Liberty or Tyranny

[Bigun]

It's mostly just being a supporter of logical argument and reason distilled from a lot of sources. I half joked about standing on the shoulders of giants upthread but really, all this stuff has been established over millenia by the greatest thinkers. I find it simultaneously amusing and nauseating that the special little snowflakes think that they can simply mock it all away with one liner answers because their TV hero of the moment does it. Whether it be Trump or some supposedly 'conservative' radio host or a Fox News personality.

Actually a lot of this reminds me of a company I worked at in the 90s. There was a woman that the suits hired in marketing that was a buzzword factory. There was nothing that wasn't an 'issue'. Sometimes I think thats the only word she knew and had learned it watching "Friends".

She screwed up several departments with her idiocy because besides completely turning the place into a verbal Romper Room, she was wholly incompetent at the actual job she was hired to do. And thats what a lot of these people seem to be. They blast words around with abandon, thinking that their volume will overcome the vapidity of the ideas behind them. Because truth be told, there really ARE NO ideas behind them. Just 'feelings' and 'agendas'.

Norm I could right a book in response to that simple statement but will refrain and simply say that when I read your earlier comment about "standing on the shoulders of giants"  I didn't take it as anything other than a fact that should be true of every single one of us given the fact that we live in the greatest country ever to have existed on this planet and, like no other people before us, have at our fingertips 24/7 the entire recorded history of man.  Sadly today, and unlike our founding fathers who really had to work at it, very few of us bother with even a cursory investigation of that record. Those that do quickly come to the realization that all of it is like an old phonograph that keeps playing the same few lines over and over again. We are the most intelligent beings on this globe by far and yet we INSIST on making the same stupid mistakes over and over again. Why that is I do not know. Is it a flaw in our design or is it a trait intentionally built into our very nature?  Whatever the answer to that question is I seriously doubt that you or I are going to be able to change it at this late date. And even that is not an original thought!

"That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons of history."

Aldous Huxley

[Henry Noel]

We are the most intelligent beings on this globe by far and yet we INSIST on making the same stupid mistakes over and over again. Why that is I do not know. Is it a flaw in our design or is it a trait intentionally built into our very nature?  Whatever the answer to that question is I seriously doubt that you or I are going to be able to change it at this late date. And even that is not an original thought!

You're probably familiar with the Kipling poem "Gods of the Copybook Headings," which is, I think appropriate here, for those not familiar with it. Note the mention of the dog returning to his vomit, and the "burnt fool's bandaged finger."

As I pass through my incarnations in every age and race,
I make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market Place.
Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all.

We were living in trees when they met us. They showed us each in turn
That Water would certainly wet us, as Fire would certainly burn:
But we found them lacking in Uplift, Vision and Breadth of Mind,
So we left them to teach the Gorillas while we followed the March of Mankind.

We moved as the Spirit listed. They never altered their pace,
Being neither cloud nor wind-borne like the Gods of the Market Place;
But they always caught up with our progress, and presently word would come
That a tribe had been wiped off its icefield, or the lights had gone out in Rome.

With the Hopes that our World is built on they were utterly out of touch,
They denied that the Moon was Stilton; they denied she was even Dutch;
They denied that Wishes were Horses; they denied that a Pig had Wings;
So we worshipped the Gods of the Market Who promised these beautiful things.

When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "Stick to the Devil you know."

On the first Feminian Sandstones we were promised the Fuller Life
(Which started by loving our neighbour and ended by loving his wife)
Till our women had no more children and the men lost reason and faith,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "The Wages of Sin is Death."

In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all,
By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul;
But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "If you don't work you die."

Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smooth-tongued wizards withdrew
And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was true
That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four —
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more.

As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man —
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began: —
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!

[Norm Lenhart]

Norm I could right a book in response to that simple statement but will refrain and simply say that when I read your earlier comment about "standing on the shoulders of giants" ...

Just to clarify, I was serious about the statement but the 'half joking' part was that it was 'me' saying it. Kind of an inside baseball/self mocking comment as many of the crapstorms over at TOS involving me usually included some special snowflake getting triggered and crying about my 'unrivaled arrogance' because I refuse to back down on positions I have taken. So I roll with it ;) 

@Silver Pines and I have an ongoing joke about it.

[Bigun]

...As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man —
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began: —
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!

So sad! And so very true!

 Most appropriate indeed @Henry Noel!  Welcome to TBR! 

[Henry Noel]

So sad! And so very true!

 Most appropriate indeed @Henry Noel!  Welcome to TBR! 

Many thanks!

[Ghost Bear]

You're probably familiar with the Kipling poem "Gods of the Copybook Headings," which is, I think appropriate here, for those not familiar with it. Note the mention of the dog returning to his vomit, and the "burnt fool's bandaged finger."

I've been seeing that poem quoted a lot recently in different places online. It strikes me that Kipling understood the human condition a lot better than most people... which is probably why his poetry stopped being taught in schools. 

[Henry Noel]

Thanks for posting the poem @Henry Noel.  Reading it was fortifying to my soul this morning.  I sometimes (often) question my convictions when so many others claim them to be wrong.  "Who am I to think I know more than so many others?" 

I will not be marching off the cliff with all the other Trump soldiers this election.  It will be hard for me as there is the slight chance that Trump could actually do some good for the country, but his moral compass does not point in that direction.  The odds are much higher that he will hasten this country's demise even quicker than Hillary Clinton.

JR and TOS had much to do with my decision not to support Trump, disregarding his lack of Conservatism or a moral compass.  Watching those that I had previously respected become the vilest of people and realizing their behavior of emulating Trump would become socially acceptable, was reason enough in itself to eschew him.  If the man came to my dinner table and behaved as he does, I would have to ask him to leave as an example to my children.  Vote for him for POTUS to be an example to all children?

Trump and his minions simply don't behave in a way that inspires confidence in me, not the less so since it reminds me of mobs in general. I liken the situation to the downfall of the Roman Republic, where constitutional ideas that had been handed down for generations got lost in the desire for strongmen to step in and act where the Senate either would not or could not take the lead. Situations like that just don't end well ... they always seem to end in tyranny.

Because of this, I, too, have a nagging feeling that a Trump presidency might actually be worse than the alternative.

[Silver Pines]

Just to clarify, I was serious about the statement but the 'half joking' part was that it was 'me' saying it. Kind of an inside baseball/self mocking comment as many of the crapstorms over at TOS involving me usually included some special snowflake getting triggered and crying about my 'unrivaled arrogance' because I refuse to back down on positions I have taken. So I roll with it ;) 

@Silver Pines and I have an ongoing joke about it.

The Colossus of Norm

[driftdiver]

The devil you know...

We could unite to fight against hillary or another dem.   Under trump anyone speaking out against him will be attacked and marginalized.

[Smokin Joe]

I've been seeing that poem quoted a lot recently in different places online. It strikes me that Kipling understood the human condition a lot better than most people... which is probably why his poetry stopped being taught in schools. 

Either that or they wanted little  snowflakes instead of young men and women.

IF

IF you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold on!'

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
' Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,
if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!
==Rudyard Kipling==

Not taught to young men much any more, but it should be.

[Smokin Joe]

We could unite to fight against hillary or another dem.   Under trump anyone speaking out against him will be attacked and marginalized.

Which makes one wonder how such a Presidency would respond to constructive criticism, even from within the Party. I question the wisdom in promoting arrogance. That has numerous bad historical precedents in terms of outcome, not just for the one who is arrogant, but for entire continents.