making of 'history' but as its most significant function. Such an attitude, it must be allowed, is not likely to produce a Gibbon even a Macaulay. But if it makes the writing of history far more difficult, it informs the teaching of history with a new life and reality." -- V.H. Galbraith, An Introduction to the Study of History (1964), cited in Tosh, ed. Historians on History, p. 24.

"At present our governors, though well meaning, are still museum-bound and millionaire-minded. At best they are collectors who can be induced to buy, but only to buy exhibition pieces, whose value is a scarcity value. The purchase of old pictures, medieval psalters, original signatures, first editions, and the maintenance of derelict castles and abbeys are a sign of goodwill. But this sub-literate interest in the past, excellent in itself, should be the beginning rather than the end of governmental generosity. ... Not less important than the immediate physical preservation of the original sources of history is the task of putting them into print." -- V.H. Galbraith, An Introduction to the Study of History (1964), cited in Tosh, ed. Historians on History, p. 25.

What you notice.....

Just got back from the American Historical Association meeting and thought I'd share one or two images from the trip. First is a "trying to be subtle" picture of the Gates of Hell... no, actually, it's the mass interview room known as the "Job Register." I think the blur reflects much more accurately how people feel in there than a crisp, sharp shot would have.

I don't think it was deliberate, but can you think of a better name for historians' toiletries?

Speaking of historic, did any of you catch that conjunction of Mars and the Moon on the Full Moon at Christmas? We had a great view, but the pictures weren't what I wanted.

Speaking of natural wonders, I did like the way this travel shot came out.

Starting the New Year with Beauty

Quotations #099, and best wishes

"The utilitarian or servile arts enable one to be a servant - of another person, of the state, of a corporation, or of a business - and to earn a living. The liberal arts, in contrast, teach one how to live; they train the faculties and bring them to perfection; they enable a person to rise above his material environment to live an intellectual, a rational, and therefore a free life in gaining truth." -- Sister Miriam Joseph, C.S.C., Ph.D., The Trivium (1937)

"It should be known that history, in matter of fact, is information about human social organization, which itself is identical with world civilization. It deals with such conditions affecting the nature of civilization as, for instance, savagery and sociability, group feelings, and the different ways by which one group of human beings achieves superiority over another. It deals with royal authority and ... with the different kinds of gainful occupations and ways of making a living, with the sciences and crafts that human beings pursue as part of their activities and efforts, and with all the other institutions that originate in civilization through its very nature." -- Ibn Khaldun of Tunis (d. 1406) The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History, (trans. Franz Rosenthal, Routledge 1958) v. 1, p. 71, cited in Civilization (11e), 217.

"The future's an apathetic void of no interest to anyone. The past is full of life, eager to irritate us, provoke and insult us, tempt us to destroy or repaint it." -- Milan Kundera

"The lust for money may be distasteful, the desire for power ignoble, but neither will drive its devotees to the criminal excess of an idea on the march. Whether the idea is the triumph of the working class or of a master race, ideology leads to the graveyard." -- Corey Robin (London Review of Books)

"After a while, marriage is a sibling relationship - marked by occasional, and rather regrettable, episodes of incest." -- Martin Amis, Yellow Dog

"Manure is worth more than a man with a doctorate." -- Polish nobleman Anzelm Gostomski, Gospodarstwo [1588], cited by J. R. McNeill, "Bridges: World Environmental History: the First 100,000 Years," Historically Speaking (July/August 2007), p. 7.

Note: This concludes my regular miscellaneous quotation collection, which was the very origin of this blog. I'm not going away, nor have I run out of quotables, really. I have a series of quotations from John Tosh's Historians on History which I still have in the queue. Next year.

Best wishes for a happy and healthy 2008!

Thursday Verses: The Nurse's Song

We've been reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator by Roald Dahl. After an evening of reading political blogs and contemplating our present predicament, my spouse suggested this as a suitable poetic offering. I agree. This was published in 1972, so it was written when Bush hadn't even started going AWOL yet. And, despite this warning, here we are.

You can find a plot summary to put it in context here, and I stole the text from here.

The Nurse's Song

This mighty man of whom I sing,
The greatest of them all,
Was once a teeny little thing,
Just eighteen inches tall.

I knew him as a tiny tot,
I nursed him on my knee.
I used to sit him on the pot
And wait for him to wee.

I always washed between his toes,
And cut his little nails.
I brushed his hair and wiped his nose
And weighed him on the scales.

Through happy childhood days he strayed,
As all nice children should.
I smacked him when he disobeyed,
And stopped when he was good.

It soon began to dawn on me
He wasn't very bright,
Because when he was twenty-three
He couldn't read or write.

"What shall we do?" his parents sob.
"The boy has got the vapors!
He couldn't even get a job
Delivering the papers!"

"Ah-ha," I said, "this little clot
Could be a politician."
"Nanny," he cried, "Oh Nanny, what
A super proposition!"

"Okay," I said, "let's learn and note
The art of politics.
Let's teach you how to miss the boat
And how to drop some bricks,
And how to win the people's vote
And lots of other tricks.

Let's learn to make a speech a day
Upon the T.V. screen,
In which you never never say
Exactly what you mean.
And most important, by the way,
In not to let your teeth decay,
And keep your fingers clean."

And now that I am eighty nine,
It's too late to repent.
The fault was mine the little swine
Became the President.

Quiz: Viva La Resistance, Viva La Flavors

	You scored as France, Free French and the Resistance. Your army is the French army. You are prefer to win your enemies by politics than by sheer action, but when the war has started you will fight to the end with those resources you have and belive in freedom and victory in the end.
France, Free French and the Resistance 75% Poland 75% Finland 69% United States 63% Italy 63% British and the Commonwealth 50% Soviet Union 25% Japan 19% Germany 19% In which World War 2 army you should have fought? created with QuizFarm.com [via]

You are Magneto

Magneto 66% Apocalypse 62% Dr. Doom 57% Juggernaut 50% Lex Luthor 47% Riddler 44% Mr. Freeze 44% Venom 41% The Joker 39% Poison Ivy 39% Kingpin 39% Mystique 38% Dark Phoenix 37% Catwoman 28% Green Goblin 22% Two-Face 10%

You fear the persecution of those that are different or underprivileged so much that you are willing to fight and hurt others for your cause.

Click here to take the Supervillain Personality Quiz [via]

You Are a Caramel Crunch Donut

You're a complex creature, and you're guilty of complicating things for fun. You've been known to sit around pondering the meaning of life... Or at times, pondering the meaning of your doughnut. To frost or not to frost? To fill or not to fill? These are your eternal questions.

What Donut Are You? [via]

Your Score: Salt

You scored 25% intoxication, 0% hotness, 50% complexity, and 0% craziness!

You are Salt! You may be bland, but life just wouldn't be the same without you. You're plentiful and you come in a variety of shapes, sizes, and colours. You bring out the flavour in whatever you touch and have been the world's best preservative for millennia. You rock.

Link: The Which Spice Are You Test [via]

There's an interesting continuity between the French Resistance and Magneto results. The donut result can only be described as an abstraction, because I'm a honey-glazed chocolate (or anything fresh) devotee.

Splashes of Color

Happy Thanksgiving!

Historical Mad Lib

This comes from a political exchange between two poets. Can you guess the people about whom this is written?

If you can convince the [________] that your armies are bombing their cities and rendering their women and children homeless beggars -- those of them that are not transformed into "mutilated mud-fish", to borrow one of your own phrases --, if you can convince these victims that they are only being subjected to a benevolent treatment which will in the end "save" their nation, it will no longer be necessary for you to convince us of your country's noble intentions. Your righteous indignation against the "polluted people" who are burning their own cities and art treasures (and presumably bombing their own citizens) to malign your soldiers, reminds me of Napoleon's noble wrath when he marched into a deserted Moscow and watched its palaces in flames. I should have expected from you who are a poet at least that much of imagination to feel, to what inhuman despair a people must be reduced to willingly burn their own handiwork of years', indeed centuries', labour. And even as a good nationalist, do you seriously believe that the mountain of bleeding corpses and the wilderness of bombed and burnt cities that is every day widening between your two countries, is making it easier for your two peoples to stretch your hands in a clasp of ever-lasting good will?

Yes, I think it sounds a lot like Iraq, too. I'll put the answer in comments, or you can read the whole exchange.