The Lotus Eater

It’s just a little unnerving to think that, in the coming civil war, Wisconsin is going to be a border state.

I count myself a member of The Circle of Skepticism, even though I don’t think it’s perfectly round.

Jean Genet, the famous Immoraliste, once said that Nazi Germany didn’t interest him, because sadism was no longer subversive there, but had been institutionalized…

When the enfeebled opposition party refuses to raise the ghost of a whisper about this infamnia, it is safe to say that our country has become uninteresting.

There is only one way to skin a hairless cat.

Oh no! The jig is up! The secret’s out! Now you all know where I get my marching orders. Oh, and sometimes from this guy too.

Now that I have duly undermined any claim I might lay as to not being a cheese-eating, wine-bibbling, infrequent bather and cowardly Francophile (you’re welcome, Messrs. Miller and Molesky), let’s all go out to the kitchen and have ourselves a snack. Plat du jour: French Student Riots.

From what I gather, the students are angry about a new employment law and organizing through the age-old Parisian method of recitative: “At Notre Dame the sections are prepared!/At rue de Bac they’re straining at the leash/students, workers, everyone/there’s a river on the run/like the flowing of the tide/Paris coming to our side!” Then someone generally breaks out into an angry, but hopeful, song to show those gendarmes what-for.

No, no, sorry, sorry (but, really, did you think I was going to resist that kind of temptation?).

In anycase, the measure seems so poorly designed with respect to civil liberties that even David Brooks might side with the French populace on this one. Whatever its economic potential, the new First Employment Contract is wide open for abuse. Unspecified dismissals could be made on political, sexual, or whimsical grounds without any accountability.

What I really love about this situation is how the French just take to the streets and start building barricades whenever they disagree vehemently with their government (”What do you theenk, Jacques? Anozzer one, for ol’ times’ sake?) . The NY Times article I linked to above suggests that this kind of demonstrating is rooted in despair and indicates a defective democracy:

“France likes to think of itself as revolutionary. But it is run like a big corporation with a powerful president at the head. Any change in the distribution of power can set off a crisis. Parliament is seen as too weak to serve as a check to that power. Protests are one of the only ways to get the government’s attention.”

Well, hell’s bells, that sounds pretty revolutionary to me. We know all about a strong executive and weak legislature, but you don’t see too many people getting up off their asses to protest against wire-tapping.

I am also interested in the contrast between these largely middle-class, student riots and the immigrant riots last fall. A somewhat appropriate stateside analogy can be drawn in looking at the difference between our anti-globalization protests and our race riots (hmm, interesting word choice). In both countries, minorty-sparked disorders reflect a desire for equal treatement and a sense of belonging to the society at large (my theory about race riots, looting, democracy, America, and consumer v. citizen must wait for another day, I’m afraid). The student led movements seem motivated not only by the private, post-adolescent fears of evaporating farmland in the middle-class, but also by that old stand-by vision of an all-inlcusive, economically progressive society.

Maybe Column A should get together with Column B, you know, for drinks or something.

I know, I know, I am a day late on this one. This is from an unsolicited response (lucky recipient!) to a trivia tidbit sent to me about the day of the month called the Ides in Ancient Rome. Who’s up for a little light history lesson with just a dash of my world-famous denuciatory hot sauce? No shoving in line now…

Actually, Roman calendrical (is that a word?) history is all rather interesting. Their workweek was 8 days; getting one’s mind around how such a difference changes experience is the kind of thinking for which the antiquarian lives.

Until the Julian Calendar came around, the year was not 365 days, and once in awhile they would just intercalate a week or a month. However, since the Pontifex Maximus was responsible for deciding when to do it (as in many societies, Rome felt the calendar to be of a religious nature), the intercalation depended on his diligence. Many Pontifices (notably Gauis Domitius Ahenobarbus c. 90s and 80s BCE) were not interested in maintaining rigorous observation of these extra days. After all, the Roman priests and augurs were noblemen and their positions merely status symbols in what was an essentially political, state-controlled religion.

The fact that this resulted in a calendar way out of step with the seasons was a side note for powerful noblemen preoccupied with exploiting the resources of foreign provinces and large slave estates. It may have been a more significant problem for small-holding farmers trying to manage their land into prosperity, though I imagine they simply adapted, as the weak always do, to a world run by men with weapons and gold.

When G. Julius Caesar became Pontifex Maximus (a rather stunning electoral victory in a race that could have broken his career, had he lost–yes, the high priest was an elected official) things changed. Today, those who are familiar with this historical giant usually remember him as one of the West’s foremost conquerors or that baldie who said, “Et tu, Brute”. Well, the latter is in doubt (Shakespeare’s lines do have some basis, though most extant sources have him saying, “And you, my son” in Greek) and the former is certainly true.

However, Caesar’s immense intellectual energy and prowess have been relegated to the background. He was a brilliant writer and lawyer, considered only second to Cicero by both historians and contemporaries. In fact, Cicero refused, on several occasions, to oppose him in court (Cicero’s oratical and intellectual reputation was all that he had as a provincial “New Man”–to be beat by Caesar, descended from one of Rome’s oldest families, would have not only been an immense personal defeat, but would have confirmed the social prejudices of the Roman aristocracy).

Anycase, Julius’ intellect was particularly remarkable for its elegance and the compassion with which it regarded the common populace. When he was the Pontifex Maximus, he reworked the calendar, and it has come down to us with only minor changes. In this, as in other undertakings, I see him essentially as a reorganizer (or reformer, if you like). He rearranged things in such a way as to make them more efficient and useful for his own purposes and those of the world at large. In unfinished public works projects (those Ides…) and early measures to create an integrated, cohesive Roman Empire (I don’t quite mean mulitculturalism here, but it was a start) , we see a man who, while no doubt interested in his own glory, built the foundations of his legacy on the principles of universal utility. He saw the potential for a world more congenial to the human enterprise, and felt that he was just the man to do the job.

Of course, this legacy was built on mountains of blood. That’s always the case. Whether it’s Alexander or Caesar or Charlemagne or the French Revolution or the American Empire, there’s bound to be suffering and a high body count. What separates the men from the boys and the visionaries from the tyrants–all visionaries are tyrants, in my opinion, though I do not think that this formula works both ways–is a crucially important commitment to goals beyond self, beyond profit or power. It is a way of reshaping daily experience that concieves of society as tool of humankind, which always can be honed to a finer point. The small interests of small men seek only to carve out sharp, particular notches in the tip of the arrowhead, useful to none but themselves. In their pursuit of exclusively private aims, they ruin the integrity of the tool for their own short-term advantage.

Reagan lowered taxes whereas I was born in the month of July.

Because I couldn’t think of a pun-filled header involving the words fallout, India, Bush, and deal.

So, India gets to become officially nuclear. I ain’t worried about it. It’s not like the World’s Largest Democracy (™ courtesy of Tommy Friedman) is affected by any political instability or is up to its gills in regional tension. It’s not like this deal will further weaken the already fragile international framework that controls atomic proliferation. It’s not like the US has ever used the existence of unregulated nuclear programs as a casus bellorum and has an executive branch that publicly prides itself on consistency in all matters. It’s not like I could I continue with this laundry list of fears and worries indefinitely were I willing to sacrifice style for substance.

Basta!

However, to be candid for a rare and lucid moment, it’s not the prospect of India in the nuclear club that puts my panties in such a pretzel. That kind of unexploited energy market is practically crying out for Western uranium. I am an all-a-flutter tangle of anxiety because Bush and company appear to be intensely intent on dismantling the American Principate that previous administrations successfully built and maintained over the course of the last 60 years.

Like it or not, my pretty little lefties, nature abhors a vacuum. In the post-Potsdam, pre-Guantanamo era, the world was willing to tolerate a more-often-than-not-benign, American hegemon, and, indeed, benefitted by its consent to the arrangement. Michael Mandelbaum’s new book, The Case for Goliath, provides a strong, if unidealistic, foundation for this claim. It’s nowhere near a utopian vision, but, as with the Beatles and FDR, all the singles are good and some of the B-sides are promising. Whether motivated by arrogance or impatience, the Bush administration has done its best to transform the dynamic of this arrangement, almost to the point of eradicating its future viability.

I am of the opinion that it all has to do with the emperor’s clothes. The UN, NATO, Kyoto, and the ICC–they are like the velvet (or, at least, velour) robes of empire. They satisfy the largely pride-based prerequisites of international diplomacy. Unilateral nuclear treaties reflect a Caligulan pre-occupation with the topside of sado-masochism. A superficial analogy, perhaps, but, then again, it’s a difficult task, underestimating the superficiality of our species.

Old Bush scandals never die–they don’t even fade away, so much as get replaced.

For EH and the twenty-five hypothetical fans we discussed

So I have decided try my hand in the world of Esoteric Clip Art Cartooning. I am calling my series “The Adventures of Pomo and Poco” (for those of you unitiated into the exciting world of 21st century textual critique–pomo is slang for postmodern and poco for postcolonial).

Part #1: “Louie, this could be the beginning of…”

Please tune in next week for my sister series, “The Adventures of Kamenev and Zinoviev“. Part #1: “The Accidental Bolshevist“.