PJ Media

PJ Mediahttps://pjmedia.com/rogerkimball/2008/10/28/obama-and-the-eternal-return/feed/PJ Media is a leading news site covering culture, politics, faith, homeland security, and more. Our reporters and columnists provide original, in-depth analysis from a variety of perspectives.en-usSat, 13 Jun 2026 04:01:43 -0400Obama and the Eternal Return<![CDATA[Enthusiasm for Obama among the scribbling classes–journalists, academics, most beneficiaries of tertiary education, and, ex officio, “community organizers” of all descriptions–puts me in mind of Friedrich Nietzsche’s idea of the Eternal Return. Nietzsche wanted to come up with the world’s most difficult idea–difficult in the moral or emotional sense. Nietzsche wanted to affirm the world, but he wanted to be sure he wasn’t sentimentalizing it. Hence the idea of the eternal recurrence: if he could say Yes to a world in which everything returned over and over again–every horror, every boredom, every stupidity–then he would know he had achieved his goal.]]>Tue, 28 Oct 2008 04:26:47 -0400<![CDATA[Roger Kimball]]>https://pjmedia.com/roger-kimball/2008/10/28/obama-and-the-eternal-return-n115319