Around the world, resurgent nationalism in defense of indigenous culture has refocused too many on the authenticity of their character: “The Real Americans”, “The Real Jews”, “The Real ____________”.
Whatever the McCoy sought, one might discover a few overlaps.
What answer may there be to so shallow a perception– more than that: a defense! — of legacy in identity?
I spent forty years in the American Wildness before venturing into the synagogue where I live and joining it.
I recall one afternoon lazing on the mall of the Maryland campus when a “Succoth Mobile” stopped not far from where I was enjoying my hour in the sun and a representative came up to me and asked, “Are you Jewish?”
“No.”
I wasn’t middle eastern.
My American eastern woodlands were nothing like, what, the hills of Judea?
Here for harvest, we celebrate Thanksgiving.
However, I also recall spending hours one afternoon in some lonely part of an upper floor of McKeldin Library (UMCP) looking over the photography of the Holocaust.
I don’t recall the motive, only the moment.
I took my Bar Mitzvah in 1968 reading off a plastic card. The morning may have been a ceremony for two, and, on my side, certainly for the adults. I really hadn’t much to do with it at all.
Forty years later, after walking out of that mill, I walked into a real synagogue where American children spoke Hebrew with fluency at their ceremonies. The “Conservative-to-Reform” Friday night greeting of the Sabbath took place in both English and Hebrew, and the building remains regal and old. There were other European and Hebrew and Israeli features as well as the unmistakable imprint of generations going back 125 years.
In hyperactive America, that’s an old synagogue.
So, one might say, I got to reconnect with family, my spiritual family (although I have spent time with the Unitarians and the Ethical Society as well over the years). I have been also ten years with my synagogue. I am one of those who, perhaps, visit for a time, but I am Jewish, and that knowledge is as fundamental to my sense of identity as my name, Schmuel. You may call me “an American of Jewish descent” but that in no way would make me less Jewish than thou.
“The barbaric and feudal politics of the world’s civilizational past would seem to be getting its claws into the world’s future and dragging it backward.”
One of the two candidates in the upcoming vote by Interpol’s 192 member states, is from Russia despite allegations that Moscow has used Interpol’s procedures to pursue political enemies.
Banks, as founder of Leave.EU, wanted Bannon’s data firm Cambridge Analytica to devise a plan in late 2015 for raising funds in the US that would support the unofficial Brexit campaign, according to the correspondence.
The emails are likely to be scrutinised in the US where Robert Mueller, the special counsel investigating possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia, has interviewed Bannon a number of times.
The possibility that Brexit (& it's bankroller Aaron Banks) and the Trump campaign relied on some of the same advisers to further far-right nationalist campaigns has set off alarm bells on both sides of the Atlantic. https://t.co/dCxc2eH283
— J. #EmergencyConfetti Doyle also on POST (@sibersong) November 18, 2018
Observation
It would seem all paths back toward the renewal of feudal political absolutism in the authentically democratic free world lead back to Moscow (and now perhaps Beijing as well).
Without Putin’s permit, Assad’s Sadnaya Prison would not exist. The memory of that obscenity will burn in history long after the “eye doctor” has succeeded in more fully destroying his own estate.
The Interpol stories involving Russia and China: which despot would wish himself to be policed?
Which despotic elite should be entrusted with the coordination policy of the world’s basic global policing element?
And how well will the west stand when it has itself been riven by the renewal of feudal governance?
The EU may impose sanctions on Hungary for adopting laws against the development of civic society, that’s according to MP Volodymyr Ariev, who is also vice-president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, chairman of the PACE Committee on Culture, Education, Science and Media.”In Hungary there are very serious problems with the European Union, with Brussels. They stem from those very anti-democratic laws that were passed by the Hungarian authorities, in particular against civic society, against the Soros University, public organizations, and not only that. Now the EU is on the path toward imposing sanctions on Hungary,” Ariev told Pryamiy TV channel.
Observation
EU / NATO has effectively lost Turkey as a partner for democracy, and it has seen democracy seriously degraded in Hungary as well. While BackChannels has thought it politic to lay off the United States in similar regard, the “Fake News!” President has made that tack similarly difficult. He has degraded the media (for many, America’s “Fourth Estate”); taken a hard run at the Department of Justice (Comey firing; effort to degrade or derail the Mueller Investigation; the out-of-order appointment of Matthew Whittaker as Acting Attorney General); and packed the court with the appointment of an at best marginally acceptable (Senate confirmation vote: 50 to 48) “old boy” of a lawyer.
Politics Medieval v Politics Modern and Democratic?
The barbaric and feudal politics of the world’s civilizational past would seem to be getting its claws into the world’s future and dragging it backward.
Steve Bannon, former political strategist for Donald Trump, said he plans to work closely with the Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban in the run-up to next year’s European Parliament elections. Mr Bannon revealed that he had visited Budapest to speak to the far-right leader and his aides in meetings not previously made public.
The political operative also suggested Hungary would make an ideal home for “The Movement” – his new campaign group aimed at electing right-wing nationalists in Europe.
This ugly truth about us explains what has happened to Brett Kavanaugh. Initially he was hated for being a Republican nominee for the Supreme Court, but it is still not universally acceptable to abominate someone only for being an originalist judge.
“Originalist judge” may not well explain what the nation saw transpire last week.
Here is this blog’s editor’s take on that.
BackChannels believed Ford, and that he (Kavanaugh) lied because he had the power to deny everything negative about himself. As much may be part of an “ambitious” or malign narcissism, and as much fits with the personality and associates of the man who nominated him.
With Red or Blue Right / Left Flag navigation, political identity may force arguments rather than reason, and that emotion drives the demonizing of the other camp as well as the concept familiar to conflicts worldwide: “accusation in a mirror”. “Witch hunt!
The Left has no need to apologize for defending Blase Ford.
The Right has no need to wonder why professional advisement — all those lawyers! — against the confirmation were ignored and the process will be remembers as forced by the Republicans or blocked by the Democrats: for an answer, the power of identity and loyalty will do.
Ford claimed that, thirty-six years ago, Kavanaugh held her down on a bed against her will, groped her, and covered her mouth when she tried to scream. Ford made the allegation anonymously in a letter to her congresswoman, Anna Eshoo, and Senator Dianne Feinstein, who originally declined to share the letter and later referred the matter to the F.B.I. for investigation. Ford has since come forward publicly; her lawyer has stated that she and her family have received threats since her name became public. Kavanaugh has responded with a categorical denial, saying in a statement, “I have never done anything like what the accuser describes—to her or to anyone. . . . I had no idea who was making this accusation until she identified herself.”
Loyalty to President Trump and possible-to-probable interference in judicial processes have been thematic from the start of President Trump’s Administration.
While charges remain “alleged”, BackChannels believes Brett Kavanaugh’s accuser Christine Blasey Ford utterly authentic.
IF public and Senate opinion comes to the same conclusion, then what will matter most will not be whether as a 17-year-old boy Kavanaugh had assaulted Ford but how he handled the accusation. He has by his blanket denial effective removed claim to the defense of juvenile behavior and will have been caught lying — and in a breathtaking abuse of power libeling his accuser — as a fully fledged adult.
What malign narcissism brought these politics to the once ever believing, confident, and idealistic United States of America?
Screen capture from hearing, September 27, 2018.
While Kavanaugh brags about his carefully kept calendars / calendar-journals, his voice breaks. Of course, had he committed an assault with great ambitions in mind, the calendar or the journal would have been the place to write the incident out of the record by not including it.
In one passage, beginning on Page 92, Judge describes his time working at a grocery store in the context of his drinking problem. Emphasis added.
It was the summer before senior year, and by now, even though I wasn’t drinking every day, I was completely hooked. Going a week without getting drunk was unthinkable. I was spending between four and seven nights with the gang, either at a party or at O’Rourke’s.
Elsewhere in the book, Judge describes one of his acquaintances at the time, someone named “Bart O’Kavanaugh,” who vomited in a car after a party.
“Truth does not become more true if the whole world were to accept it; nor does it become less true if the whole world were to reject it.”
“The risk of a wrong decision is preferable to the terror of indecision.”
September 28, 2018 (and live at posting here).
“The basic principles that underscore the Senate’s constitutional duty of advice and consent on federal judicial nominees require nothing less than a careful examination of the accusations and facts by the FBI,” said Robert Carlson, president of the organization, in a Thursday night letter addressed to Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley and ranking Democrat Dianne Feinstein.
“Each appointment to our nation’s Highest Court (as with all others) is simply too important to rush to a vote,” Carlson wrote. “Deciding to proceed without conducting additional investigation would not only have a lasting impact on the Senate’s reputation, but it will also negatively affect the great trust necessary for the American people to have in the Supreme Court.”
I got the polygraph test Dr. Ford took showing truthfulness about her account in the record. To quote a judge: “law enforcement agencies use polygraphs to test the credibility of witnesses” & the tests “serve law enforcement purposes.” That judge was Brett Kavanaugh in 2016 case.
.@SenateGOP: Enough righteous indignation over "the process." If you really want a proper process aimed at learning the truth, support an FBI investigation.#Kavanaugh#DelayTheVote
“The Supreme Court,” he said, “must never be viewed as a partisan institution.”
His performance on Thursday, responding to accusations of sexual misconduct at a hearing of the same Senate committee, sent a different message. Judge Kavanaugh was angry and emotional, embracing the language of slashing partisanship. His demeanor raised questions about his neutrality and temperament and whether the already fragile reputation of the Supreme Court as an institution devoted to law rather than politics would be threatened if he is confirmed.
Political independence may be America’s greatest prize for free thinkers. BackChannels’ editor left the Democratic Party about nine years ago and has not registered with the Republican Party since then.
Regarding Shamus Khan’s piece, one may suggest the following, which has been copied from the editor’s portion of The Awesome Conversation online:
What would be tyrannous would be to allow the privileged to mask away crime and impose their will on others without criticism or notice and with impunity. The combination of humanism (all the way back to Cyrus and his cylinder), British empiricism, and American ideals beg for and rely on the thorough examination of criminal acts and, at times, libelous claims.
The FBI has now an additional week to explore the validity of both Kavanaugh’s and Blase Ford’s testimony, and we will see — or hear — how evidence acquired adds up.
It’s not enough to be angry or partisan in such a matter: it’s important to reject assumptions and beliefs in favor of examination taken with the highest integrity.
This morning saw a follow-up:
The survival of a democratic state depends on the confidence of its constituents. Toward that end, the Senate delayed its vote in favor of a one week extension for supplemental FBI investigation.
Finger pointing serves no democratic ends.
Most tyrannies know well “reflection in the mirror”, i.e., accusing targets of harboring the aggressive plans that are the speaker’s own.
Considering the term Supreme Court justices enjoy . . . what’s another week?
I think it’s good to see “checks and balances” in action.
BackChannels has been enjoying — appreciating, actually — the NBC News videos on YouTube featuring each of the notables speaking at Arizona Senator John McCain’s funeral service at the National Cathedral this day in Washington, D.C. More remembrance, the service even at its most personal heights — see the previous post featuring Meghan McCain’s reflections on her father’s death — has been an extraordinary reflection on the American spirit and the principles and values that inform the nation.
After God Bless America, may God bless Town & Country for the transcriptions.
From the above delivery by former President Barrack Obama:
In captivity John learned in ways that few of us ever will the meaning of those words, how each moment, each day, each choice is a test. And John McCain passed that test again and again and again. And that’s why when John spoke of virtues like service and valor they weren’t just words to him, it was a truth that he had lived and for which he was prepared to die. And it forced even the most cynical to consider what were we doing for our country? What might we risk everything for?
Related Videos
Scroll down. The live links for the list have been placed at the bottom of this post.
Stimulus: a Facebook-based accusation to the effect that Ocasio-Cortez will come to resemble Castro and other socialist dictators.
Baloney.
The event in question appears to have been designed for partisan listening and not for open public discourse:
—— She said the journalist ban “was designed to protect + invite vulnerable populations to PUBLIC discourse: immigrants, victims of domestic abuse, and so on.”
“We indicated previously that the event would be closed to press,” she said. “Future ones are open.” ——
I think all political organizations have the prerogative to determine their meeting doors open or closed to facilitate policy planning and research. To amplify the decision to avoid the media circus and actually listen to the underserved or, in some ways, people with problems that are nonetheless a part of our communities seems to me execrable — but if that’s the way Fox wants to operate, well that says a lot about Fox News.
Additionally, with this town hall non-story: it was designed to protect + invite vulnerable populations to PUBLIC discourse: immigrants, victims of domestic abuse, and so on.
We indicated previously that the event would be closed to press. Future ones are open.
Dictators, not “isms”, have killed millions, and therefore having a look at the psychology of dictatorship — and the nature of disingenuous news personalities, lol, may be more helpful than the demonizing of a young American politician.
The desire for human dignity and freedom exacts a price from all who would have both in security perpetually. In the silhouette, an American Civil War cannon faces southwest in the direction of General Robert E. Lee’s then retreating Confederate army (Sept. 17-18, 1862). In BackChannels’ humble opinion, the one bloody day of battle marked the beginning of the end of absolute power, landed aristocracy, and slavery in the soon to be reunited and reconstructed United States of America. We should wish today not to return — or be returned — to the feudal past, its abuses, criminality, excesses, and inhumanity, however complex, convoluted, and modern the legal, political, and technological means.
BackChannels 