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496 [lbo-talk] Polanski -- rank: 1000

"The French seem to have some notion of droit de seigneur at work, even if such a thing is fictitious." Really? That would be interesting to know. My french isn't up to reading the newspapers. I would have guessed that the French view would be nationalistic anti-Americanism, of the 'you can't trust the US courts' variety. But I can imagine that, with that national difference factored in they might see it as a case of common American trollop pulling down a high cultural figure. Still, s ...

Document Size:	5056
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Wed Sep 30 10:48:20 PDT 2009

497 [lbo-talk] the European Left, they dead -- rank: 1000

Wojtek writes 'The Euro left has been long dead - as political identity that is. Most of what used to be the Left's agenda has long been accepted by mainstream and right leaning parties (or I should say pro-business parties, as the Left-Right distinction has lost most of its meaning.)' Which is definitely the case. I remember a good, if cynical article (Martin Seymour Lipset?) about the disappearing problem of 'American Exceptionalism'. Responding to political scientists who asked the question ...

Document Size:	5667
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Wed Sep 30 10:29:45 PDT 2009

498 [lbo-talk] Polanski -- rank: 1000

There was a good documentary on the problems with the Polanski sentencing - I couldn't remember it all so I'm borrowing this account from http://www.leanleft.com/archives/2009/09/29/8613/: "He did not flee to avoid prosecution for the crime; he did not even flee to avoid sentencing, at first: after being allowed to travel abroad to complete a film project in the interval between trial and sentencing, he returned to the US on his own recognizance to accept a sentence in the case in which his ...

Document Size:	7109
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Wed Sep 30 09:05:06 PDT 2009

499 [lbo-talk] tonsillectomy -- rank: 1000

Bhaskar wrote: Yesterday morning I got a tonsillectomy and a spetoplasty at the same time. Ouch. I had a tonsillectomy last year - care of the National Health Service. They told me it was the most painful operation you can have - and it was. But hang in there, it does get better. Having suffered from tonsillitis on and off for twenty five years, it was the best thing I ever did.

Document Size:	4896
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Sep 29 23:35:47 PDT 2009

500 [lbo-talk] The State (Was: Ralph loves the nice plutocrats) -- rank: 1000

On Sep 25, 2009, at 10:29 AM, Chris Doss wrote: > Engels was just wrong. Yes, and we will all be reading Chris Doss when Engels is long forgotten... or But Chris, he always spoke so highly of you...

Document Size:	4932
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Sep 25 11:00:25 PDT 2009

501 [lbo-talk] Signs of the times -- rank: 1000

Chris writes 'The myths of catholicism are few in number' Yes, but all those saints - that's a bit hokey, mormonish, even - not to mention those chintzy drapes, incense and scoffing (and crapping out?) bit of Jesus every Sunday. Papal infallibility? face it, it is a recipe for mockery. I am afraid the protestants' attacks on the fetishism of the catholic church are true, however much those delusions enriched art and culture.

Document Size:	4940
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Sun Sep 20 01:57:18 PDT 2009

502 [lbo-talk] Obama achievement -- rank: 1000

Dennis Claxton asks what are Obama's achievements. I think that whatever the motives for cancelling the East European Missile Shield, that is an unalloyed good, and a considerable one.

Document Size:	4607
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Fri Sep 18 12:16:09 PDT 2009

503 [lbo-talk] LRB on Megrahi -- rank: 1000

Yes, it is an excellent article. I was surprised that everyone on the left seemed to have forgotten that Megrahi had been framed. It was Lester Coleman who said it first, I think, and I reviewed his book back in 1993 http://web.archive.org/web/20000901225206/www.informinc.co.uk/LM/LM61/LM61_Libya.html There was a good documentary on it, too. Pierce is excellent.

Document Size:	4964
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Thu Sep 17 23:32:48 PDT 2009

504 [lbo-talk] Signs of the times -- rank: 1000

"King had a Ph.D. Does that count? " I thought he plagirised it (from Reinhold Niebuhr) ... or is that just some garbage I picked up off the internet

Document Size:	4652
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Wed Sep 16 15:07:02 PDT 2009

505 [lbo-talk] Signs of the Times -- rank: 1000

Chris on the superiority of Catholicism to Mormonism > There may be a Mormon equivalent to Thomas Aquinas or Duns Scotus > out there, but if so I haven't heard of him. To which, Doug replies 'They've been dead for 700 years! Today, we've got the cretinous Ratso. ' But you could add James Connolly, Muriel Spark, Chico Mendes, Graham Greene, who are more contemporaneous. Still, I think Protestantism is a definite social advance on Catholicism, but Mormonism is definitely a slide back into wo ...

Document Size:	5120
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Wed Sep 16 12:08:05 PDT 2009

506 [lbo-talk] Conservatism -- rank: 1000

Alan Rudy writes 'I guess the synthesis is the success of utilitarian and libertarian political economies generate processes of differentiation and homogenization that produce romanticism and fantasicism on the cultural right.' If you mean that the market creates problems to which romantic conservatism offers an imaginary solution, then I agree with that. You only have to think of the difficulties Conservatives over here in the UK had with family policy. They would lecture people that there was ...

Document Size:	5168
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Wed Sep 16 10:45:06 PDT 2009

507 [lbo-talk] European Union (was Conservatism) -- rank: 1000

"You are missing an important point - the sickening nationalism of European nation states. EU offers a healthy internationalist antidote to this national;ism and that is why it is so hated by the right and insular Brits." It is true that the European Commission, and to some extent the European Council are at odds with popular nationalism. But what they dislike about nationalism is the popular aspect. They are not 'internationalist' at all, but European chauvinists. That is why they sl ...

Document Size:	6324
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Wed Sep 16 10:39:44 PDT 2009

508 [lbo-talk] European Union (was Conservatism) -- rank: 1000

Somebody Somebody writes: 'Personally, I think it's weird that the far left is opposed to the EU.' Having just completed four years doctorate on the European Union, I came to the conclusion that it was a pretty reactionary development, and that the left were right to oppose it (though some of their reasons are the wrong ones). "Even Trotsky supported the end of custom barriers and a federation of European states as a transitional demand." Yes, and that would have been a good basis on w ...

Document Size:	7830
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Sep 15 11:16:54 PDT 2009

509 [lbo-talk] Conservatism -- rank: 1000

Jim, citing Ruth Bevan's (thanks for the reference) argument - "a closer resemblance between Marx's thought and Burke's, despite the fact Marx was quite scornful of Burke". I wonder if Marx's coinage 'Dictatorship of the Proletariat' was a joke on Burke's nightmare vision of democracy as 'The despotism of the multitude' Great shame about Jerry Cohen, by the way.

Document Size:	4752
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Sep 15 06:43:50 PDT 2009

510 [lbo-talk] War (was Conservatism) -- rank: 1000

Heraclitus tells us that war-worship is close to the origins of dialectic (these arguments seem disturbingly convincing to me): "When Homer said that he wished war might disappear from the lives of gods and men, he forgot that without opposition all things would cease to exist. "It must be clearly seen that war is the natural state of man - except for what things would we not have heard the word justice? - Justice is contention. Through contention all things come to be. "War is th ...

Document Size:	5345
Author:	James Heartfield
Date:	Tue Sep 15 04:09:57 PDT 2009