[Peace-discuss] on Kucinich and Paul

[John W.]

At 07:00 PM 11/13/2007, you wrote:

>Is there a German Chancellor whom you "like"?  How about a Premier of the 
>Soviet Union? Or a Chairman of the PRC?  Are those questions as reasonable 
>as which president you like?  If not, why not?

I was going to ask if any of the leaders you mention above is placed into 
office through a process of democratic popular election.  But then I 
realized how jejune and "pre-political" such a question would sound to one 
of your erudition.


>There is a sort of pre-political -- and even proto-fascist -- view (which 
>I think Karen doesn't share) that if we could just elect a "good" 
>president (= one we like) then everything would be OK.  (For people my 
>age, the example is often that "good" John Kennedy...)
>
>I think this is dangerous and unhistorical nonsense.  For understandable 
>historical reasons, the United States had to be said to be founded on 
>laudable, even democratic principles: even then it was impossible to get 
>the 1787 constitution ratified without adding more of those principles 
>(the Bill of Rights).  But from its beginnings, as anyone who looks at the 
>matter can see, the US too has been the sort of political society 
>described by the protagonist of Thomas More's Utopia (1516):
>
>"When I consider any social system that prevails in the modern world, I 
>can't, so help me God, see it as anything but a conspiracy of the rich to 
>advance their own interests under the pretext of organizing society."

I suppose it's equally dumb to point out that you and your family, Carl, 
have participated in and benefited greatly from this precise arrangement 
for literally centuries.  I don't see you renouncing all your worldly goods 
and becoming a St. Francis of Assisi or Buddha or any such thing.



>When we recognize that that's who our leaders work for, we have several 
>choices.  First, you can hope for the coming of good leader -- a president 
>you like -- who will do the right things.

Which does happen once in a blue moon, even though you refuse to 
acknowledge it.


>This was a common view three generations ago, when the leaders of Germany, 
>Russia, and the Untied States were each acclaimed as such a leader.  (The 
>German term for the notion was "Fuehrerprinzip," and we make a mistake if 
>we think it only an historical curio.)
>
>Or you can recall what has been frequently pointed out, notably by David 
>Hume at the beginning of his First Principles of Government (1748):
>
>"Nothing appears more surprising to those who consider human affairs with 
>a philosophical eye than the easiness with which the many are governed by 
>the few; and to observe the implicit submission with which men resign 
>their own sentiments and passions to those of their rulers. When we 
>enquire by what means this wonder is brought about, we shall find, that as 
>force is always on the side of the governed, the governors have nothing to 
>support them but opinion.

Huh?  Force is always on the side of the governed?  How is that 
exactly?  (This is where, incidentally, I marvel at the naivete of 
libertarians, who fervently believe that their individual "right to bear 
arms" constitutes some amazing bulwark against government tyranny.)


>'Tis therefore, on opinion only that government is founded; and this maxim 
>extends to the most despotic and most military governments, as well as to 
>the most free and most popular."

Is it permissible, out here in the Real World, to differ with such a 
towering intellect as David Hume?  All over the globe, thousands of 
peasants are giving their lives every day in futile struggles against 
despotic regimes.  Sure, "the people" will triumph eventually, whatever 
exactly that means, if only because an individual despot is not immortal or 
invincible.  But said despot is quickly and easily replaced by 
another.  Despots are just as fungible as the fellahin.

(Carl and David Hume remind me of why I rejected, for once and all, the 
"Ivory Tower" back in 1971.)


>That means that within all the high-sounding principles of (any) 
>government, effort must be exerted to bring that opinion in line with the 
>facts. And that of course means that you have to find out what the facts 
>are. In the absence of an accurate analysis, the best will in the world 
>can only err, or be correct by accident.  --CGE

Well, I still think that, on balance, Abraham Lincoln and FDR, and even 
Eisenhower and JFK and LBJ, did some pretty good things despite their many 
flaws.  They "rose to the occasion" of their times and took certain actions 
that were genuinely beneficial to mankind as a whole, not merely to the 
ruling class.

Incidentally, I almost hesitate to point out for the umpteenth time that 
"the facts" are many and complex, and subject to more than one "correct" 
interpretation.



>John W. wrote:
>
>>So what Carl is trying so very hard to say (or perhaps NOT to say) is 
>>that there is NO President in the entirety of American history that he 
>>likes.  :-)
>>
>>
>>
>>At 03:03 PM 11/13/2007, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>>
>>>Having been reared in Virginia, I've always been partial to Cyrus 
>>>Griffin.  Of course, his office was undermined by the treasonous 
>>>assembly in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787.  They'd all sworn 
>>>allegiance to the Articles of Confederation and were supposed to suggest 
>>>only improvements, but instead made an executive power-grab because they 
>>>were afraid that only a militarily strong executive could put down the 
>>>movements toward social transformation underway at the time (e.g., 
>>>Shays' Rebellion).
>>>
>>>The Philadelphia putschists were consciously trying to roll back the 
>>>clock on democracy, in order to protect wealth: as their chronicler 
>>>(James Madison) said, the coup they engineered that year was designed 
>>>"to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority."  So poor 
>>>Cyrus (named for the Persian king who allowed the Jews to return to 
>>>Jerusalem) had to go.  (He then went off to negotiate personally for 
>>>reconciliation with the Creek nation, as he had done in regard to Great 
>>>Britain fifteen years before.)
>>>
>>>For more recent times, we have the lapidary judgment of Noam Chomsky, 
>>>"If the Nuremberg laws were applied, then every post-war American 
>>>president would have been hanged."
>>>
>>>Before the war H. L. Mencken is supposed to have said, "One party always 
>>>devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is 
>>>unfit to rule - and both commonly succeed, and are right..."
>>>
>>>I'd suggest, if you haven't read it, a recent edition of Howard Zinn's 
>>>People's History of the Untied States, which tells the story with the 
>>>politics left in. We usually get only the jingoist version.  --CGE
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>Karen Medina wrote:
>>>
>>>>Carl,
>>>>
>>>>I pick on you because you are a historian, is there a president that
>>>>you did like? I'd be especially interested in comparing that person's
>>>>campaign rhetoric and their deeds.
>>>>
>>>>-karen medina