The United Hates of America
Jamie Glazov’s United in Hate is a serious book and deserves serious attention. Mulling it over, I recalled reading a newspaper article about some domestic calamity or other that had befallen the United States and tripping over a providential typo — the United States was misspelled as the “Untied States,” an apt metathesis or anagram. Which fits in pretty well with Glazov’s argument and which suggests another felicitous misprint we might stumble across one of these days: the “United Hates of America.”
For the U.S. is a country that seems to be increasingly at war, not with the hostile nations of the world that wish it harm, but with itself: the electoral gulf between red and blue states; the growing procedural animosity between Democrats and Republicans, mirroring the ideological conflict between liberals and conservatives; the unprecedented legal threat that the current administration is levying against its predecessor’s anti-terrorist interrogation methods, which promises even further discord and self-division; the friction between the mainstream press and the blogosphere, with the former tending on the whole to suppress information and the latter to unearth it; and especially the long and destabilizing campaign of the American Left against the political interests of its own country and its rush to embrace the dictatorial agendas of America’s most resolute enemies. In the current geopolitical context, the most pronounced subset of this zealous campaign is the “unholy alliance” (to use David Horowitz’s phrase) between the radical Left and the Islamic Right, which is a major theme of Glazov’s book.
There are, of course, many other excellent books on the general subject that United in Hate is addressing. I might mention in passing such works as David Pryce-Jones’ The Closed Circle, Paul Hollander’s Political Pilgrims, David Horowitz’s The Politics of Bad Faith, Phyllis Chesler’s The Death of Feminism, Mary Habek’s Knowing the Enemy, Nick Cohen’s What’s Left, Mark Steyn’s America Alone, Robert Spencer’s Stealth Jihad, Kenneth Timmerman’s Shadow Warriors — and even Saul Bellow’s To Jerusalem and Back, where we read the following prescient passage:
But the connection of democratic nations with the civilization that formed them is growing loose and queer. They seem to have forgotten what they are about. They seem to be experimenting or gambling with their liberties, unwittingly preparing themselves for totalitarianism, or perhaps not quite consciously willing it.
This was written in 1975 and could have served as an epigraph to United in Hate.
What Glazov has done in carrying on the work of his intellectual compatriots is to narrow and intensify the beam of their concern, laser-like. He directs his scrutiny to the love affair of the radical Left, and even large segments of the liberal Left, with the very forces that would destroy them, and he does this with a relentless, unswerving focus, buttressed by a veritable profusion of specific, high-profile examples and case studies. And he stays on message with such fierce and unwavering concentration that the reader has no choice but to keep pace. Mental coffee breaks are out of the question.
The result is devastating. The only resistance that those unsympathetic to his thesis can mount is to respond ad hominem and slander the messenger, for his examples cannot be wished away and his analysis seems the only conceivable means of making sense of the leftist orgy of national treason, betrayal of genuine liberal principles, and passionate support of tyrants and demagogues. Patriotism may often be “the last refuge of a scoundrel,” as Dr. Johnson remarked, but whether or not this is so, I would add that treason is the act that always bears his signature.
For Glazov, the political believer, that is, the man or woman of the sanctimonious Left, is estranged from real human relationships. Glazov writes: “the believer attempts to fill the void left by the lack of real human connection with a supposed love for humanity as a whole.” He calls this psychological aberration, this proneness to utopian reveries of perfect consummations at the expense of concrete human experience, “negative identification.” By this he intends that “a person who has failed to identify positively with his own environment subjugates his individuality to a powerful, authoritarian entity, through which he vicariously experiences a feeling of power and purpose.” The political believer feels swept up in the luminous project of building a new and equitable world in which all social distinctions and economic disparities are expunged — regardless of the cost in human corpses littering the road to the golden city.
The consequence of this species of “totalitarian puritanism” — of the need to redesign human nature and recreate society to consort with an ideal archetype that exists nowhere but in the empyrean of human desire or the Platonic realm of supersensual forms — is ruthlessly destructive and accounts for the unseemly devotion of Western fellow travelers with the one-party despotisms of the Soviet Union, Communist China, North Vietnam, Cambodia, Nicaragua, and Cuba.
Must read it. Seems that Glazov is getting at the question that has been nagging me for months. To wit: “What is going on inside the person who is a committed leftist/statist/utopian?” I simply, frankly and honestly just do not understand the thought processes that lead one to the conclusions that the folks mentioned in the review and many others have reached about America, war, the environment, rule of law, etc. How do you get to the point where you believe that stuff? What happened or is happening to these people to keep them at what Solway notes is really an immature stage of their mental and emotional development? The “longing for a return to childhood” is one way of describing it? One way to explain a lot of the vitriol and meanness of much political commentary, the ad hominem attacks, the name-calling and such is just to imagine the speakers being 6 year-olds. Except for the sophistication of the words and the “adult” nature of the subjects, it makes more sense for much of their behavior to be coming from a 6-year old. Not sure that’s THE answer, just helps me make sense of some of it.
I long ago defined the odd behavior of the “progressives” in this context by what I call the “Nomad syndrome” and the “Manson syndrome”.
The Nomad syndrome derives its name from the original series Star Trek episode, “The Changeling”. In it, an Earth space probe, Nomad, was radically changed by contact with an advanced alien probe (a plot later recycled in the first ST film). Nomad’s original mission was to collect and sterilize soil samples; its “revised” parameter was to seek out “perfect” civilizations- and “sterilize” anything which was not perfect. It burnt off two inhabited planets before it was stopped.
The Nomad syndrome in progressive circles is the belief that our society is refusing to become perfect of its own accord. The “proof” of this is that we repeatedly refuse to recognize the “inherent superiority” of the progressives, their philosophies, etc., and to give them the absolute power over the rest of us they believe they are “entitled” to. So, to achieve Utopia, our “imperfect” culture must die, so that they can create a perfect one in its place.(Basically the same as Glazov’s hypothesis, but he overlooks the innate feeling of superiority present in those who practice this delusion.)
As for the Manson syndrome, it goes back to Vincent Bugliosi’s book “Helter Skelter”. According to Bugliosi, Manson’s motivation for the murders his cult carried out was his belief that blacks would be blamed for them. This, he believed, would set off a “race war”, which he was sure African-Americans would win because of their “physical superiority”. But, once they had destroyed everyone else, they would be unable to run things- yes, Manson is a hardcore racist. So, they would need Manson and his followers to “guide” them.
The leftist “intellectuals” of today hold similarly racially-charged opinions of the Islamists. They find their “Eastern”, mystical, anti-science, anti-reason philosophy attractive, because it rejects Western rationalism even more thoroughly than they (the “intellectuals”) do. But they also believe that, after an Islamist “Triumph”, those same mystically-inclined “holy warriors” will literally be too stupid to run the world- but smart enough at the same time to somehow recognize the “innate superiority” of the “enlightened elite’”, who will then (magnanimously) agree to do the actual work of running the new world for them.
They’ll probably still believe it, at the moment that they are bent over the block and the talwar is being raised to remove their heads. After all, they have proven over and over again that their ability to misinterpret facts is exceeded only by their capacity for self-delusion.
clear ether
eon
These leftists instinctively recognize Islam as a monolithic political movement that resonates with their own and not as a religion. Fellow travellers, that is. That is instructive in itself. Marx tells them that the false consciousness of Islam will also fall to the revolution of the proletariat. What else do they need to know?
The leftists and Islamists are united in hatred
of a common perceived enemy. They share the
characteristic of wanting to dictate every
aspect of life according to their whims.
Do not be fooled by the leftists desires for
various “equalities”, their societies end
up being the most unequal. This is just a
tool to justify their opposition to us. They
crave power, the power of life and death to
those they feel have cheated them of their
proper place in society.
The Islamists feel that they have been denied
their position of dominance in the world as
well. This axis of hate desires revenge on
those responsible and this is mostly us.
Hate and desire for revenge outweigh reason
and logic. The guys who end up in power after
a revolution usually get there in a coalition
of grievances that end up in repression and
executions.
Remember how sad Uncle Ho was when he had to
execute former allies of his that he labeled
good nationalists.
Many well meaning people keep scratching their heads trying to figure out the nexus between liberal progressives and Islamic fascists. They cannot fathom how self professed liberal humanists can align themselves with the most regressive and oppressive factions alive today.
What they fail to comprehend is that the liberal left of today is by NO means a humane movement, nor a progressive one. It has alot more in common with Islamic fascism than with democratic principles. The putrid truth of the matter is that the leaders of the far left are totalitarian in their views and brook NO dissent. In their perverse world view there are NO lines that cannot be crossed which will interfere with their power, or the imposition of their new utopian world order.
Once the general public, at least those who are not yet indoctrinated into the cult of Obama, understand what is taking place under their noses in the name of liberal politics, they will rise up in real democratic fashion and take back their country.
Hopefully it will not be too late.
I resent being called, for no reason, “secular” (see my latest book, Mosaic Orpheus). And I particularly resent someone who repeats the canard that I “exulted” in 9/11 — this arose after someone (I can imagine who) taped a phone call of mine in which I said we shouldn’t call the hijackers cowards. Any sane person would agree, I think.
#2, eon
You have summed it up exactly as it is, psychologically. BTW, I am a refugee from the Left, which I took leave of in 1987. I met a fair number of people of the types you describe: smug “intellectuals” who believed in their own superiority to the rest of us. In fact, I did not get along with these people because I kept probing (being the aspiring academic Marxist that I was)the issues which conservative critics of socialism had put before us. My sin was to take such heterodoxy seriously, and to range far afield from the parameters set by the orthodox activists and thinkers. I was never fully accepted by these people. That was one of many clues as to what the “progressives” were about.
We must never let their apparent “justice and peace” agenda fool us into thinking who they are and what it is they really want. They thrill to the sight of (in their imaginations)the muscular, truculent jihadis swinging the scimitar down on the necks of the capitalist pig dogs.
But if we do end up, in this nation, moving towards outright hot civil war these people are going to be shocked at the speed with which their socialist aspirations are broken and their lives forfeit for treason.
Glazov writes: “the believer attempts to fill the void left by the lack of real human connection with a supposed love for humanity as a whole.” He calls this psychological aberration, this proneness to utopian reveries of perfect consummations at the expense of concrete human experience, “negative identification”…”totalitarian puritanism”…
Absolutely.
Thus explaining the complete impossibility of penetrating a True Believer’s skull with reason and facts. Their position isn’t based in reason but in aberrant psychology.
As Glazov apparently notes, America’s Left, its cadre of Useful Idiots, will be the first to go as its unholy alliance with Radical Islam (united in hatred of America) plays itself out.
To put this alliance in a biblical framework: Liberalism is the great Whore of Babylon and Islam is the Beast.
sounds as if glazov knows something….read eric hoffer’s TRUE BELIEVERS….he ties the loose ends together…similar words ring true…annihilation,redemption,utopian,adolescent,intelligentsia(useful idiots),the collective,loss of self….this is a “psychological phoenix”purification by fire,death,destruction…child-like in its over simplification….despising democracy,freedom,liberty…uva65
Well put, Adina. In America, the Left latched onto the single issue of racial justice early, and made its home within that cause. This foundation in anti-lynching activism took at least as much from that movement as it contributed. It also contributed to the unusually deep misogyny infecting American Leftism — lynching era politics being shaped by a reflexive disavowal of women’s anti-violence and even suffrage causes. These lines were drawn early, and deep, and by the time Norman Mailer articulated them in 1959, he was merely saying out loud what was well understood: American Leftists were parasitically obsessed with the minority male underclass, not civil rights as others understood them. Charles Manson was merely a few steps further down that path than many who dominate academia and bend the President’s ear today. Thus, a perfect situation of Islamists, with their ethic of male supremacy and command of violent identity politics. Look at the baroque mish-mash of positions defended in The Nation: small-letter liberal broke off from this stuff a long time ago and is essentially dead now.
Both are revealed religions, both are driven by a feeling of superiority that needs to inflicted on others. These people do not lead by example, they force others to “do as they say”. Others must be driven to join, both gain converts at the tip of a spear rather than persuasive argument.
Even the structure is the same;
Prophet;
Mohammad = Marx
Inspired Creed;
Koran = Das Capital
Worldly Presence;
Dar As Islam = Democratic People’s Republic
Preachers;
Imams = Representatives of the People
Odd that Islam is the only religion that feels the need to seize and hold land, eh?
Explaining the leftest mid set is quite easy. Evolution is the basis of their belief system. It is a total denial of a transcendental being involved in the affairs of man. Therefore man is the sole determinate of his own destiny. Just like their belief that a species is the result of a continuous process, they also believe social institutions are continuously evolving. Therefore anything old is dated, including our form of government. Progress is anything new. People who don’t share their views are standing in the way of progress.
Void of any ultimate good or evil they see everything (like Jim Henson of the Puppets)as separate sides of the same coin. Hence doing evil is the same as doing good if it achieves the end result desired. Their desire is to move us to a socialist utopia. So if people get in the way they will use any means to ridicule and defame them. If there are social costs to be born by the public then it is a small price to pay for progress.
The final factor is the narcissist culture we live in. Being on the left is being one of the beautiful people, the educated, the elite. It is no wonder Hollywood is so far left. Uneducated and grossly overpaid these no talent entertainers seek to be socially significant.
Say what you will about the Communists they used our freedoms to destroy us. They understand the need to capture and control the educational process. For years they have worked the halls of academia and established phony think tanks. Their hard work did not end with the fall of the Berlin wall. Our ivory towers had already been captured. Checkmate.
I agree with everything written here–except the glaring inaccuracy that Israel is “the only true democratic nation in the Middle East.” Majority-Muslim Turkey is truly democratic.
The America haters from within and without are as Ayn Rand said so well “haters of the good” What’s wrong with the good? Well “the good” often have self confidence, they have faith (usually derived from a relationship with the Living God) which allows them to be successful in the endeavors of life without suspecting the person next to them is about to do them wrong. The good don’t go around accusing others of things they haven’t done because they are focused on themselves, their family, their business, their charity or their community. The good love the truth and because the good love the truth, the truth sets them free.
This is what the haters hate the most; FREEDOM! That’s why on the far left and the Islamic radical right they have found common ground; they hate freedom, in particular, yours! How dare you walk around thinking you are free to do what you will! How dare you exercise the freedom God gave you! Therefore the haters seek to put you in chains (or kill you, either one is fine). As can be seen right now, the haters are being exposed for what they truly are, they will tax you, cheat you, steal from you, take away your guns, take away your right to free speech, take away your right to express your religion in public. Take away your right to choose a doctor, take away your right to educate your children as you see fit. They are even working on taking away your right to breath. (Think Co2) Currently they are working on all of these things at US Goverment levels.
The haters are the exact opposite of the good, they are self loathing, ignorant of the truth and therefore arrogant, they are unsaved and unwashed by the truth and therefore they are not free, they are not free from guilt, they see neither black nor white, only gray, there is no truth, no right no wrong, they see only their opinion and their desire enslave their enemy, the free. They like to appear as angels of light always trying to help the poor but in reality they are seeking to destroy the faith, self-esteem and the confidence of the good. All of their “helping” comes at expense of the good not theirs. The haters are vain, jealous, perverted, lyars, cheats and thieves.
What they haters don’t realize and never will is that they have already lost and they are already dammed. Maybe the haters were dammed from the beggining, maybe they dammed themselves by their actions.
The good do not seek to put an end to their ememies (apart from self defense), in fact the good help their enemies, try to save them, convince them of the truth, the good feed and clothe their enemies, the good rebuild nations and then cancel the debt, the good are the greatest charitable givers in the history of the Earth.
The good will inherit the Earth.
“One must break eggs to make an omelette, goes the totalitarian cliché, but what one invariably gets is a heap of broken eggs and a nagging question. Where is the omelette?”
Is “Where is the omelette?” the right question?
I rather think the question which ‘nags’–and reveals the ethically apalling nature of this metaphor– is, “Who, exactly, gets to eat it?”
If ever there were a freudian slip in the totalitarian choice of metaphor, this, surely, is it.
I stopped being a Democrat in the 1990s, but until just this year, I continued to draw a philosphical distinction between the “mainstream left” and the “radical left”.
I switched sides, but I continued to believe that there was lots of room for legitimate differences within our great pluralistic society. Typical Democrats or typical Republican were people of good conscience, who just had differences of perspective.
However, everything changed for me with the January Gaza protests. The Left’s participation in (and the media’s non-reaction) to the blatant return of good old-fashioned Jew hatred struck me deeply. Coupled with it were the themes of contempt for civilized society generally, that was the moment when the depth of the alliance between radical Islam and radical Leftism became forever clear to me.
I still believe that many mainstream leftists are good people, but now I see them as unwitting accomplices to the rise of a new totalitarian movement. Regular old garden variety Democrats need to wake up and realize who they are in bed with.
This has been a very depressing spring for me that way.
And Glasov’s book is excellent.
Class Clown,
Your comments are spot on. I left the Left in ’87 and was a moderate to conservative Democrat during the Nineties. I left the Democratic Party in 2002. It was not the Democratic Party my parents belonged to, my grandparents belonged to, or the one I could live with. It started being taken over by the Marxists gradually and really picked up steam during the Eighties.
Once it became clear to me that the Left had tag teamed up with Islam, I was out of there. I’m not a Jew, but am an Israel supporter. It’s frightening to see how many Diaspora Jews are Marxists/Communists/socialists and are working against Israel.
The “Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel,” comment is usually wrenched out of context. Boswell gave the context:
Patriotism having become one of our topicks, Johnson suddenly uttered, in a strong determined tone, an apophthegm, at which many will start: “Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” But let it be considered, that he did not mean a real and generous love of our country, but that pretended patriotism which so many, in all ages and countries, have made a cloak of self-interest.
And Dr. Johnson had moreover written a book titled “The Patriot”, in which he said:
It ought to be deeply impressed on the minds of all who have voices in this national deliberation, that no man can deserve a seat in parliament, who is not a patriot. No other man will protect our rights: no other man can merit our confidence.
A patriot is he whose publick conduct is regulated by one single motive, the love of his country; who, as an agent in parliament, has, for himself, neither hope nor fear, neither kindness nor resentment, but refers every thing to the common interest.
It seems therefore that the Grand Cham of literature would count the sort so devastatingly exposed by Glazov as “scoundrels” rather than “patriots”. I forebear to think how he would respond to the apophthegm that “dissent is patriotic”.
The paranoia on the right is the same paranoia that the left has about creationist fundamentalists installing a ‘christian mullah regime’in the US.
Both are way over the top and ridiculous enough to sell a lot of books.
Kudos.
Thanks to “moderate” anti-war,pro-social justice liberals who fell under the spell of of lifelong radical socialist whose only competence is for flowery rhetoric, we now have a Federal Government dedicated to the Marxist extremist philoophy aand brilliantly reasoned strategy of Saul Alinsky: The end justifies the means; apologize only when you hit above the belt.
Glazov’s book’s primary value is in clarifying the total, mindless obsession with the respective faiths of his subjects but the truth is that both sides are willing to work in the common cause of bringing down America, believing that, after that goal is accomplished, they will deal with the elimination of tthe other.
Victory by any means, including working with a power you know is dedicated to exterminating you. Hitler and Stalin.
#21 Steeevyo;
I don’t think you can really call it “paranoia” to simply state, based on their own statements and behaviors, that modern-day “progressive intellectuals” are not nearly as smart as they think they are, and repeatedly prove it by constantly insisting that people who hate us are good in spite of all evidence to the contrary. That is simply realism.
Something the “progressives” repeatedly refuse to acknowledge the existence of.
clear ether
eon
“Nomad syndrome.” Excellent!
There are three types of the Left: the mainstream left, the progressive left and the radical left.
Mainstream left is common, everyday people who subscribes to the Democratic/liberal ideas and policies and support them via only voting or opining strongly on the issues. They do not really participate in the overall political scene, where they could have significant influences on the political-ideological line of their fellow leftists more involved in the issues or associated with top-level people. They tend to take a step back from the campaigns and activism, citing family matters, jobs, or being clueless about the process. With the right channels and the right people at the top, they are more active in all levels and doing whatever it takes to promote their ideas through indoctrination and education, in public schools, in businesses, etc.
Progressive left is a mainstreamed but very active group of people promoting ideas and policies to totally reshape the society based on models founded from socialism (scientific-technocratic socialism) or Marxism/communism. It seeks the elimination of all traditional values and old ways of life, believing them to be the hindrances to a more progressive, perfect society. They are more active in the political campaigns and know top-level people through various connections or channels.
Radical left is the far left-oriented group of people totally dedicated to any revolution idea or action through activism in all levels of the society, covert or overt. You could meet a well-known, moneyed art collector from San Jose and not know that he is really a radical leftist. ANSWER, ISM and other radical orgs are filled with these people. The militant left exist within the radical left. They are truly anti-democratic using democratic means to get what they wanted. They do not truly believe the powers are with the people, only believe the powers belong to a small group of “elite, wise intellectuals” and everyone else must heed and obey this small group.
In a nutshell: mainstream left – unwitting accomplices; progressive left – willing accomplices; radical left – dangerous accomplices.
Oops, this line: With the right channels and the right people at the top, they are more active in all levels and doing whatever it takes to promote their ideas through indoctrination and education, in public schools, in businesses, etc.
…belong to the progressive left, not mainstream left. Sorry.
Carlos the Jackal, that old Commie terrorist, converted to Islam in prison during the mid 1990s. He gave as his reason that only Islam remained capable of fighting and destroying the United States and Capitalism. That’s Glazov’s idea in a nutshell, the reason for the alliance of left and Islamist.
There will be many scoffers, but now, this needs to reside in the collective consciousness of humanity.
All (without exception) outward manifestations of human thought, activity, etc., actually derive from their spiritual correspondences.
Consider this: All the evil that humans manifest (especially nowadays) might be due to the spiritual possession of the human heart-will- mind.
The ancients held some grains of truth when they suspected a spiritual possession when someone acted in an abnormal way. Let no one deride their beliefs, because there has always been a good degree of truth in this.
When the age of Enlightenment, Industrial Revolution, etc., came about, most people scoffed at these apparently unsophisticated notions. Of course, it was said, now we know through science that their ailment is only a chemical imbalance, or psychological disorder, and so on.
But they stopped exploring any further, mostly due to scientific arrogance. What if the manifested physical problems had spiritual origins, well beyond what they were/are capable of detecting?
Today, what is being seen and wondered at by most rational and decent people is nothing less than an unprecedented and quickened possession by negative entities that exist in other planes of reality or pseudo-reality. These entities are naturally attracted and drawn to individuals who resonate with specific aspects of their negative nature; and now are making their presence increasingly felt through them.
Where does this information come from? Divulging it would only create unnecessary anxiety in humanity and the detailed knowledge itself would not necessarily help anyone.
It will be proper and useful for good and just individuals to honestly meditate on this.
All the best.
#5 said:
What they fail to comprehend is that the liberal left of today is by NO means a humane movement, nor a progressive one. It has alot more in common with Islamic fascism than with democratic principles. The putrid truth of the matter is that the leaders of the far left are totalitarian in their views and brook NO dissent. In their perverse world view there are NO lines that cannot be crossed which will interfere with their power, or the imposition of their new utopian world order.
Well put, well said Adina!! There is no arguing with liberals or those of the far left. They can only see their own greatness and almost all of them suffer from the “legend in their own mind syndrome.” You cannot rationalize or debate them. They fall apart at any criticism or correction and everyone else, and their opinions are just plain wrong. We are witnessing this right here in the USA as the mullah obamaham and his liberal cronies cuddle up to the muslim/islamofacist world at Israel’s expense and the degradation of our nation’s security. Liberalism equals tyranny and is totalitarian in nature. There is NOTHING progressive about todays liberals as they find common ground with the iedologoical nightmare that is islam. Lierbals and progressive sway and dance to what ever the popular movement or cause is, throwing cautions to the winds to enforce “progressive and socialist change” even if the populace is against such perverted movement to the far left.Islam and the left have found common ground: they both hate America, the constitution and our freedoms that so have have given the ultimate sacrifice for.
There is no peace within islam, and with islam there can be no peace!
#13 — Evolution is the basis of their belief system. It is a total denial of a transcendental being involved in the affairs of man. Therefore man is the sole determinate of his own destiny.
Evolution isn’t a leftist belief system. It’s reality. You don’t “believe” in reality. You choose to classify denial of reality as belief and then turn around and attempt to classify acceptance of reality as belief. These aren’t similar things.
A glass sits on the table. The guy denying reality believes that the glass isn’t there. The guy accepting reality doesn’t need to “believe” that the glass exists. It simply does. The guy accepting reality isn’t going out of his way to deny it or believe anything.
Similarly you are claiming a “belief” on the part of those who accept the reality of evolution that isn’t there.
And yes reality being what it is implies that there’s no god mucking about in the affairs of man. Shocking.
Void of any ultimate good or evil they see everything (like Jim Henson of the Puppets)as separate sides of the same coin. Hence doing evil is the same as doing good if it achieves the end result desired.
Incorrect. The concept of good cannot exist without the concept of evil. They *are* two sides of the same coin. Merely knowing this doesn’t excuse doing evil.
#28 — But they stopped exploring any further, mostly due to scientific arrogance. What if the manifested physical problems had spiritual origins, well beyond what they were/are capable of detecting?
Those who don’t get science will typically cast scientific inquiry as arrogant. They also usually have some sort of other ‘out there’ belief. Those who aren’t religious or who cast it aside might opt for little green men and argue that arrogant scientists can’t detect them because they’re too stupid to look for them, too ignorant of physics to build quantum flux capacitor inter-dimensional jammers to render the LGM’s visible, and so on. The religious will hold forth about demons, possessions, miracles, and stigmata; they will often go on to claim equipment can’t be built.
In all cases we call these folks “crackpots.” Not being able to explain everything isn’t the obverse of ‘therefore everything exists.’
Re: #28:
Science has been, and is arrogant; same as religion and all dogmas. Religion has nothing to do with God. It is men who link religion to God.
Also, scientists are not stupid, not at all. Many are simply not wise. In most cases, they are educated beyond their ability to think wisely. Most of them (and/or the layman) haven’t really looked any further than the externals to answer the existential questions. It has been rather, a lack of real scientific curiosity; so that, if it doesn’t fit the predetermined parameters, it is not worth investigating. When much has been invested in a particular way of thinking, it is extremely difficult to stray from it. It is simple human nature. And this applies to politics to a very significant degree.
As not being able to explain everything… Actually, many things do exist that will never be provable by any scientific means, because they transcend the physical, therefore, the scientific.
Be well.
#32 — In most cases, they are educated beyond their ability to think wisely.
Ummm…. OK, that about wraps that up. Meds?
Excellent book, and Glazov is a fine, very knowledgeable and witty man, a scholar in Russian/Soviet affair – I attended the book launch in Los Angeles last Thursday and I was impressed. Everyone should get “United In Hate.”
Re: #34
Yes, no doubt Glazov is an International Treasure, along with Mark Steyn, Sowell, etc.
James Glazov’s book is excellent. However, it might be supplemented by a history of the “Left.” which derives its name from the French Revolution – the National Assembly was seated in a semicircle, with Jacobins led by Maximillian Robespierre on the far left and the monarchists and clericals on the far right. Revolution became fashionable in the 19th century, with revolutionaries thinking of themselves in the tradition of the Jacobins and so “Left.” Vladimir Lenin regarded himself as such, establishing the Soviet Union in a permanent “Reign of Terror” in order to prevent “Thermidor” (the month in which Robespierre and his colleages were overthrown and executed).
Robespierre gave a speech at the National Assembly in February of 1794, justifying the use of terror to establish virtue, hence the origin of the term “terrorism.” Sergei Nechayev in 19th century Russia invented ways of bringing the revolution (like Saul Alinsky) – see his Catechism of the Revolutionary.
The enthusiasts for mass slaughter and the like called “the Left” which James Glazov describes,are followers of Robespierre.