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They would have you believe this is why the EU’s in shambles....

Sun, 05 Jun 2011 15:07:20 +0200

They would have you believe this is why the EU’s in shambles. You’re better off reading this article.

"Faux television newscasts produced by the son of a woman who was in a coma when the Berlin Wall fell..."

Wed, 23 Feb 2011 00:31:32 +0100

“

Faux television newscasts produced by the son of a woman who was in a coma when the Berlin Wall fell and whose weak heart, it is feared, could not bear the shock of the change, suggest that - however disappointing socialism’s achievements so far - its ‘might have been’ cannot be dismissed easily; for example, one of the newscasts recodes the spectacle of Easterners clambering over the ruins of the wall toward the land of consumerism and individualism into a counterfactual fantasy of Westerners fleeing from the insecurities and injustices of capitalism toward the collectivist promise of a GDR that never quite was, but might have been. The film thus reminds us that the history of revolution has hitherto limited transformative energies, not liberated them - the apotheosis of this containment-effect being its current troping in advertising.

In this trend, the various so-called ‘velvet revolutions’ in the former Soviet bloc are exemplary: peoples striving for utopia merely got capitalism.

”

- Crystal Bartolovich writes about Goodbye, Lenin in a much nicer way than Žižek does, while, more or less, making the same point. This is, by the way, what bummers look like. From “History after the End of History: Critical Counterfactualism and Revolution,” 2006.

"I think we have gone through a period when too many children and people have been given to..."

Tue, 15 Feb 2011 02:48:42 +0100

“I think we have gone through a period when too many children and people have been given to understand “I have a problem, it is the Government’s job to cope with it!” or “I have a problem, I will go and get a grant to cope with it!” “I am homeless, the Government must house me!” and so they are casting their problems on society and who is society? There is no such thing! There are individual men and women and there are families and no government can do anything except through people and people look to themselves first.”

- How could I sleep at night if I thought Thatcher’s words were not persistently heeded in the corridors of power and Glenn Beck’s studio?

"LET US, HOWEVER, RETURN to the war in Vietnam and the response that it has aroused among American..."

Sun, 13 Feb 2011 23:40:56 +0100

“

LET US, HOWEVER, RETURN to the war in Vietnam and the response that it has aroused among American intellectuals. A striking feature of the recent debate on Southeast Asian policy has been the distinction that is commonly drawn between “responsible criticism,” on the one hand, and “sentimental,” or “emotional,” or “hysterical” criticism, on the other. There is much to be learned from a careful study of the terms in which this distinction is drawn. The “hysterical critics” are to be identified, apparently, by their irrational refusal to accept one fundamental political axiom, namely that the United States has the right to extend its power and control without limit, insofar as is feasible. Responsible criticism does not challenge this assumption, but argues, rather, that we probably can’t “get away with it” at this particular time and place.

A distinction of this sort seems to be what Irving Kristol, for example, has in mind in his analysis of the protest over Vietnam policy (Encounter, August, 1965). He contrasts the responsible critics, such as Walter Lippmann, the Times, and Senator Fulbright, with the “teach-in movement.” “Unlike the university protesters,” he points out, “Mr. Lippmann engages in no presumptuous suppositions as to ‘what the Vietnamese people really want’—he obviously doesn’t much care—or in legalistic exegesis as to whether, or to what extent, there is ‘aggression’ or ‘revolution’ in South Vietnam. His is a realpolitik point of view; and he will apparently even contemplate the possibility of a nuclear war against China in extreme circumstances.” This is commendable, and contrasts favorably, for Kristol, with the talk of the “unreasonable, ideological types” in the teach-in movement, who often seem to be motivated by such absurdities as “simple, virtuous ‘anti-imperialism,’ “who deliver “harangues on ‘the power structure,’ ” and who even sometimes stoop so low as to read “articles and reports from the foreign press on the American presence in Vietnam.” Furthermore, these nasty types are often psychologists, mathematicians, chemists, or philosophers (just as, incidentally, those most vocal in protest in the Soviet Union are generally physicists, literary intellectuals, and others remote from the exercise of power), rather than people with Washington contacts, who, of course, realize that “had they a new, good idea about Vietnam, they would get a prompt and respectful hearing” in Washington.

I am not interested here in whether Kristol’s characterization of protest and dissent is accurate, but rather in the assumptions on which it rests. Is the purity of American motives a matter that is beyond discussion, or that is irrelevant to discussion? Should decisions be left to “experts” with Washington contacts—even if we assume that they command the necessary knowledge and principles to make the “best” decision, will they invariably do so? And, a logically prior question, is “expertise” applicable—that is, is there a body of theory and of relevant information, not in the public domain, that can be applied to the analysis of foreign policy or that demonstrates the correctness of present actions in some way that psychologists, mathematicians, chemists, and philosophers are incapable of comprehending? Although Kristol does not examine these questions directly, his attitude presupposes answers, answers which are wrong in all cases. American aggressiveness, however it may be masked in pious rhetoric, is a dominant force in world affairs and must be analyzed in terms of its causes and motives. There is no body of theory or significant body of relevant information, beyond the comprehension of the layman, which makes policy immune from criticism. To the extent that “expert knowledge” is applied to world affairs, it is surely appropriate—for a person of any integrity, quite necessary—to question its quality and the goals it serves. These facts seem too obvious to require extended discussion.

”

- Oh fuck. Here comes Noam Chomsky, time traveling from 1967, to tell us all what’s wrong with the DC establishment media. That’s right: s/Vietnam/Iraq/g etc. Brought to you by NYRB: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1967/feb/23/a-special-supplement-the-responsibility-of-intelle/?pagination=false&printpage=true

"Neoliberal theorists are, however, profoundly suspicious of democracy. Governance by majority rule..."

Sun, 13 Feb 2011 02:48:06 +0100

“Neoliberal theorists are, however, profoundly suspicious of democracy. Governance by majority rule is seen as a potential threat to individual rights and constitutional liberties. Democracy is viewed as a luxury, only possible under conditions of relative affluence coupled with a strong middle-class presence to guarantee political stability. Neoliberals therefore tend to favour governance by experts and elites.”

- David Harvey basically explains contemporary US foreign policy perfectly in 2003’s Brief History of Neoliberalism.

parisalamexicaine: Chilaquiles à la MPF. Responding to the...

Fri, 04 Feb 2011 00:05:56 +0100

parisalamexicaine:

Chilaquiles à la MPF. Responding to the demand put forth by the first post here, I present tonight’s dinner. One too many tortillas went into the mix, but otherwise, it was great.

I should have more faith in the future in my own saucability and not rely on Carrefour’s jarred fajita (or whatever) salsa. It’s not as sugary as usual European Mexican stuff, but there’s still an obnoxious sweetness to it.

Sad news. The Sarkozy régime has reduced French culture to...

Wed, 26 Jan 2011 15:53:45 +0100

Sad news. The Sarkozy régime has reduced French culture to “Who’s the Boss?” remakes.

"Nowhere is woman treated according to the merit of her work, but rather as a sex. It is therefore..."

Wed, 15 Dec 2010 12:39:00 +0100

“Nowhere is woman treated according to the merit of her work, but rather as a sex. It is therefore almost inevitable that she should pay for her right to exist, to keep a position in whatever line, with sex favors. Thus it is merely a question of degree whether she sells herself to one man, in or out of marriage, or to many men.”

- Emma Goldman on marriage and prostitution. She skirts around condemning marriage outright in this century-old piece, but you can feel it, the condemnation, bubbling underneath passages like this one.

No further Shahrukh Khan or Willow Smith discussion is needed,...

Sun, 21 Nov 2010 00:56:00 +0100

No further Shahrukh Khan or Willow Smith discussion is needed, but I know this will inspire you to watch the original video more or less instantly, so here’s the link to save you the trouble of typing “youtube chaiyya” into your location bar. [via nehrujackets]

A rectilinear map of the Amtrak system that makes the US look...

Sat, 20 Nov 2010 21:55:03 +0100

A rectilinear map of the Amtrak system that makes the US look like a giant subway? If anyone in my family read anything I put online, I would presently write things like “this would be a great holiday present for me, you know!” Actually… the map of the Interstate system might even be more to my tastes… I have certainly spent more time cutting across America on those colored lines than on Amtrak’s.

Spurs party refuses to end. As @Spursonside explained: One last...

Sat, 20 Nov 2010 21:04:13 +0100

Spurs party refuses to end. As @Spursonside explained:

One last pic from the Emirates - our fans still inside after the final whistle, pictured from the West Stand!

I’m still buzzing, after all, why shouldn’t half of North London be the same way?

"This kind of ‘reading’, however, no longer produces interpretations but merely _tests_..."

Sat, 20 Nov 2010 19:04:52 +0100

“This kind of ‘reading’, however, no longer produces interpretations but merely _tests_ them: it’s not the beginning of the critical enterprise, but its appendix. And then, here you don’t really read the _text_ anymore, but rather through the text, looking for your unit of analysis. The task is constrained from the start; it’s a reading without freedom.”

- Franco Moretti talks about returning to the source novels after engaging in some distant reading. From his 2000 article “Conjectures on World Literature.”

nocoastoffense: buscando américa/boardwalk empire carpet

Sat, 20 Nov 2010 19:02:07 +0100

nocoastoffense:

buscando américa/boardwalk empire carpet

Wenger wearing his “Chinese hobo grandma parka” sobs his way off...

Sat, 20 Nov 2010 17:44:00 +0100

Wenger wearing his “Chinese hobo grandma parka” sobs his way off the pitch after Spurs unlesh a psyops masterpiece, scoring three unanswered goals in the second half to take three points at the Emirates for the first time ever, defeating Arsenal twice in a row in the Prem for the first time in forever, and beating Arsenal at home (including Highbury) for the first time since the first season of the Prem. Oh, and Spurs haven’t beaten any of the Big Four away in something like 70 meetings.

Then to get goals from current darlings Gareth Bale and Raphael van der Vaart, as well as having Gallas be a solid central defender in his return to Arsenal… man. The only way it could be better would be to have Wenger walk off, sobbing. Oh, wait…

I still await news of his certain whingefest postmatch.

Outrageous country decadence in this meeting between Bretons and...

Fri, 19 Nov 2010 17:51:00 +0100

Outrageous country decadence in this meeting between Bretons and Occitans. Mostly this video is great because of the shots of aligot being prepared on a mass-scale, but note also the “Gâteau à la broche,” or “Šakotis,” as I know it. Now I’m off to Carrefour to buy some potatoes and cantal cheese.

"[A]mazingly, remarkably, counterintuitively and bizarrely, humanities majors in the United States,..."

Tue, 16 Nov 2010 22:43:00 +0100

“[A]mazingly, remarkably, counterintuitively and bizarrely, humanities majors in the United States, as a percentage of all bachelor’s degrees, have held steady since about 1990—since the onset of the culture wars, in fact. Despite all the attacks on our Piss Christ this and our queerying that and our deconstructing the Other; despite all the parents and friends and journalists and random passersby telling students they’ll be consigned to a life of selling apples and flipping burgers if they major in English; despite the skyrocketing of tuition and the rise of the predatory private-student-loan industry; despite all this, humanities enrollments have been at or about the 8 percent mark for about twenty years.”

- Michael Bérubé brings it. He’s right; it’s pretty much entirely unlikely that any “o noez hoomanicheez” article will have begun with a legit premise.

Such optimism!

Mon, 15 Nov 2010 22:05:23 +0100

Such optimism!

"If you have no clear idea of what you want to replace the state with, you have no right to..."

Mon, 15 Nov 2010 20:47:00 +0100

“If you have no clear idea of what you want to replace the state with, you have no right to subtract/withdraw from the state. Instead of taking a distance from the state, the true task should be to make the state itself work in a non-statal mode. The alternative “either struggle for state power (which makes us the same as the enemy we are fighting) or resist by withdrawing to a position of distance from the state” is false—both its terms share the same premise, that the state-form, in the way we know it today, is here to stay, so that all we can do is either take over the state or take a distance towards it. Here, one should shamelessly repeat the lesson of Lenin’s _State and Revolution_: the goal of revolutionary violence is not to take over state power, but to transform it, radically changing its functioning, its relationship to its base, and so on.”

- No more Žižek, I swear, after this, also from 2009’s First as Tragedy, Then as Farce. This is a crucial point for my dissertation though (made by a jillion geographers, though, not Žižek; Geographers ♥ Lenin ☭).

"The difference between liberalism and the radical Left is that, although they refer to the same..."

Mon, 15 Nov 2010 04:39:12 +0100

“The difference between liberalism and the radical Left is that, although they refer to the same three elements (liberal center, populist Right, radical Left), they locate them in a radically different topology: for the liberal center, the radical Left and the Right are two forms of the same “totalitarian” excess; while for the Left, the only true alternative is the one between itself and the liberal mainstream, the populist “radical” Right being nothing but the *symptom* of liberalism’s inability to deal with the Leftist threat. When today we hear a politician or an ideologist offering us a choice between liberal freedom and fundamentalist oppression, triumphantly asking (purely rhetorical) questions such as “Do you want women to be excluded from public life and deprived of their elementary rights? Do you want every critic or mocker of religion to be punishable by death?” what should make us suspicious is the very self-evidence of the answer—who would have wanted *that*? The problem is that such a simplistic liberal universalism long ago lost its innocence. This is why, for a true Leftist, the conflict between liberal permissiveness and fundamentalism is ultimately a *false* conflict—a vicious cycle in which two opposed poles generate and presuppose each other. Here one should take an Hegelian step backwards, placing in question the very measure from which fundamentalism appears in all its horror. Liberals have long ago lost their right to judge. What Horkheimer once said should also be applied to today’s fundamentalism: those who do not want to talk (critically) about liberal democracy and its noble principles should also keep quiet about religious fundamentalism.”

- That’s right; I’m the loser quoting Žižek.

Happy Smurfy family.

Tue, 02 Nov 2010 12:45:04 +0100

Happy Smurfy family.