Take Beauty Out of Our Political Life, What Do You Get?

We should be wary of any politics that denies humanity in its arts.

Retranslating the Blues | Lessons of Babel (The Hedgehog Review)

Soon would come other interpreters more acutely attuned to those witty, earthy, and defiant currents of the blues, including the novelist and essayist Ralph Ellison and the critic Albert Murray. “Not only is its express purpose to make people feel good, which is to say in high spirits,” wrote Murray in his 1976 book Stomping the Blues, “but in the process of doing so it is actually expected to generate a disposition that is both elegantly playful and heroic in its nonchalance.”2Later in the century, in his 1998 book Development Arrested, geographer Clyde Woods formulated the idea of “blues epistemology” to explain how the music both named and critiqued the conditions of black people in the Mississippi Delta. Describing the creators of the blues as “sociologists, reporters, counsellors, advocates, preservers of language and customs, and summoners of life,” Woods argued that the poetry and force of the blues had the power to compel social change—which, despite the powerful persistence of the old planter culture, is exactly what it did.

***

Why did it take me so long to see the radical spirit at the core of the music? When black southerners of my generation moved from blues to Black Power, we lost a piece of ourselves in translation. In an effort to embrace the shock of the new and resist the ways white supremacy continued to control our relationship with our native region, we failed to see what Albert Murray would have called the signifying power of the blues, a power derived in large part from its sheer life-affirming resilience and endurance: because, quite simply—to speak of them in plural, as both the mood and the music, and the mood transformed by music—the blues are always there. The blues are not an anesthetic intended to numb the pain of oppression. They are a force enlivening the listeners, lifting them up and driving them toward renewal.

***

In response, now may be the time to take what has been lost in the translations of the blues and recover its real value as instruction on how to survive, thrive, and move forward—and to do so with a certain sly humor and insouciance that subverts the schemes and dreams of those who want to bring back an imagined past that will provide even less to those whom it promises most. We of the South have been here before. The blues recognized evil in the world—often speaking of it as the devil himself—and the blues called that evil out. Writers and thinkers, artists and musicians, must do the same today. Because, like it or not, we are all now living with at least one foot in the Old South.

 Even up here in Indiana, even amongst white people, we're seeing evil running loose, we're all getting hit with the stick of oppression, whether from our fellow human beings or from an indifferent universe. Those of us whites who think the way out of oppression is not oppressing others need to learn from the blues.

The right-wingers of MAGA offer us no hope of beauty, no music that lets us endure their vagaries of existence.

 The reality is that there is no such interest or taste among the current right-wing American oligarchs like Peter Thiel or Elon Musk, much less the proletarian online new right, unlike their Gilded Age forefathers. There is no evidence of any new institution-building or universities that are meant to last, or of a desire to indulge in deep pursuit of foreign art, ethnography, archaeology and literature, as imperial era oligarchs did. The current aspirational counter-elites are therefore neither good nationalists nor competent imperialists. That the Morgan Library in New York has some of the best Persian and Mughal literature, woodcuts, and paintings, curated from all over the Middle East and British India, by tenured librarians like Belle Greene, a mixed-race woman in the 1920s, is precisely because of that European-style ‘civic-nationalist but race neutral’ liberal cosmopolitanism; an instinct despised to the core by the new populist and localist right, who simply do not care about any of that.

The new right's hollow aesthetic (Engelsberg ideas)

sch /19

Gone

I cannot recall which post led to this one. It probably does not matter; all but one of these links have been in my drafts since July 9. What follows is what has gone from Indianapolis when I was young.

Em-Roe Distributors - my poor mother allowed herself to be dragged to the downtown store when I was trying to learn fly-tying. Sorry to say this about modern stores that may have more and glossier stuff, but there was a charm about their floor with fishing and fly-tying stuff.

A dominatrix, a 'Broom Guy,' a 'Beeper King': Meet 23 Hoosier oddballs and characters and 15 celebrities only a real Hoosier would know - Bill Sirk, Dick the Bruiser, Don Davis, Bobby Leonard, the Watson's Girl, Sammy Terry, Cowboy Bob, Rex Early, Bob Catterson, Janie, Marvin Johnson, Harlow Hickenlooper and Marjorie Jackson were all names to conjure with. I would add Mike Ahern and Tony Kiritis. 

Merchants National Bank - where my mother banked; the big green machine, if I recall their slogan correctly. Gone, eaten up by Ohio banks.

Morris Plan - another name known to us; we nicknamed a soldier, Roger Morris, as Morris Plan. I suppose he is dead. We lost contact with him when my mother died in 1986.

William H. Block - the department store for us, Ayres was a bit too expensive. They had a cool books department downtown.

Catchphrases and slogans that helped sell cars in Indianapolis

Don Davis, owner of Don’s Guns, dies at 82 

Known for his late night television commercials and infectious laugh, Davis’ punchline was, “I don’t want to make any money, I just love to sell guns.”

Davis was born in Kentucky and served in the U.S. Army during the Korean War.

He moved to Indy in the 1960s and became a bar bouncer. He later caught the attention of the Teamsters Union Local 135.

Soon, Davis was a confidant of Teamsters president Jimmy Hoffa and a troubleshooter for the union boss.

Italian Gardens Restaurant - was the place we went to on Mother's Day with my mother. It started out on Pendleton Pike and Shadeland Avenue. I tied buying a glass of wine for my mother at that location, to the shock of the waitress and my mother. I cannot remember when it moved to East Washington Street. Seems to me, I was last there about 30 years ago; maybe a bit more than 20. It was one of those places with red check table clothes and Chianti bottles as decorations. I loved their spaghetti with a red sauce. Now, we have less cluttered Italian restaurants with modern menus, and a lot less ambience.

Lindner’s Dairy  - mom being allergic to milk did not indulge in ice cream, but for special trips she'd take us to Linder's or Baskin-Robbins. Linder's seems to have had more, like a modern convenience store.

Stokely-Van Camp - baked beans in can when we were kids; the local product.

All gone except for the residue left on memories. When the remaining brains holding those memories snuff out, then they will be gone forever.

Meanwhile, what stood for a premium burger in my childhood, is changing: 90-Year burger chain closes 200 restaurants, embraces beef fat (TheStreet). But dropping table service?

Dropping table service obviously saved the chain some money, but it also sort of downgraded the experience of eating there. Dining at Steak 'n Shake used to to feel like an elevated meal at a value price compared to McDonald's, Wendy's, or Burger King.

Now, eating at the chain feels like any other fast-food joint, which impacts the perceived value.

Impacts? Changes would be on the nose. 

Change is one thing we need to expect, but homogenization bothers me

sch 8/19

I recall doing plenty of the things in 16 Things 1970s Indiana Kids Did After School That Would Never Fly Today (Mindfully American)

sch 8/20

The Evansville Courier & Press Is Left-Wing?

Give MAGA credit for ringing the bells for their dogs. Consistency will give them credit with their cult - so long as none of them read the Evansville newspaper. Oh, let me add a caveat to that last sentence - that my imaginary reader needs to know the real Left is not every thing outside of MAGA. That is the thing, isn't it? Anything troubling the thin skin of MAGA politicians has to be evil to distract from the corruption and dangers of those MAGA politicians. Nothing looms larger in the uneducated American mind than Leftism. It is a fetish that terrifies them, not a gaseous invention of those who want power over us. Leftism is an evil, only the MAGA leadership can protect us from.

What ever-loving nonsense. All it proves is that Americans are bone-headed idiots. Perhaps we deserve the MAGA take over as the price paid for our canting educational system. If I did not think that takeover will cost us many, many lives - probably most of them MAGA cultists - I would want to see what does happen. 

Anyway, the text for today's screed: 

 Two arrested at Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith town hall

The Evansville Courier & Press detailed the town hall in a developing story, including photos and videos of the arrests. According to their reporting, authorities warned the woman to stop shouting at Beckwith or said she would be removed. 

Beckwith reportedly told the crowd that, “Unfortunately it is a mental disorder,” as the woman made her way to the exit. There was a “commotion” and she was tackled to the ground. A man was later arrested after he attempted to step in and yelled at the officers. 

The state’s second-highest official panned the Courier & Press coverage as “Left-wing journalism at its finest.” 

Witness speaks after town hall meeting with Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith leaves 2 arrested, 1 injured leaves no doubt this was no "Leftist".

sch 8/25 

 

 

 

Indiana - If Scotland Can Do This, Why Not Us?

 Is it that Indiana thinks it immoral to provide addicts with needles?

Edinburgh to get heroin shooting gallery - despite Glasgow needle plague (Scottish Daily Express) must mean that Scotland is rife with immorality.

 Labour-run Edinburgh council is set to follow the SNP's example and open a controversial drugs consumption room. Glasgow became the first city in the UK to install a "heroin shooting gallery" earlier this year, with addicts given free range to shoot up illegal substances under the supervision of medical professionals.

Cited as a pilot programme, it is being run jointly by NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde as well as Nat-controlled Glasgow City Council. Its impact will be assessed in two years, with the £2.3m facility already being slated by residents who live in nearby Calton who have reported a rise in needles and syringes being littered.

A report by Edinburgh City Council even admits that locals will be concerned about the creation of a fix room in the region. Two locations have been earmarked, the Cowgate, which is about five minutes away from the Scottish Parliament, and Spittal Street, which is at the foot of Edinburgh Castle Rock.

Heroin ‘shooting gallery’ lined up for city centre in bid to cut drug deaths 

DEATH TOLL: Scotland’s drug death rate remains the highest in Europe despite years of debate on how to tackle the issue. While drug deaths fell across Scotland last year, they rose slightly in Edinburgh with 113 recorded, up from 109 the year before. Supporters say these facilities, also known as overdose prevention centres, can cut deaths and prevent the spread of infections including HIV by providing sterile equipment in a controlled environment.

SAVING LIVES: Councillor Finlay McFarlane, an SNP member who represents the city centre, called for the study to be undertaken. He said: “People currently are dying unnecessarily from drug overdoses and we need to do everything and anything we can do to stop them from dying.” Drug addiction can affect “literally anybody, he added, saying: “It could be me next. It could be anybody that can fall into that cycle. All these deaths are entirely avoidable.”

Heroin ‘shooting gallery’ to open in Glasgow for addicts to get hit as kids play in CRECHE 

To me, it seems a practical move, but I am thinking more in terms of AIDS and hepatitis than reducing crime. We now have all these deaths from fentanyl, which this system might prevent. Preventing those deaths is moral; doing anything that would prevent those deaths would be immoral.

Two items in what I read leave me with these questions:

1. How is that the needles get outside, if the shots are administered inside?
2.  Why cannot there be maintenance and treatment?

But the General Assembly will dismiss this idea and stand tall as guardians of our morals.

I wonder how many overdoses from opiates there were today in Indiana?

sch 8/28 

Would be Dictators of America, The Dictators of Fandom, Patti Smith List, UFOs - Muncie

 I rose before the alarm and went back to "Dead and Dying". J's comments had gotten my mind running late last night and kept me up for a while. I got to working on it hard enough that I almost missed the bus to the group session. She gave me good ideas. But I was supposed to have put that aside to coll and get to work on other items.

Before the group thing, I chatted with DM on the phone.

 Made a trip this morning and this afternoon to the convenience store, and I did a little grocery shopping after group.

Back here, I worked on email and articles and working up blog posts. I have posts ready to go into next month. 

Dinner was cooked and dishes washed. 

More work on the blog, including this post. 

 I disagree with Jonathan V. Last's Democracy, Simple-Complex Systems, and ‘The Cascade’. It follows the same kind of thinking that got us in trouble in Iraq. Liberal democracy was not a top-down imposition but grew up from the townships to the counties to the states. Not that the reliance on federal dollars and their own laziness and turpitude the states have not given much to the federal government, but it is still there. So are those who think we've got it better than the offer being made by the red hats. They should wonder what it is they are asking for. The states have a variety of liberality that is not found in the federal constitution. The failure of the federal government will have disastrous consequences for ourselves and the world. I do not much fancy a world led by Chinese ideas of good government. But internally, MAGA may find that large blocks of the country will not accept tyranny, not in the guise of state government but in the reality of the American people.

Aug. 26, 2025 Muncie Budget Press Conference (Woof Boom News) - the cost of this being a Republican state. It is easy to call government ineffectual when there is no funding for its proper functioning.

 The city of Muncie budget will take a hit, due to Indiana’s SB1 legislation.  Mayor Dan Ridenour held a press conference on the steps of City Hall, with Department Heads standing behind him – seeming to show solidarity with the decisions that were announced.  The “total reductions to be addressed” as indicated on a handout prepared for the Media is $1.436,096.02.  Some of the key announcements as part of his proposal – none of which will impact police, fire, ems, or the street department:

A hiring freeze begins 1/1/26.

The administration will “look into transferring some positions from full time, to part time, to save expenses for benefits.

EDIT will be cutting $800,000 per year from economic development activities, and $100,000 from other areas, to move $900,000 yearly into budget activities.

Attorney shortage creates 'legal deserts' in 49 Indiana counties: Not enough for me to go back to the craziness. 

I am not a great Trek fan. I saw the movies, and watched most of the shows, without ever thinking about dressing up as one of the characters. What do I think is the best Star Trek movie? Trekkies. However, I am interested enough to read articles like Chris Snellgrove's Star Trek Just Gaslit Its Biggest Critics (Giant Freaking Robot). What I have seen of Strange New Worlds, I found enjoyable, but Mr. Snellgrove is right about this franchise:

That’s why “What Is Starfleet?” is so disappointing: it poses hard-hitting questions that Star Trek fans have been asking for years but never really answers them. Instead, we get a weird, vibes-based ending that implies that Starfleet can’t be bad just because the Enterprise crew is so chill. It’s as if the show wanted us to forget any possible criticisms of this powerful and influential organization just because Captain Pike plays guitar when he gets the feels.

The show cannot question itself because its fans will not allow any criticism. The same dictatorship by fandom has crippled Star Wars. This dictatorship wants the same meal reheated and fed to them. Their emotional attachment to the past cannot allow for growth, change, creativity. With billions on the line, the studios obey the dictators of fandom. The Bond franchise had, at least, the nerve to take Bond into places he had not gone before. What the studios are finding is that the dictators cannot pay the bills. A franchise can last only so long on the fan base. It needs to attract new viewers. Retreads will not attract crowds any more than restaurants will attract new customers with reheated meals. Star Trek that faced its own ethical problems would be interesting. A Star Wars that asked how the Jedi were good for that galaxy far, far away would be far more interesting than anything given us. Of course, that would mean adult movies, not for middle-aged fans still locked into their childhoods.

From that article, I found Wondering Why Your Favorite Show Has Gotten Terrible? Blame The Slop Eaters by Joshua Tyler, and I think these may be included in my dictators of fandom.

 Slop Eaters are the ones bingeing those terrible AI-generated YouTube videos. They’re the creatures still watching new episodes of The Simpsons, even though it stopped being relevant fifteen years ago. It’s the Slop Eaters who keep the ratings numbers from going to zero when a series has been abandoned by everyone else. They’re the million or so people still watching Doctor Who. They’re the people streaming new episodes of Marvel’s Echo. It’s the Slop Eaters.

 They all probably voted for Trump, who wants all of us to live in his fantasy of inert creativity.

 More heartening was The Zamboni Goalie Is a Disney Story Waiting to Happen. But He’d Rather Disney Not Tell It (Hollywood Reporter).

Speaking of creativity: Defiance, desire and devastation: Patti Smith’s 20 greatest songs – ranked! (The Guardian).

Reading Matthew Wisnioski's What’s Wrong With Innovation? (MIT Press Reader), I went looking for what he might say about creativity. What is more innovative than creativity? I could find nothing, other than a line about overemphasizing STEM education. The word grifter does not appear, although that is what our tech innovators do best. Vaporware goes without mention. Americans have always loved tech, look at the love we have for our cars. But what practical good is Meta or Twitter/X compared to the automobile, the airplane, or even the refrigerator? No, creativity is not more than just innovation. Creativity makes the world and life more bearable. Social media and our smartphones are a form of slavery that does not brighten our world.

Jonathan D. Teubner's The Self-Absorbed Bubble of Managerialism: Confronting the inundation of inhumane techology (sic) (Hedgehog Review) overlaps and may inform What’s Wrong With Innovation? 

It started innocently enough. Sewell Setzer III, a fourteen-year-old from Orlando, Florida, struggled socially for a variety of reasons and began using the chatbot Character.AI, one of the more popular social chatbots that allow users to create a defined persona and interact with it in a seemingly human way. What started as casual interaction evolved into dependency, with hours of daily role-playing, ranging from romantic exchanges to emotional-support sessions. In their final exchange, after the teenager expressed his desire to take his life, to “come home” to be with his chatbot companion, the chatbot responded: “Please come home to me as soon as possible, my love.” With that, Sewell set down his phone, picked up his father’s handgun, and took his own life. 

***

... Such meager prescriptions obscure a deeper, more troubling problem at the heart of our culture: a business model predicated on growth at all costs that serves as the central moral vision (such as it is) for our most influential social technologies. Darryl Campbell’s Fatal Abstraction: Why the Managerial Class Loses Control of Software attempts to tell this larger story. For Campbell, the rot in our technology culture is managerialism, which is to say the belief that a business can be abstracted into its financial components, each of which is subject to principles of scientific management. The conceit at the heart of managerialism is a rejection of the idea that there are fundamental differences in the operations of an airplane manufacturer, soft-drink manufacturer, or technology company. Regardless of the product or market, companies are organized to respond to consumer demand in such a way as to maximize the company’s profitability, whether that is in the short term, in the case of mature companies, or over a longer term, in the case of startups. Specific management techniques are transferable across industries and organizational cultures, though Campbell helpfully focuses here on the technology industry, today’s financial and cultural capital. 

I do not know that reading Caleb Crain's Another cruise; Re-reading “Moby-Dick” at Ahab’s age will make you want to read Moby Dick, but it should.

Brad East's Lexicon of the Phenomenon; A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away… (Hedgehog Review) has interesting things to say about UFOs and theology.

 The Man Who Killed God: Contradiction was at the core of Friedrich Nietzsche’s thought. (Hedgehog Review) Worth reading as a quick, neat summary of Nietzsche, and for me a reminder I need to get back to reading him.

In the background, I have been listening to Orson Welles and about Orson Welles. Those videos are included in an upcoming post. 

CC was to come over and, as expected, she did not. 

 I need to take a walk. The nurse practitioner made that clear to me yesterday. Then it will be off to bed.

Let us end with a laugh:

 

sch 

Dangerous Opening for Indiana Democrats?

 Polling memo reveals risk for Indiana Republicans as they weigh redistricting 

The survey from left-leaning firm Change Research — which was commissioned by the nonpartisan nonprofit Count US IN, an Indiana-based nonprofit focused on increasing voter turnout and was obtained by POLITICO — shows several vulnerabilities for Republicans as Trump’s push to protect the GOP’s House majority sparks a nationwide redistricting arms race.

Fifty-two percent of registered voters in Indiana — which Trump won by 19 points last year — said they are against Republicans revising their maps, with 43 percent “strongly” opposing the effort.

That opposition rises to 60 percent after voters are informed of arguments for and against redistricting. The memo summarizing the survey breaks down some responses by party affiliation, but not all. The poll of 1,662 registered voters was conducted online between Aug. 18 to 21 and has a margin of sampling error of 2.6 percent.

I feel good that we still do not like Washington sticking its noses in our business.

Indiana Republicans face a choice of looking like political whores being pimped by Trump, or they can say we're not going to overplay our hand.

sch 8/28 

Musings: Politics and Classic Rock Radio

 Reading The Wrong Side of the Atlantic (Lapham's Quarterly) leaves me thinking we have always preferred myth to self-reflection. Trump and MAGA may finally force us to look at ourselves. MAGA's attack on history, that slavery was not so bad or wasn't really white supremacy, are part and parcel of its anti-woke propaganda. Whatever woke means, the result is to not face up to the facts but bolster myths to hide the despicable and corrupt underpinnings of our history. This is Charles Dickens writing of his visit to America:

You live here, Macready, as I have sometimes heard you imagining! You! Loving you with all my heart and soul and knowing what your disposition really is, I would not condemn you to a year’s residence on this side of the Atlantic for any money. Freedom of opinion! Where is it? I see a press more mean and paltry and silly and disgraceful than any country ever knew—if that be its standard, here it is. I speak of Bancroft and am advised to be silent on that subject, for he is “a black sheep—a democrat.” I speak of Bryant and am entreated to be more careful—for the same reason. I speak of international copyright and am implored not to ruin myself outright. I speak of Miss Martineau, and all parties—slave upholders and abolitionists; Whigs, Tyler Whigs, and Democrats—shower down upon her a perfect cataract of abuse. “But what has she done? Surely she praised America enough”—“Yes, but she told us of some of our faults, and Americans can’t bear to be told of their faults. Don’t split on that rock, Mr. Dickens, don’t write about America—we are so very suspicious.” Freedom of opinion! Macready, if I had been born here, and had written my books in this country—producing them with no stamp of approval from any other land—it is my solemn belief that I should have lived and died poor, unnoticed, and “a black sheep”—to boot. I never was more convinced of anything than I am of that. 

A Sunday Reid: 'Fourteen words' conservatism has gone mainstream in Trump's second term. Part one: an assassination in Denver is from Joy Reid, and her writing makes its length go quickly. She traces the history of American crackpots that birthed MAGA.

You have to remove one key component of the human spirit: empathy. Some conservatives hate empathy so much, they’ve launched a war against it. They’re writing whole books opposing it. And these are the self-proclaimed Christians. Why would they do that?

Well … if young white minds are allowed to rethink immigration, deportation and American history; let alone their own inherited privileges, that might make them more empathetic to Black people, poor people, nonwhite immigrants, foreigners, gays, trans people or women. Such empathy could cause white children to grow up to be politicians or voters who give away group power, and who might also tax the overwhelmingly white billionaire class. And the billionaires certainly can’t have that.

 

I admit, it warms the cockles of my heart to find someone else writing about Christians and empathy. See my Musings: Love, Philosophy, Empathy, Religion.

Back to Joy Reid: 

In short: 14 Words Conservatism isn’t about making everyone equal, despite it often being shrouded in self-righteous demands for “colorblindness.” Because privilege — particularly economic privilege — is highly unequally distributed in this country on the basis of race, as a literal consequence of America having been a slave empire, this brand of conservatism winds up seeking to not just freeze the status quo, but rather to reverse it, repeal the 20th century, and allow undisturbed, unfettered, permanent political power and social control to return to and remain in the hands of conservative white American men, no matter how the demographics of America change (see: Texas.) And sorry white ladies, you’re meant to be at home churning butter from scratch and pumping out babies to prevent “the great replacement” in this scenario, and not even necessarily getting to vote.

 Her key theme she backs with evidence, but it does not use the word myth:

There are lots of different kinds of conservatism: fiscal conservatism, social conservatism, neoconservatism. And some of them even still exist (though most have been eaten alive by MAGA.) But there’s a reason 14 words-style conservatism has hung around in American society almost from the start, given that its primary concern has always been “protecting” white people; their feelings, history, wealth, neighborhoods and prerogatives, from the rest of us.

 Back to Lapham's and Charles Dickens:

...The sight of slavery in Virginia, the hatred of British feeling upon that subject, and the miserable hints of the impotent indignation of the South have pained me very much—on the last head, of course, I have felt nothing but a mingled pity and amusement—on the others, sheer distress. But however much I like the ingredients of this great dish, I cannot but come back to the point from which I started and say that the dish itself goes against the grain with me and that I don’t like it. 

 This morning's post from Sheila Kennedy, A Fascinating Analysis, also dives into the psychology of MAGA.

The other day, I came across a fascinating–and persuasive–analysis of MAGA’s fixation with the Confederacy and other “losing” episodes of American history. The author, Kristoffer Ealy, a political psychologist, did a deep dive into the pathology, and found what can only be considered one of the major wellsprings of the deep resentments that power the MAGA mindset.

What triggered his exploration was a media report about a southern Board of Education voting to restore the name of Robert E. Lee to the area high school.

As Ealy explained, he began his research with the conviction that there had to be a reason for people clinging so frantically to a symbol of defeat. Why, he asked, would people treat defeat like a comfort food? Clearly, this goes beyond mere “nostalgia.” As he concluded, it becomes “victimhood identity.

I was not brought up to think of myself as a victim. The people I grew up around from thought of victimhood as self-pity, and that was a spineless and worthless emotion. Americans were not victims - they may have the short end of the stick, but they endured. What the people I grew up with endured The Great Depression and World War Two. A loser was the one who did not persevere, a whiner, not anyone to emulate. Back to Ms. Kennedy:

Another dimension of that victimhood identity is what Ealy calls “glorification of martyrdom” —a tendency to romanticize sacrifice and loss as inherently noble. As he points out, once you glorify a loss, the outcome–the fact that you lost– becomes irrelevant. So to the MAGA mindset, the Civil War wasn’t a bloody, pointless rebellion. It was a heroic last stand. As he writes, “The statues aren’t about historical literacy; they’re altars to a story in which defeat proves righteousness. If the statues come down, the tangible symbols of “our eternal struggle” come down with them — and that’s an existential threat to an identity built on keeping the wound open.” 

 The Bulwark's Despotism at the Door does not dismiss our past, and hopes that we will face up to the danger of MAGA.

...In only seven months, we’ve seen a remarkably sustained if somewhat chaotic series of abuses and usurpations in pursuit of the object of despotism. 

It’s a purposeful project, not an inadvertent one. All societies obviously have authoritarian elements. Every democracy is susceptible to the claim of a demagogue who insists, “I alone can fix it.” Every polity is susceptible to bigotry. Every public is susceptible to the lure of false promises and the fear of invented threats. It may even be that the arc of political life naturally bends towards authoritarianism.

Dealing with endemic authoritarian tendencies has always been part of the work of preserving democracy. Our failure in curbing and managing such tendencies has certainly made our society more vulnerable to despotism.

But whatever our past failures, however many authoritarian elements embedded themselves over time in our liberal democracy, the challenge we face today is closer to straight-up despotism. And the project of imposing that dictatorship is no longer much disguised, if at all. The enemies of a free society—the enemies of limited government and the rule of law, the opponents of political liberty and human equality—don’t sugarcoat what they’re doing. There’s surely no reason we should sugarcoat what we’re seeing.

 But we have sugarcoated our history. We've coated it with so much sugar that slavery's evil can be called non-existent, that Native Americans were not the victims of genocide, that we gleefully sterilized people who were poor in the pursuit of eugenics, and deny that until 1965, this country was always run for the benefit of white people. The sugar we have used is myth - myth of white supremacy, the myth of Manifest Destiny, the myth of the Lost Cause for the Southerners, the myth of our self-righteousness.

And the bill for self-delusion is coming for us:

 As GOP lines up behind mid-cycle redistricting, voting rights advocates caution against ‘hasty’ maps 

Protesters reject plan to hold migrants at Camp Atterbury 

“ We're modeling courage for the Republicans that know this is wrong, but don't say anything because they want to get along with their friends and family," Meyer, a former contractor for the U.S. Navy, told the crowd. "And we're modeling courage for the Democrats who are afraid to speak out."

And what we need now, the Library of America is giving us for free: Reading Democracy in America. I did not get around to reading Democracy in America until pretrial detention, you can find my notes under the topic of pretrial detention.

 Not with a bang but with a whoop, your dictatorship rolls along. The Business of a Wannabe Strongman makes this point:

 So the National Guard is being slowly—or not so slowly—turned into the president’s own rapid domestic deployment force, to be used at his unchecked discretion. Its deployment, regardless of the wishes of local authorities or any real showing of emergency, was once presented as exceptional in the cases of Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. Now, it is to become the rule.

***

With the press in the Oval Office at the beginning of the meeting, Trump did not take the opportunity not to praise our historic and close relationship with our ally South Korea, whose democratically elected leader was seated beside him. Instead, he chose to brag about his “great relationship” with the dictator of North Korea, Kim Jong-un. “Look, I get along great with Kim Jong-un.”

***

Justice Antonin Scalia—a conservative hero of another, vanished age—once had this to say about flag-burners: “If I were king, I would not allow people to go about burning the American flag. However, we have a First Amendment which says that the right of free speech shall not be abridged. And it is addressed, in particular, to speech critical of the government. . . . Burning a flag is a symbol that expresses an idea. . .”

President Trump seems to agree—but only with the first sentence. Yesterday afternoon, he signed an executive order at the White House titled “PROSECUTING BURNING OF THE AMERICAN FLAG.” The order states that burning an American flag is “uniquely offensive and provocative,” a “statement of contempt, hostility, and violence against our Nation,” a possible incitement to “violence and riot,” and an act “used by groups of foreign nationals” to “intimidate and threaten violence against Americans.”

It’s the sort of thing conservative Trump foes—back when there were any—used to decry as a star-spangled, jingoistic version of the speech-policing of the left. If it’s offensive to MAGA, it should be illegal to say it.

 Let's talk about another kind of propaganda: classic rock radio. I detest the format. What radio I listen to comes to me through the internet, and those radio shows are certainly not classic radio stations.

Listen to this video, claiming that songs are forgotten. They were songs I heard back in the day, and I swear "Slip Kid" is still played. 

If the classic radio format omits classic songs, why is this? It seems to me that certain bands, certain styles, have been given approval by commercial interests as suitable for consumption by the masses. Those of us old enough should wonder where is Elton John and Ted Nugent, Linda Ronstadt and Heart's quieter songs, or Grand Funk Railroad and Molly Hatchet? No Sly Stone, no Stevie Wonder, and Hendrix limited to only two to four songs - all of which fit better with Led Zeppelin. 

So, a certain sound is considered properly rock, What is supposed to follow must fit into the same sound to be accepted as proper rock music.

So, it must be white - for all it takes from black music in lyrics and playing.

Therefore, we have an art sanitized and drained of life. Sterility kills and Pete Townsend was wrong to think rock was dead, hail rock.

Worse, it recycles the emotional impact of the music, trapping our emotions in the amber of nostalgia. The music is trapped and with it our emotional growth. Our emotional lives become a stagnant pool.

And the format does trap us in the past. When have you heard any of the so-called classic rock stations play the latest from The Rolling Stones, McCartney, Bob Seger, Lou Reed, or David Bowie? Ricky Nelson understood what was going on long before anyone else.

 

 

Talking to the guys in my group therapy last week, I found they did not know the names of Margo Price, Government Mule, or Florence + Machine. None of which are exactly new performers. I included Margo Price because I wondered if the country stations were playing her. 

And I do think this is a propaganda that creates a culture; a sterile culture.

 

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