Footnotes to Plato from the foothills of the Superstition Mountains
We live in times of extreme social and political polarization. (We are so polarized that we are polarized over the nature, extent, and causes of polarization! But I will resist the temptation to meta-level digress.)
Cathy Young, A Shameful, Appalling Spectacle
Philip Wegmann, How Zelensky Miscalculated Trump
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Bill,
I think that you would find this VDH post, “Ten bad takeaways from the Zelenskyy blow-up” on X today of interest: https://x.com/VDHanson/status/1895892571664343159
Vito
Can a sane man not agree with VDH?
Quo vadis, Volodymyr?
The way I see it, Trump wants Peace, and Zelensky just wants to prop up his own squalid little position.
VDH is mostly right. Zelensky miserably failed to understand the difference between Biden and Trump and their respective agendas, attitudes and considerations. In fact — and it is very sad indeed — he appeared to be deeply infected by a virus of Russian cultural origin. The said virus takes over the host’s mind and makes it think that it knows better than anyone else, is stronger than any opposition and is in charge of determining what is a moral high ground in any given situation for any given participant. It even makes the host think that he knows English better than Vance. But I do hope that Z walks back from this dead end… In fact he already issued a lengthy apology on X.
I think Trump, who could easily have ended the show or tamped it down in order to prevent Zelenskyy from pooping his jammies in public like that, just wanted the whole world to see what a cocky little shit the guy is.
What Trump really ought to have done is given Z a copy of Thucydides, and told him to go read the bit about the Melians.
Very glad to see that this grift is over.
What actually are our strategic objectives to even be in Ukraine? Have any of you heard a satisfactory answer outside of ideological preening about “protecting democracy” and the “rules-based international order” as some sort of anachronistic reference to Cold War containment when American power and prestige were greater, when we hadn’t yet failed in every other major conflict since the First Gulf War?
What this dustup reveals, like others are suggesting, is a generational paradigm shift. What is not being discussed is that I’m seeing a lot of Trump voters who are presumably older, perhaps baby boomers, and who nevertheless think the press conference was an embarrassing lapse of American leadership of the Free World. That is a cute euphemism for American imperium. This is critical because it really seems the hawks who care about confronting Putin aggressively both paradoxically assume and yet don’t take seriously the fact there is no such think as Ukrainian sovereignty regardless of the outcome of the war. What’s is up for negotiation is who will be Ukraine’s suzerain and to what extent — we the novel interlopers or the great power of the last 300+ years — not if Ukraine will be a strategically independent nation when the blood-letting stops. That’s the subtext here: Two wolves fighting over what’s left of a sheep because the former has trespassed in the latter’s traditional hunting grounds. Trump and Vance letting the mask slip to the strategic reality of the situation and not observing the niceties of “diplomacy” and “statesmanship” reveal the underlying dynamics and reality of the situation. That’s what’s “offensive,” not substantively in a sense of decorum but as a matter of ideology to all those who like the prosperity and security afforded by empire, but who also don’t want to confess to partaking in one and refuse to speak plainly about what maintenance of it entails, making for a contemptible delusion that explains our disastrous foreign policy of the last three decades.
In contrast, the New Right, who is significantly populated by younger men like a millennial like myself, say this uncomfortable and unflattering truth out loud: We’re not propping up Ukrainian sovereignty for moral reasons; we’re cynically leveraging millions of Ukrainian lives so we can put a gun to any Russian state’s head in furtherance of American Babel, where Slavs from the Dnieper to the Urals can have all the same shallow lives of materialist consumption, meaningless sexual gratification, and spiritual alienation from all communal ties and traditional ways of being to which we “liberated” Westerners are so enthralled.
For the sake of the common good, it would be helpful if the nation could acknowledge American power-projection is diminished, we’re overextended, and the good ‘ole days inaugurated by Ronald Reagan winning the Cold War have been squandered for a more dangerous world — one where we need to be less ideological and more pragmatic about our real interests that don’t involve blowing billions in strategically unwinnable proxy wars. We need to consolidate American empire, not expand it into the Eurasian steppe. We need to be more like Hadrian and not like Trajan. Peace in Ukraine balances our flank, so we can redirect our attention to a theater where we’ve been for 80 years, the far Pacific, where the fate of American imperium truly lies.
That’s not what politeness enjoins but what honesty demands.
Bill,
Also sorry for the long-winded comment. I didn’t mean to go off on a tangent. The TL;DR of it is that, contra to the disingenuous pearl clutching in reaction to the the fracas at the conferences, I appreciate Trump and Vance throwing their weight around and speaking plainly about the situation. I can’t stand the this wishy-washy dissembling and mythmaking and moralizing about what geopolitics, like it or not, at rock-bottom is, and what our position as a straining super power in 2025 implies. There are those on both on the left and right who don’t grasp we’re an empire who is in denial about being an empire — as well as the burdens and responsibilities that come with it. That’s why we’re in another quagmire in Ukraine with no good solutions that correspond with the absolutist and manichean rhetoric that so characterizes our public thinking in foreign policy matters.
I fear for the President’s life.
He faces many threats. Add to them the Ukrainian intelligence services.
There are endless repetitions now of Trump being in the Kremlin’s pocket. He’s scheming with Putin to divide Ukraine and as long as he’s in office Ukraine has no future. Ukrainian intelligence could recruit somebody to do the dirty work. I hope Tulsi Gabbard is on this.
https://x.com/DavidSacks/status/1895971755648233940
“Why Zelensky Cannot Make Peace”
James,
I too fear for Trump’s life. I also fear that his successes will go to his head and feed hubris. His ego is big enough as it is even without irresponsible folk claiming that he is under divine protection and that his survival of two assassination attempts is a miracle.
If he falls, I am confident that Vance can carry the fight forward with the help of the outstanding cabinet.
Bill and James,
Everyday, Trump, Vance, and Elon and are threaten with physical harm on social media by leftist fanatics.
This week three aircraft violated the protected airspace over Palm Beach and were intercepted by F-16 fighter jets, and what makes these encounters particularly troubling is that in two of these cases the initial warnings of the air force pilots were not heeded, and thus flares had to be deployed.
Also very concerning is the absolute silence on the two individuals, including details about the PA shooters training and electronic equipment, who attempted to kill Trump before the election. Is Patel looking into this?
Vito
Hopefully DJT will be spared hubris from the assassination attempts, but instead will be humbled. He has certainly asked the Creator for humility before. Below is a link to a prayer he posted on truth social, last May. Much has happened since then. In his post, he asked for angelic protection. I suppose he may think his prayer was answered, and may he be grateful for it. I copied it down at the time. The link below is from a left-wing site, and the vitriol in the comments is stunning, and shows the evil we all face. Prayer “to” himself; the left understands nothing.
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-prayer-to-himself-enemies-stumble/#comments_section_start
Vito,
I hope we can avoid hot civil war. That avoidance is something to pray for, not the continuance of the Bergoglio papacy (not that you are praying for it.)
Perhaps half the population is in the grip of collective madness. I visited a friend in Scottsdale this morning. He tells me that his wife wants them to move out of the country. She fears what Trump will do. What makes this TDS surreal is that this woman is not unintelligent, and is actually a ‘very nice person.’ But she is off her rocker, quite obviously.
Is there a social psychologist in the house? What the hell is going on?
Ben,
What percentage of your millennial generation inclines toward your version of Realpolitik? You make some important points, but in too rambling a way. I would like to hear what Vito and James think of your New Right perspective. Geopolitics is not my wheel house.
You are perhaps not too far from Kissinger’s approach. See here: https://maverickphilosopher.typepad.com/maverick_philosopher/2023/11/robert-kaplan-on-henry-kissinger.html
Brother Bill
What the hell is going on indeed? But the madness is pervasive, and much beyond Trump; the sweeping global warming panic and the sweeping covid panic show that many people do not anymore have common sense, and memory enough, to believe their own eyes.
Why ? Maybe they never dwell in silence enough to sense the presence of the Creator. We have gone from newspapers, to radio, to TV, to the internet on a desktop computer, to the wi-fi ‘net’ on a ‘smart’ phone (which I do not, and never will have).
The racket drives away basic awareness.
Your yearly month of unplug of years past is more necessary than ever. It ought to be a movement.
— Catacomb Joe
Addendum to what the hell is going on:
It seems to me that it is mostly women who are this crazy. Why is that?
Or is my perception off?
Bill,
In the David Sachs comment, “Why Zelensky Cannot Make Peace,’ which you link above, note his third point:
Sachs says Zelensky “fears the ultra-nationalists … (a relative minority but well-armed and willing to use violence to achieve their ends) refuses to accept any territorial concessions to Russia…”
Sachs is referring to a faction in the western areas of Ukraine, roughly “Galicia” in the Austrian-Hungarian Empire. It is Russophobic and the source of Ukraine’s contemporary neo-Nazi currents. In WWII this area was a recruiting ground for armed formations covering the Wehrmacht’s retreat in the face of the advancing Red Army. They fought Russian soldiers. They also did a lot of the dirty work in the Holocaust and in cleansing the area of ethnic Poles. Zelensky is right to fear them.
As for the President’s safety, there are three sources of danger:
— Islamic extremists (Trump’s support for Israel, the global intifada, etc.)
— Anti-DOGE extremists (home-grown radicals who think Trump and Musk are dictators and threats to “our democracy. Musk’s a rich guy; I hope he’s bought a robust protective detail. Someone can take a shot at him in the manner of Luigi Mangione gunning down that health insurance company executive some months ago.)
— Ukrainian extremists (Trump’s a Russian agent, etc.)
James,
Thanks for the history lesson. I concur that the three threats to POTUS you list are indeed dangerous.
But shouldn’t we add the ChiComs, NOKO, and the Russkis to the list as lesser threats?
You mention Mangione. His sort of crime is intolerable. I would like to see Trump issue an EO mandating the ‘execution’ (carrying-out) of the death penalty as opposed to the mere sentencing of miscreants to death row to be kept alive for decades at taxpayer expense, there to commit further crimes in prison.
Why is Nidal Hasan (Ft Hood massacre, November 2009) still alive? And the Boston Marathon bomber?
Justice demands the death penalty in these three cases, and plenty more.
Bro Joe,
You make a couple of very important points.
>>The racket drives away basic awareness.<< And it changes the way we process reality. Marshall McLuhan was on to this in the mid-60s with his Understanding Media, which I read when it first came out.
>>It seems to me that it is mostly women who are this crazy.<< True, and there is nothing sexist (or racist, ageist, etc.) about speaking the truth.
>>Why is that?<< It is rooted in the biological and spiritual nature of women who are naturally nurturing and communal and inclusive, and who are easily dominated by their emotions to the detriment of thEir capacity to think sharply, carefully, and -- dare I say it -- PENETRATINGLY.
BUT: This is no reason to exclude the distaff contingent from politics. There are so many exceptions who are not mere outliers. Abd so I disagree with you and others to my Right.
It may be self-serving to say it, but my position is eminently sane, fair, balanced, reasonable, etc! Kamala is undoubtedly a dingbat and a chucklehead, but I could give a very long list of women who belong in politics. Trump would agree as witness his wise choice of Tulsi Gabbard and Pam Bondi, and that unbelievably talented 27 yr old Karoline Leavitt. Have you seen this sweetie-pie in action?
Bill,
I think that there is much truth in the New Right perspective that Ben presents in his initial comment, in that he calls attention to the masked motives behind American foreign policy in Eastern Europe in general and in the Russia/Ukraine in particular, which are essentially that of replacing traditional values and modes of life with the secularism/individualism/relativism of contemporary capitalist society. Two points to consider, however: Is this radical undermining of the old order of things intrinsically tied to capitalist development or is it merely accommodated by it? Certainly, commoditization weakens this old order, but must this weakening take the bizarre forms of the last decades? Second, this explanation ignores another driving motive for American foreign policy. Specifically, I am thinking of the centrality of the Russia hoax, endlessly perpetuated by the Left, as a means to demonize and marginalize the populist forces that emerged in the last ten years. Given the disastrous consequences of its domestic policies, the Left, drawing on the ideological residues of the Cold War, endlessly seeks to distract the American populace with a foreign threat, especially post-Soviet Russia; this strategy, when linked with that of sowing internal racial and ethnic division, allows the Left to portray MAGA as disloyal, authoritarian, and racist. Thus, unconditional support for the Ukraine War is one of a set of ideological tools designed to retain its control over the state and civil society.
Vito
Bill,
I just saw Vito Caiati’s and Ben’s comments. I’m in general agreement with them. There are changes going on in what is called the “world order,” which is typically defined as the distribution of power in the system and the legitimacy of its use.
I took an amateur’s cut at it in an essay last fall. If you’re interested, I’ll link it below.
The world order seems to be reverting back to its historical mean. The wars of the twentieth century culled the number of great powers from several at the beginning of the period to two by 1945 (sorry, UK). These were reduced to one by 1991 with the collapse of the Soviet Union. We’ve been in a transitional period of an American “unipolar moment” since then, with the Russo-Ukraine war a turning point marking the end of one kind of world order and the beginning of a different one. The system seems to be reverting to several great powers again.
“Liberal hegemony” is the tag word here. It’s been the dominant ideology in the West for the past several decades and is now in its death throes. With the passage of time, we may see that it reached its high-water mark on the Eurasian steppes before receding.
-Jim
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2024/10/forever_wars_this_way.html
Hi Brother Bill
Well I don’t have a TV, but I just watched the impressive Karoline Leavitt on my desk-top I Mac, in this clip here:
https://www.foxnews.com/video/6369591911112
Things ARE looking up.
Joe,
That is a representative clip, but to really appreciate how effective she is you have to see how she shuts down the leftist journos.
She really shines by comparison with her predecessors, Jen ‘Circleback’ Psakis and the the intersectional jill-ass Karine Jean-Pierre, who lacks qualifications but is dripping with ‘wokifications.’
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