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[little j ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ ✔]

Possibly, but I finished. Very good up until the ghost circles, at which point it just started introducing all sorts of new concepts and characters: I can't stand it when a story does that for its final arc. I'm convinced the Crown of Horns was brought in just so Jeff Smith had something that could neatly wrap the plot up; quite disappointing.

[Tails82]

Moments: The Pulitzer Prize Winning Photographs, by Hal Buell. My selections:

SPOILER: Click to show

1942:

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The first prize for photography was given to Milton Brooks. Photo of striking Ford workers with clubs beating up a guy who tried to cross the picket line.

1943:

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Frank Noel is in the Pacific, recovering from malaria and getting out while he still can in the face of a Japanese onslaught. His ship bound for New York City is hit by a Jap torpedo. Trapped inside, he breaks the door down to escape into the lifeboats. Five days out at sea. During this time they encountered another boat which led to this photo: Indian sailors in a bad situation ask for water, but his boat can't offer them anything. The ships drifted apart as a tropical storm came in and they lost visual contact. The Indian boat was never seen again. Luckily Noel was rescued and he went on to cover the war in Europe, the 1948 war in Palestine, and the Korean war where he was captured early on and spent 32 months in a Japanese prison camp. After an escape he was recaptured and faced beatings, solitary confinement. He managed to get some photographs of the prisoners after some of his AP colleagues smuggled in a camera.

1944: The AP's Frank Filan moves in with US Marines during the invasion of Tarawa, armed with a camera. The Marines face problems when an underwater reef makes entry into the harbor difficult. Amphibious craft scrape over the top but the man landing craft cannot pass. Marines had to get out and wade through neck-deep water to the shore hundreds of yards in the distance, facing machine gun, mortar and rifle fire from the Japanese. Filan's landing craft was hit and started to sink, costing him his cameras and equipment. He makes it to shore with another Marine and looks for cover, coming out at night to help the other soldiers save wounded Marines. Filan's prizewinning photos were from the second day destruction, after he borrowed a camera from a military photographer. 4,800 Jap troops were on the island with 2,000 Korean construction workers. 17 Japanese and 129 of the workers survived. Over 1,000 Marines were killed and over 2,000 wounded - 40 Marines either wounded or killed every hour. "At Tarawa, the Americans learned that the Japanese troops were determined to die to the last man rather than surrender. And the Japanese discovered that the Americans were just as determined to stay on the island once they were ashore."

1945: The raising of the flag at Iwo Jima. Joe Rosenthal was in the thick of the battle that would become the deadliest ever for the US Marines. He later remarked, "No one knows how they survived that beach...It was like walking in rain without getting wet." This was the first time in Japan's history that a foreign nation had invaded its home territory. An American success here would be devastating to Japanese morale. Almost 7,000 Americans and 20,000 out of 22,000 Japanese would die in the nearly month-long battle. Three of the flag-raisers in the photo were killed in the fighting and never saw the picture, while a fourth was seriously wounded. Bill Genaust, who took motion picture footage of the flag raising, was also killed from rifle fire. Rosenthal's photo became famous and this Pulitzer was rewarded the year the picture was taken, rather than the following year.

1951:

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Max Desfor, the Bridge at Taedong. Desperate refugees flee across a broken bridge in Korea after it had been blown out by advancing Chinese troops. Desfor came across this sight after crossing on a nearby military pontoon bridge, and could only take 3-4 photographs before his hands went numb. Masses of refugees inched along, some got their hands stuck to the cold steel girders, others fell into the water.

1954:

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The first amateur photographer awarded the prize. A trucker rescued from a bridge accident, moments before the cab broke off and fell into the rocks below.

1966: Kyoichi Sawada is permanently assigned to Vietnam. He has a reputation as a daredevil photographer, on one occasion having run through a minefield to photograph advancing American troops. Sawada won the prize for a portfolio of Vietnam photographs in a time when the prize went heavily to coverage of the war. He would return to photography work in Cambodia where, tragically, he went missing and was found dead the following day, 30 feet from his car and shot in the chest several times along with his companion. In total, 24 journalists were killed or went missing in Cambodia that year.

1969: Monetta Sleet wins the prize for his photograph of Martin Luther King's widow at his funeral. "The murderer was still being sought, and the church was guarded against attack by the white state troopers King and his people had confronted over the years."

1970:

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Steve Starr covers race demonstrators at Cornell. "For some years, Cornell had actively recruited ghetto blacks, and it was close to setting up a black studies program. The university had established one dormitory exclusively for black women students. The black students wanted more, however." Seeking amnesty for seven black students who had recently torn apart an administration building on campus, and demanding a separate college run solely by blacks, a student group overran the Student Union and kicked out parents who were staying there overnight. Starr rushed over on rumors that there were guns, making it the first time an armed group had ever taken over an American campus. The black students would later emerge with guns when they dispersed, taking advantage of an amnesty offer from the administration. Starr was worried there would be rocks thrown or gunshots, but nothing violent happened. The black students later claimed they had armed up because they thought white students were going to shoot at them first.

1971: the Kent State photograph by Kent Milo. Nixon's announcement of an expanded mission in Cambodia led to 75 early college closings to prevent further violence by students. After a nearby beer bust, angry students at Kent State lit the ROTC building on fire and threw stones at firemen who tried to put it out. The National Guard came in with tear gas and arrested 150. Filo was there when thousands of students gathered for a violent protest, fighting and throwing rocks at the National Guard while they brought out more tear gas. One group of guardsmen were backed up a hill as the students advanced with rocks, and shots rang out. Filo at first thought they were blanks. Some even thought the photo had been faked before the deaths were announced. "Filo's picture joined the collection of photographic icons that forever would be part of the history of the Vietnam War, that are symbolic of the war fought on American streets as well as that in the Asian countryside." The screaming woman in the photo was actually not a student, but a runaway from Florida who had been curious. She was reunited with her parents because of the picture and did not like the publicity it had given her.

1972:

Vietnam photo-vets Horst Faas and Michel Laurent photograph a massacre in Bangladesh. India and Pakistan had split after the British had left, and now Bangladesh declared it was leaving Pakistan. West Pakistan troops came in to stop them, and 1 million were killed while 10 million became refugees. India stepped in, joining up with the East Pakistan guerrillas to drive out West Pakistan forces, and Bangladesh was born. Anger at mass atrocities from West Pakistan led to revenge attacks. Faas and Laurent met up at Dacca racetrack where thousands had gathered. Four bound captives were brought in, members of the West Pakistan-friendly militias who were accused of rape and murder, and they were promptly tortured. Laurent and Faas walked off after asking that the torture stop, believing that if they left the men let up and had been doing it as a publicity stunt for the cameras. The two returned after it didn't stop, blending in with the crowd. The prisoners were slowly killed after nearly an hour of bayonet stabs, finished off with the crowd who trampled them. Faas and Laurent left after the spectacle was over and people in the crowd started asking questions. A few of the spectators gave chase but soon lost interest. The photographs were then sent to London via India, which permitted transmission of the torture images but did not want the bayonet stabbings sent out. The result was that the story played out in the press longer than it would have, with the news first and then later images of the killings drawn out once they came to light. While critics said their presence had encouraged the violence, others said it brought the story to international attention and brought pressure on Bangladesh. Laurent would be killed in Cambodia three years later.

1973:

Nick Ut's photo of the Vietnamese children wounded by napalm. The girl in the center of the photo went on to study pharmacy in Cuba on orders from North Vietnam, who used her and the picture for propaganda. She would later defect with her husband at the Toronto airport and remained in Canada, reuniting with the photographer.

1976:

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Stanley Forman, fire escape collapse in Boston. The woman died but her body cushioned the child's fall. Critics charged papers with sensationalism and insensitivity, while the press reminded readers they would report the news whether it's harsh or gentle. The picture also led to greater attention and inspection efforts in many cities.

1977:

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Stanley Forman becomes the first person to win the prize in two consecutive years. Boston student protestors were out at City Hall Plaza, chanting against desegregation and busing. A black attorney unwittingly passed through on his way to work and was singled out by the mob, who grabbed him and started beating on him. One student desecrated a flag by taking the pole down and using it as a weapon, striking the victim with it multiple times.

1978:

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Josh Blair's photos of a standoff situation involving Anthony Kiritsis and Richard Hall. Kiritsis wired himself to Hall in a dead man's switch attached to a sawed-off shotgun. He blamed Hall after Hall's mortgage company had loaned him some money towards construction for a mall, which Kiritsis used along with his life's savings. Kiritsis argued that Hall had refused to help him out and had badmouthed his mall to potential investors, so that the business would fail and then Hall's company could foreclose on it. The standoff continued into a third day and some people began to see Kiritsis as some kind of hero fighting the big guy. After negotiations, he eventually agreed to immunity from the local prosecutor's office, and a press conference where he'd get the chance to tell the world his grievances. Some were worried that he'd kill Hall on air, but Kiritsis used the time to ramble about how he felt he'd been wronged and how he wanted $130,000 back from Hall, who was too tired from the ordeal to respond. "Kiritsis rambled on, wild-eyed; he waved his arm, pointed dramatically at the disoriented Hall, and told the world that he was a national hero. But the perception of the little guy versus the big guy dissipated. Kiritsis was obviously out of control." Kiritsis left the press conference and walked with Hall into a nearby apartment, and a shot rang out. Who died? Nobody: Kiritsis had freed Hall, shot a blast into the air and then walked out unarmed. He would be declared insane and sent to a mental institution.

1980:

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An anonymous photographer wins the prize for his photos of the Ayatollah Khomeini's execution of the Kurds, in what would come to be known as ethnic cleansing. Khomeini's henchmen, after taking control of Iran, were now sent into Kurdistan to deny their desire for independence. Mass beheadings, firing squads, and other forms of execution followed on the killing fields. The anonymous photographer with UPI managed to capture one of the executions on film, but his identity was kept secret to avoid a similar fate (either inside or outside Iran). In 2006 the man's identity was revealed as Jahangir Razmi, a Tehran cameraman. He received his $10,000 prize the next year at the Pulitzer reward lunch in New York City.

1981:

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Liberia's coup d'etat that would lead to decades of instability. The issue? "slaves freed before the American Civil War...black colonials developed a ruling aristocracy that presided over the more traditional tribal populations. Inequity was deeply established in the country." The president was assassinated and a string of executions followed. Deposed cabinet members were forced to march through the streets, tied to poles, and shot. Larry Price, the only American cameraman on the scene, captured the moment. The coup's leader would executed himself ten years later.

1983:

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James B. Dickman's gruesome photos from El Salvador. In 1980, Bishop Oscar Romero was killed for criticizing the government's policies and a bomb was thrown at mourners during his funeral. In a largely Roman Catholic country, these actions led to more anti-government activity, which in turn led to more crackdowns by the government's death squads.

1984:

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Anthony Suau's picture of a grieving woman on Memorial Day.

1985: Larry Price wins another Pulitzer for his coverage of two rebel movements that year - Angola and El Salvador. The American-backed rebels in Angola held about half the country, fighting against the Cuban/Soviet-supported government. Coverage was sparse and getting in would be difficult, but Price found a way in after he met a nurse who knew medical aid personnel working in Angola. From there he got in touch with anti-government Angola reps in Washington, and after months of setup he finally got on the ground with the rebels. The trip was meant to last three weeks, but ended up lasting six. Getting out turned out to be difficult as well: "Our families and the people at the Inquirer wondered what happened to us." At one point Angolan government pinned down the rebel unit with air surveillance and they went for two days without water, but eventually he got out by slipping into rebel-friendly Zaire. El Salvador's rebels were in worse shape because the government had much better control. Price's unit was trapped under a culvert after a helicopter opened fire on them. The rebels were worried that the government forces would conduct a ground sweep to finish them off, but fortunately this did not happen.

1990: David Turnley covers the Tiananmen Square carnage, the fall of the Berlin Wall AND the end of Ceaucescu. He captured early photos of the advancing Chinese troops by standing up on a flimsy bike supported only by its kickstand, which allowed him to get some height over the crowds. Unfortunately it also meant he stood out, and Chinese forces spotted him. The Chinese chased him down and broke his cameras, but undeterred he returned to the scene after he borrowed another camera at his hotel. There he covered the troop attacks, which occurred every 15 minutes until the students were driven out at 5am that night. The real body count is still unknown. Turnley turned to Berlin Wall coverage the moment he heard the news at a New York exhibition, quickly boarding a flight to Germany. He made his way through heavy traffic by hiring a motorcycle and arrived in time to photograph its destruction. He also met two elderly women who tearfully met up near Checkpoint Charlie after the wall came down. Asking if they were relatives, the women revealed that they were not. They only knew each other because they lived next to the wall on opposite sides, and waved back and forth every morning. Later, Turnley made his way into Romania after some difficulty by hitching a ride on a bus belonging to Doctors Without Borders. The mood was different from Berlin - Ceaucescu was slain and the country's future uncertain.

1991:

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Greg Marinovich photographs the deadly violence in South Africa, as part of a group of white photographers who would come to be known as the "Bang-Bang Group" for their coverage of deadly violence in the country. Nelson Mandela's recently-legalized ANC party was fighting against the Zulu-backed Inkatha party for supremacy..."as the two fighting factions battled hand to hand with rocks, knives, spears, and small arms, police often used excessive firepower to stop the outbreaks, and photographers ended up in the crossfire." The group traveled together as a protective measure in case violence broke out, "violence that could easily be turned against white photographers." In previous months, hundreds had been killed in work hostels that Marinovich was watching over, and he would go on to cover the additional flareups of violence. On one occasion, 4-5 men pushed a captive off a nearby train station into the street, claiming he was with the Inkatha. When Marinovich asked how they knew this, they simply said "We know." The attackers began to stone the victim, and then stabbed him in the chest with large knives. When the man tried to get up, his attackers threw some larger boulders at him. At this point the attackers told Marinovich to stop taking pictures, to which he replied "I'll stop making pictures when you stop killing him." The attackers continued, however, driving a dagger into the victim's head, throwing more stones until someone threw gasoline and a match on him. The victim jumped up one last time and ran in a few circles before he fell a final time. Marinovich continued to cover South African violence until he was seriously wounded in 1992. Another member of the Bang-Bang group died in the same attack.

1991: William Snyder wins a Pulitzer for covering overcrowded orphanages in Romania, "social debris that Ceaucescu left behind". Neglect, malnutrition, dirty needles and the subsequent wide spread of diseases (including AIDS) were documented.

1992:

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The AP covers the death of the Soviet Union. Gorbachev was holed up for 80 hours as communist hardliners tried to retake control, but Yeltsin went to the streets and climbed a tank urging Russians to stand against the hardliners. Much of the Russian military and KGB joined the people, not wanting to fire on tens of thousands of their countrymen. After the coup collapsed, Gorbachev returned and found that street activists had torn down the statues of Lenin and other communist elites. After pressure from Yeltsin, Gorbachev agreed to dissolve the discredited Communist party and Soviet satellites began to secede. The red flag was soon taken down from the Kremlin itself. Gorbachev would resign on Christmas Day, 1991.

1994:

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Paul Watson, photo of a dead American soldier dragged through the streets of Mogadishu. 450 American soldiers were in the country on a mission to track down Mohammed Fatah Aidid, a key leader in the 1991 overthrow of the government that had thrown Somalia into chaos. Mohammed had also killed 24 Pakistani peacekeepers and three journalists. The Americans tracked down the Mogadishu hideout of his lieutenants and an unexpectedly-fierce fight broke out. Watson was one of the few journalists left in the city and watched the fight from his hotel rooftop. Two US helicopters were downed by RPGs and the resulting rescue effort led to an hours-long battle into the night in what was described as the worst combat since Vietnam. Watson, accompanied by bodyguards armed with AK-47s, tracked down the folks who paraded the dead American's body through the streets the following day. He managed to get pictures before the bodyguards told him the crowd was making threats and it wasn't safe to stick around. Mohammed Aidid was killed in 1996 but the anarchy continues.

1994:

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Kevin Carter's Sudan photo of a dying child, vulture lying in wait. Carter scared the vulture off after taking the shot. The animist south had opposed the northern Muslim-controlled government's influence for decades, and by 1992 the north had tried to impose Islamic law on the south, and was diverting international aid away from the south and to themselves. Millions were displaced and the UN, constantly under attack, discontinued food distribution to interior villages. Carter, a member of the Bang-Bang Group, became depressed after taking photos of the starving children. Just days after winning the Pulitzer, Carter learned that 1991's winner Greg Marinovich had been seriously wounded, and his best friend Ken Oosterbroek was killed in South Africa. Critics made things even worse when they accused Carter of staging his photo, asked why he didn't do more to help the girl, and accused him of being just another vulture at the scene. Haunted by the nightmarish images he saw throughout his career, Carter killed himself that July.

1995: Carol Guzy covers the regime change in Haiti. The country's ruling elite had been largely isolated from the rest of the world after a US-led trade embargo, enacted because the junta had thrown out Haiti's democratically elected president in 1991. Thousands of Haitians fled as the country grew poorer and poorer under the ruling generals, who also became increasingly harsher. The US took in refugees at Guantanamo. Talk of an international invasion of Haiti ended after negotiations, when the president was reinstated under 20,000 multi-national peacekeepers and the generals agreed to leave the country. Jean-Bertrand Aristide's entry into office was expected to be shaky, because he was seen as a unreliable ally who had openly opposed American policies. At a celebration parade, a junta supporter threw a grenade into the crowd killing several people. Some in the crowd grabbed a nearby person as a scapegoat and started beating him up, but the intervention of a GI saved the man's life. Guzy's photo of the moment won the Pulitzer that year, the first woman to win the prize twice.

2001: Alan Diaz captures the taking of Elian Gonzalez by armed agents. The man photographed with Elian was Donato Darlymple, who had rescued him from the ocean after their craft sank and was now a close family friend.

2007:

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Israeli soldiers break up a Jewish settlement. "The girl in the picture, who identified herself only as Nili, was a fifteen-year-old resident...She called the picture a disgrace to Israel because, she said, it showed the security forces attacking the people instead of defending them."

2009:

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Obama campaign coverage. Remember the hype? Here's a creepy photo of fence-watchers eagerly waiting for a glimpse of their messiah.

[Tails82]

1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die

Of which I have heard...138.

[Tails82]

50 Politics Classics - Tom Butler-Bowdon.

SPOILER: Click to show

"A sketch of the perennial divide between those who believe that government is there actively to improve peoples' lives, and those who believe that its main purpose is to ensure liberty."

imo you can't improve someone's life if they're engaged in self-destructive behavior, because rewarding them for that (aside from stealing from other taxpayers) props up the bad behavior and encourages it, leading to national decay, decline and ultimate destruction from within. All you do with redistribution is 1) make one person's life worse when you take their cash, and 2) send the cash to corrupt causes that would've failed on their own, so that corruption flourishes. Turning corruption from a few bad apples that would collapse on their own, into a nationalized corrupt system where everyone is made to fail in the end.

Therefore,

"Philosophy of Freedom: Liberty as an End in Itself"

"Lord Acton saw history as one long movement toward greater freedom, with Providence working behind events to ensure that good eventually triumphed over evil. Yet knowing that political liberty means freedom of action, he had no illusions of ever achieving a perfect society. The moment that a ruler or a state decides to achieve a certain perfection, or 'one view' of how things should be, is when things start to go bad. For Acton, liberty was 'the delicate fruit of a mature civilization.' It takes a long time for freedom to become rooted in institutions, and even then it is prey to subversion and corruption.

"Hannah Arendt noted that totalitarian movements get their power from a claim to be expressions of 'inevitable' forces of Nature or History. Compared to these forces the individual life and its freedoms mean little, and so people become dispensable."

There are other groupings the author makes, not necessarily limited to ideology but rather the means to bring about those views. So a group like "Act Now: The Role of Political Activism" includes Saul Alinsky and Rachel Carson, as well as Thomas Paine and Henry David Thoreau. Then there are realists in geopolitics vs visionaries, and again this includes leaders on the left and right.

"Although the moral leadership of a Martin Luther King, Gandhi, or Mandela can be hugely significant in making the case for change, it is something else to be sitting in the president's or prime minister's chair and making decisions that will affect millions. Churchill's prowess as a wartime leader came partly from his skill as a historian; he was able to see Hitler's rise as simply another example of pan-European aggression, and as the only one to have seen service in the Great War, he had unusual clarity about Germany's true designs. What Britain should be doing, he felt, was as clear as day. The question was how to put the fight to Hitler when the time inevitably came, and he spent his ten 'wilderness years' up to 1939 immersing himself in the minutiae of the British navy's capabilities and technology. Churchill's brilliance lay in being absolutely correct on the policy side (where Chamberlain and many others failed), combined with an extraordinary grasp of detail. Clausewitz's statement that 'Amateurs focus on strategy, experts on logistics,' could not have been more apt."

The book will also look at passages discussing the best form of government...

"To deprive man of freedom is to relegate him to the status of a thing, rather than elevate him to the status of a person. Man must never be treated as a means to the end of the state, but always as an end within himself." -Martin Luther King

Aristotle looked for a form of government that had the most advantages with the least disadvantages, and concluded democracy offered the most positives - not because he saw all people as equal but because "The many are more incorruptible than the few." When a large property-holding group of citizens has a say in how the state works, there is incentive to keep the state going. This stability is sorely lacking in oligarchies or tyrannies. "Edmund Burke made much the same argument in his polemical reaction to the French Revolution. Because the French state had been taken over by unpropertied upstarts who had nothing to lose, they happily trashed all Ancien Regime institutions, even if they had done much good and formed France's social fabric. Like Aristotle, Burke argued that the state was not simply an administrative body to regulate the economy and keep law and order, but was to be revered as 'a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born.'

"So blinded by power are some monarchs that they cannot see that even they must govern with some degree of consent. Confucius's great interpreter Mancius put this well: 'The people are of supreme importance; the altars of the gods of earth and grain come next; last comes the ruler.' John Locke was also of the conservative mold at a time when European monarchies were not friendly. We might take government by popular consent for granted now, but it was risky to say this at the time. Critics blamed Locke's philosophy for its influence on the French and American revolutions, and also denounced his calls for religious liberty and his idea that "Every man has a Property in his own Person which no Body has any Right to but himself" - which influenced the anti-slavery movement. De Tocqueville wrote on his visits to America that, while democratic societies seemed more tumultuous and unrefined compared to the "tranquility" of establishment monarchies, the stability of monarchs was mostly an illusion - because the longer the few in power oppressed the many and did not govern according to their interests, the more fragile the regime became, and more ripe for revolution. "De Tocqueville concluded that what more equal and democratic societies lack in noble refinement, they make up for in being more just."

Our Founders recognized that most people would push for their own values to be forced on everyone else, it was better to have a pluralistic and divided system to place a check on the different factions and separate branches of government. Finally, Orwell's picture of Stalinism in Animal Farm became reality once the writings of dissidents like Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn were smuggled out of the USSR and into America. These accounts undermined the Soviet myth that theirs was a great land of equality. "The book reminds us that, despite the best of intentions, most revolutions simply substitute one ruling class for another. States that claim to be 'servants of the people' often turn out to be the most brutal."

The final division is the question of whether economic prosperity leads to political stability, or if it's the other way around. Some writers note that the poorest nations have one main thing in common, failed states. There's no incentive to invest in a lawless region. But others argue that the more entrenched the government is, the more power a select few special interest groups have, leading to a bad economy and growing grievances that can only be addressed through violence. In The Fourth Revolution, the authors write "Government used to be an occasional partner in life...Today it is an omnipresent nanny." (And might I mention, as the government's control over more areas of daily life grows, so too does the control of those special interests). The state's natural tendency is to always grow, but this growth is not matched with a growth of confidence among the people. In the 1960s, 70 percent of Americans said they had confidence in the US government. Today it's down to 17 percent.

---

So let's get into Essays on Freedom and Power: "Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end."

Lord Acton: writing on political and Vatican corruption, Acton opposed the absolute power of a monarch and the claim of papal infallibility from popes who had illegitimate children. Acton wrote in a private letter:

"I cannot accept your canon that we are to judge Pope and King unlike other men, with favorable presumption that they did no wrong. If there is any presumption it is the other way, against the holders of power, increasing as the power increases. Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

"Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence not authority: still more when you ass the tendency of the certainty of corruption by authority. There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it."

"Thus, the famous 'power corrupts' line must be seen within the context of papal infallibility, which Acton vigorously opposed at the First Vatican Council in 1870. As a staunch Catholic, he believed that the moral laws of the Church were perfect, but that human beings certainly were not. To stay in power a good person may need to become bad, and their potential for badness grows in line with the extent of their power."

Acton published no books in his lifetime but worked on a history of liberty, tracing its slow emergence from the classical to the modern world. His essays were published after his death, but his ideas did not gain in popularity until WWII when people began to see them as a prophetic warning against totalitarians.

Acton believed in universal truth and empirical research, looking across cultures rather than focusing on the historical views of one's own nation, and viewing history through the lens of timeless moral standards, preferably Christian ones. Along with de Tocqueville, he believed that Providence worked over time, spreading good and civilization where there was once ignorance and evil. This does not mean that humans will reach perfection on this earth, since civilized society remains always-vulnerable to corruption. But it also means that tyrannies and absolutists will never last, either. No group can obtain permanent obedience and must always justify its power - and the longer abuse goes on, the harder it is for them to justify themselves. Absolutist regimes look powerful but are as fragile as an egg.

Unsurprisingly, Acton believed freedom of conscience and religion was the basic liberty that secured the rest. Although well-off himself, Acton had been denied entry into Cambridge because he was a Catholic. The history of liberty throughout the ages was "the deliverance of man...from the power of man." While England had shown itself to be more free than other nations, a nation must never rest on its laurels, as the mistakes of Greece and Rome showed us. Acton pointed out in one essay that we must not forget the difference between democracy and true liberty - many democracies allowed the slave trade to flourish. Liberty was always to be protected, advanced and constantly maintained.

Acton viewed American society as a combination of popular sovereignty with some caution like the English parliament. Americans did not give into the French Revolution's excesses which, much like the excesses of monarchy, proved abusive. America's government was strong enough to get things done, but still balanced out by the states. "It was democracy in its highest perfection...armed and vigilant, less against aristocracy and monarchy than against its own weaknesses and excess." Americans sought equality of opportunity, not the French state's forced wealth redistribution that was "drenched in blood." Like democracy, Acton also pointed out that equality and liberty were not the same things. Was democracy worth it if it did not protect essential liberties? How could equality through redistribution be justified when it meant violence and theft against others?

One of Acton's great points is that democracies have to choose between sovereignty of the people (which can devolve into mob rule) or the rule of law. The framework provided by the rule of law is much more successful in protecting liberty. He warned that we must not equate democracy with liberty when our rights can be attacked by 'popular will,' and that no one in a democracy should be complacent. Democracy is only valuable to the extent that it enhances and preserves our liberties. If it does not, then the occasional vote is a hollow gesture.

Daron Acemoglu and James A Robinson: Why Nations Fail. The argument that the poorest countries of the world all have failed states - the incentive to create wealth disappears in these areas. The authors begin by noting the protesters against Mubarak in Egypt: when asked what they wanted, one of the leading protest bloggers focused entirely on political ends. The elite had rigged the system for itself, and until that changed there would be no economic betterment. Meanwhile, outside experts raised explanations such as a desire for more wealth, Egypt's geography as the reason its state was doing poorly, poor work ethic from Egyptians...The authors argued that the protesters were right and the experts were wrong. Failed states across the globe had one thing in common: elites had seized political power and then looted all the wealth, ending opportunities for advancement and prosperity for the masses. It's only natural that the economy stagnates, as nobody else has any incentive to work because they will not see any advancement. In developed nation, nobody expects that the government is going to take you from your house in the middle of the night and steal your property for itself, with no explanation. It's not just government services that lead to success - rather, the driving force of a good economy is the rule of law and legal transparency. People do not risk their lives by the millions to cross borders, rivers and seas just so they can get better social services and health care. They are looking for opportunity and freedom that has been denied to them by their own country's ruling elites.

So why do authoritarian leaders not see this, and continue spending on themselves? Because power is hard to give up. These leaders continue to spend lavishly on themselves, looting from the people, because they look at their personal goals and believe it's better to loot for themselves and spend lavishly now, look like a powerful and rich ruler to secure their power today, rather than be remembered as an adequate leader who just led the country through modest economic growth. If they decided to give up power: 1) they've seen through centuries of failed revolutions that the guys who replace them will be as bad, or worse, and 2) if they hold a real democratic vote, it'll just mean they get voted out of power. Once an entrenched system of government is in place, the incentive is for the existing government to keep the well-connected pleased. There's no incentive to appeal to the people. The powerful seek to protect their own interests in an "iron law of oligarchy," a term coined by Robert Michels.

The authors point out that the growth seen in authoritarian institutions is not what it seems. The Soviet Union rapidly expanded from the 30s to the 70s, as the state moved the economy from agriculture to industry. It looked like it was on the rise, but by the 1980s it had run out of steam. Growth came to a halt because "lack of innovations and poor economic incentives prevented any further progress." We are seeing the same thing in China today, they argue. (And I agree - much of what the Soviets did involved stealing from us or from their own people, and China's cyberattacks on us continue. It's no atomic bomb espionage, but they're relying on us to advance rather than producing innovations of their own). While China's government is more diversified than the Soviet state, and there are some entrepreneurs, the basic problem remains: sustained growth is not possible when the government controls its big companies, which will stagnate when they face new challenges and are not able to reinvent themselves. The state shows no signs of becoming more inclusive or answerable to the broader citizenry. Paradoxically, things are more equal for all when the selfish motives of the people at large can be satisfied.

Saul Alinsky: Rules for Radicals, focuses entirely on power and revolutionary means to get it. "It is impossible to conceive of a world devoid of power; the only choice of concepts is between organized and unorganized power." Surprisingly, Alinsky believed in compromise (if you start with nothing, demand 100 percent and get 30 percent, you're 30 ahead). He denounced flag-burning and said that real radicals would cut their hair, because all the excess and obnoxiousness of the hippie era did was automatically annoy people and turn them off to the message right from the start. But at the same time he believed you had to see things in black and white and, despite that 30 percent compromise, be convinced you were 100 percent right and that your opponents were totally immoral. (I agree with this in the sense that what HE wanted was totally immoral, because...) Alinsky did not examine whether the ends justified the means, arguing that everyone was going to do something corrupt - "He who fears corruption fears life." Alinsky denounced concerns for morality because he believed it was the most moral people who did not act. Individual conscience was secondary to community organizing, by force if necessary, because we should be willing to corrupt ourselves to help the movement get what it wants. Imo this is the ideology for aspiring oligarchs, as discussed directly above...Alinsky concedes that there is corruption and an amoral pursuit of power inherent in this movement so that the activists can get what they want from others, which is often material stuff. He also concedes that this movement has historically been unsuccessful, as the activists disengaged after their early lootings and went back to an apathy that let Stalin and Mao come to power. I would argue instead that Alinsky's ideology is directly to blame for them, not just an onlooker, because they encouraged a movement for thieves and an environment where one of the best thieves would naturally emerge as king. They should not be let off the hook just because they say afterwards that they didn't like the consequences, and try to blame someone else for what they did.

Graham T. Allison and Philip Zelikow: examine the decision-making of individuals vs institutions during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Some argue that ultimately institutions will be rational actors, but this view fails to account for matters like pride, ambition, limited information, etc. The US thought that the Soviets would not send ballistic missiles to Cuba, believing this to be an irrational move. But this issue was just as much about Soviet pride and the desire to send a message to the US, humiliate them in some way and put pressure on them to withdraw from Berlin. Another example is Saddam's invasion of Kuwait, which was not rational from a military standpoint because he'd be roflstomped, but to fulfill his irrational desire to be seen as a leader of the Arab world.

On another end is the argument that institutions can intrude on personal decision-making, for good or ill. While our excellent intel gathering let us know the extent of the weaponry in Cuba, the Kennedy administration, CIA and Navy all had their own opinions on how to respond. On the Soviet end, Khrushchev had his own initial desire to send missiles as a tactical move, and this was pushed to more militaristic ends by the Soviet army which started sending a bunch more weaponry. There were also side matters like when a U2 pilot in Alaska strayed into Soviet airspace during this time, which was not ordered by any person but the result of an electronic malfunction, a "routine" action that went astray and could've triggered a WWIII response from Soviet institutions.

The third model looks at the whole decision-making process, not just the action that was decided but the other options and opinions as they played out, in a kind of court setting. Kennedy was under pressure to look tough because congressional elections were coming up and his failure to deal with Cuba had been his Achilles heel - Robert Kennedy thought that to do nothing as the Soviets brought nukes right up to our door would've meant impeachment. The head of the Joint Chiefs wanted a blitz attack to take everything out in Cuba in one crack. SecDef McNamara favored the blockade, reasoning that the overall nuclear balance had not shifted and that the positioning in Cuba was a question of politics rather than a military problem. JFK would not attack, believing the move would've been like Pearl Harbor and the Soviets would respond by invading West Berlin, leading to nuclear war. But no matter what he decided, some within the organization would be disappointed. Kennedy mixed diplomacy with an ultimatum: a strike if the Soviets continued the shipments. He did not simply seek a diplomatic bargain because it'd give Khrushchev the impression that the US was desperate and he could press for more demands without consequence. But there was no set timeline for withdrawal and Khrushchev used this to save face, in return getting a pledge from Kennedy not to intervene in Cuba. The authors write that Khrushchev's final decision to stop arms shipments was influenced by a Soviet spy in the National Press Club, who heard from a Chicago reporter that an attack was prepared and ready to begin at any moment. Small and obscure details like this can change history.

Norman Angell: war between advanced nations makes no sense because of economic integration. In a long pamphlet he published in 1909, Angell argued that Germany's actions would be disastrous and counterproductive. This was at a time when Germany was looking to get for itself what Britain had, and believed they needed an advanced navy to bring it about. Angell's writings stirred controversy and led to a response from Churchill. Of course, Europe went to war twice after that despite the economic connections. Angell expanded his writings into a book and it was revised in 1933 to warn against another war. But are we too quick to dismiss it today? While true that nations acted on more than just economic matters when making the decision to go to war, is a great military necessary for economic success? Angell disliked the idea that the country with the greatest nation ultimately won the leading economy based on who had the biggest military to back them up, like a sort of Darwinian geopolitical struggle. Angell believed that a nation's prosperity did not depend on territorial expansion, and that in the modern world it was wealth rather than raw power that matters. Also, the cost of war would be more expensive than the perceived gains of success. Angell believed that it the nations who were most unfit were actually the ones who were most willing to start a war - they attack other countries because something is wrong with their system at home. A truly successful state is prosperous enough that it sees no need to go to war. A nation's true value is determined by its entrepreneurs and traders. Wealth is generated by individuals, and Germany would not automatically gain the wealth of Holland just by sending in the army. Angell also argued that the British empire worked not because of the military force behind it, but because it was a system of trade between relatively independent nations - Britain did not "own" them in the sense that they had to pay tribute or else. Therefore, a power like Germany could not expect to invade one of those colonies and expect to "own" them, or gain tribute from them when Britain itself never did in the first place.

Pacifists have usually been criticized as idealistic and unrealistic, but Angell's arguments led to other criticism that he was too materialistic: denying the moral or ideal reasons to wage war because they did not want to give up any of their personal comforts that they had in peacetime. But Angell's argument concerned the people at large: among democratic nations, war would be decided not by the leaders but by the majority, who would deliberate the gains and the risks involved. Future conflicts would not be started between free nations, who could instead work through cooperation and trade to benefit everyone. Instead, war in the modern world would begin between different ideologies. Recently some critics have noted the parallels between the economic arguments of today and those of 1914, and asked whether we are being too naive like Angell - soon enough, Putin invaded Crimea despite all the economic arguments against it and the country's credit rating. Yet overall, despite two huge wars and multiple genocides, today the average person has a lower chance of a violent death in war than at any other time in history. Angell later noted that he had been too optimistic, but that he had not argued war would end entirely - only that it would be futile.

Hannah Arendt: The Origins of Totalitarianism. "The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction and the distinction between true and false no longer exist."

Arendt was a German-Jewish intellectual who had been barred from teaching by the Nazis. As a result she became more involved in politics and joined the German Zionist Organization, then she was arrested by the Gestapo. Escaping from a camp with her husband, she fled to France and then to America where she became a citizen. She also became involved in organizations that helped other Jews escape, and became the first female politics professor at Princeton. Like millions of others, she wanted to know how this totalitarian system had happened. Once fully in power, the totalitarian continues to strike and bumps his attacks up to full force. For example, Stalin only began his great purges in 1934, after he had executed or sent all his potential opposition to the gulag. The totalitarian is not content with political power and continues on, trying to control the thoughts and minds of everyone so that the state and the people are one and the same. Under this system, the individual means nothing and the state believes any action it takes is justified. Arendt made a bold comment at the time that Nazism and Communism were two sides of the same totalitarian coin, one based on race, one based on class. They were morally the same. Many people continued to believe right up to the early 1950s that the Soviets were just doing a well-intentioned socialist experiment, but then the horrors of Stalin's regime began to get out and Arendt was vindicated.

From the editor: "Although Europe had seen plenty of tyrannies that had sought to equalize and flatten social hierarchies to make countries more governable, these were not able to destroy the non-political bonds of community and family. Stalin and Hitler both saw the danger of leaving some spheres of life non-political, and made sure that every aspect of life and relationship was carried out in the name of party and country. With this demand for absolute loyalty, their regimes also required the elimination of any kind of rationale for why they should exist. While Lenin, naturally, saw all government policy in terms of whether it fitted Marxist theory, under Stalin policy itself no longer mattered, only control and power. Soviet Russia became a government of whatever Stalin had decided the night before."

Arendt noted that totalitarian governments went beyond the typical, powerful elites who could rule over society. They sought "a means of dominating and terrorizing human beings from within." Hitler argued that there was no difference between the state and the people when he said during a speech to the SA, "All that you are, you are through me; all that I am, I am through you alone." A totalitarian government is not looking at specific domestic or foreign policy achievements - its ultimate goal is to have the whole population belong to the government's way of thinking. The main territory that the totalitarian wants to invade is the mind, because when this happens it means that objective truth becomes irrelevant and the leader's propaganda is all that matters. Once laid down, the only way for a person to survive in this system is to show everyone that he is the most loyal and the most brutal.

Arendt notes that other states find it hard to read totalitarian governments, often making the mistake that they're dealing with another normal, rational government. This is why appeasement failed and only impending nuclear annihilation held back the Soviets: because they saw their nations as only temporary headquarters for a international movement that was on its way to world conquest. A totalitarian does NOT exist for nationalism or to advance a country. It exists for international domination, and the well-being of the people within the countries they currently control is the least of their concerns.

Arednt warns that we must not write these 20th century totalitarian movements off as aberrations. These ideologies nearly swept the world, and attracted so many people at first because they claimed they were "scientific" or "inevitable" results of our future. Engels said at Marx's funeral, "Just as Darwin discovered the law of development of organic life, so Marx discovered the development of human history." The members of totalitarian movements continue to be convinced that they represent the future, and it's only a matter of time before our current system dies off completely and is replaced by their oppressive regime on a global level.

Thankfully, there is one saving grace: the regimes are short-lived because facts get in. The totalitarians can come out of nowhere, reign supreme while they exist, but they collapse in short order. But they can't remain stable when they reach nation status, because the simple fact is that they aren't a global movement and this fiction becomes more unbelievable the longer it goes on. This is too late for the people who are caught in it, but not for the rest of us. Try to quickly conquer the world like Hitler, and the rest of the world fights back. Stay within the state's boundaries like Stalin, and the truth leaks in from other parts of the world. This is why totalitarianism collapses and becomes increasingly controlling over daily life, in an attempt to stop the truth from getting in, ultimately resorting to concentration camps even when the police were enough to stop political dissent. Because the internal police wouldn't stop other ideas from getting in, and once that happens it's game over. Arendt's writings are still relevant even though Hitler and Stalin are long gone, because every form of government known to man has repeated itself. There is no reason to believe totalitarianism will not reappear at some point.

[Allaprima ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ ✔]

Remembered Overlord exists, so I decided to read the LNs from the start instead of just going from where the anime left off.

[Preventing Google Doxxing]

Are those not shit?
Dropped the show around episode 7 because nothing had happened up to that point.

[Allaprima ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ ✔]

I liked it enough to catch up on all 10 LNs and I'm hyped for the 11th coming at the end of the month, but it's probably not for everyone. (if only I didn't have to then wait on the translation team)
Author has a habit of giving you 100 pages from the point of view of people you're 100% certain are going to die horribly.

[Tails82]

50 Politics Classics continued.

SPOILER: Click to show

Aristotle: men are set apart from animals by their morality, the ability to discern good from evil. The state at first glance appears to be for defense, but Aristotle argues it "is a creation of nature and prior to the individual" - the state serves a moral purpose, not only for us to flourish but to live in a just society. It exists not only for defense against violence, but to develop the spiritual and philosophical well-being of its people.

Difference between him and Plato: they agreed on the purpose of the state, but Plato believed a state was only as good as the citizens who made it up, so he believed in aggressive social engineering. Censorship, common property, and rule by elite all had a role to play in his form of government. Aristotle was more inclined to believe the family unit and private property were the bedrock of society. Both were skeptical of pure democracy and its mob-rule, but Aristotle had more faith in the people than Plato. "Aristotle's keener appreciation of human nature meant his politics were more realistic, and as a result more influential on states and governments through the ages."

Aristotle examined whether slave ownership was unjust, and concluded that since within nature there are some who are born to rule while others are to serve, this would remain a necessary part of life. Just as some had a talent for politics, others were suited for work. But Aristotle warned that the master-slave relationship would only work if both recognized their place, accepted it and worked together. It would be bad for both slave and master if this relationship was only in place because it was forced through law. Aristotle did not look at whether an educated slave could rise, and was probably unwilling to go much further because the Greek city-state relied on slave labor at the time. His conclusion is that the government and the family are not structured the same. While the family has a head of household, a state must be made up of equals and freemen who are ruled through a constitution.

Because virtuous living is the path to happiness, Aristotle's state exists to help pursue virtue. How to organize this state? Aristotle says it does not work for relationships and children to be made common (knocking the Spartan model). Property? It also cannot be shared commonly because it goes against human nature. Enmity and instability result. People should be left to pursue their own interests free of coercion, but should be encouraged to share with others. "Plato believed that the state would only be strong if fully unified, and social and cultural life strictly controlled, whereas Aristotle maintains just the opposite: A state becomes strong thanks to a plurality of voices and ideas." Although Aristotle agreed that education should not be left up to families, he did not go as far as Plato and wanted something more like a public school rather than Plato's system of mass indoctrination.

Aristotle's divisions of government were the three main systems of government plus their corrupted form: Kingship / Tyranny, Aristocracy / Oligarchy, and Polity / Democracy. Aristotle believed the latter was more stable than oligarchy because "the many are more incorruptible than the few," but he did not favor unlimited democracy. Oligarchy was rule by the rich, democracy rule by poor. The rich would resort to violence because they had too much to protect, while the poor would be violent and unstable because they had nothing to lose. Aristotle believed the most stable system was one with a large middle class that had modest property ownership and direct involvement in government affairs.

2/3rds of Aristotle's original work is lost to us.

Isaiah Berlin: Two Concepts of Liberty, originally an essay for Oxford in 1958. His father had been a timber merchant who pulled the family out of Russia shortly after the Bolshevik uprising, and fled to England. Berlin wondered why leftists in the US and Britain were praising the Soviet Union and arguing that the socialist regime served to "liberate" the people, as they turned a blind eye to the loss of personal freedom and the destruction caused by those regimes.

"Humanity is the raw material upon which I impose my creative will; even though men suffer and die in the process, they are lifted by it to a height to which they could never have risen without my coercive - but creative - violation of their lives. This is the argument used by every dictator, inquisitor or bully who seeks some moral, or even aesthetic, justification for his conduct. I must do for men (or with them) what they cannot do for themselves, and I cannot ask their permission or consent, because they are in no condition to know what is best for them."

Berlin defined the two different concepts of liberty at play here: Negative liberty and positive liberty. Negative liberty is preferred because it is the extent to which we are free from government interference. Positive liberty followed to its conclusion leads to abuse, because when one person in power believes they know the best path (ex the government providing health care, education, etc), they view themselves as enlightened and believe that the use of coercion and force against others is justified - because if other people were as enlightened as I am, they would voluntarily do these actions anyway, so I am acting for their own good whether they like it or not. Berlin argues that once you take this view of positive liberty enforced by government rule, you give yourself license to "bully oppress, torture them in the name, and on behalf, of their 'real' selves." This view paints the leader as having the only correct, truly enlightened view, and imposes it on others through force because they are simply too ignorant to see how great my way is. "Many a tyrant could use this formula to justify his worst acts of oppression." If you refuse to go along, you are painted as an enemy of the people. But as Kant put it, "Nobody may compel me to be happy in his own way."

This is the problem behind every law, whether you range from Marx to Locke: every such action impedes individual liberty in some way. Hegel, Marx etc. argued that if you create a truly rational state, then domination and power wouldn't be necessary because everyone would willingly follow it on their own. But Berlin notes that this assumption makes the leap that only my position is rational, and everybody else's beliefs are not. Even Locke said "Where there is no law there is no freedom" while Montesquieu, Kant and Burke believed political liberty was not the freedom to do what we want, but the ability to "do what we ought" - this is the idea that law and liberation are the same thing, because rational laws have the authority of God, nature, and history behind them. They are therefore "self-evident." But we should not delude ourselves into thinking that even a limited government's presence does not restrict our liberty in some way. Even "doing what we ought" comes at a cost to liberty.

Once we open this door to rule by enlightened leadership, we get people trying to impose their will on us. As Fichte put it, "No one has rights...against reason." Comte asked, if we do not allow free thinking in sciences like chemistry and biology, why allow it in politics or social matters? Berlin says if we follow this line of argument to its logical conclusion "There can only be one correct way of life." Wise people will pursue reason on their own, but everyone else is coerced against their will. This is the Plato model of an enlightened philosopher-ruler, which asks "Why should demonstrable error be suffered to survive and breed?" This opens the path to despotism and the punishment of other people as acceptable, on the assumption that only we are the real rational leaders.

This model of rationality in politics has some big assumptions: that the one true purpose of all people is rational self-direction, that the true end of all rational beings is one single, harmonious arrangement which some men can perceive more clearly than others, that all conflict in the world is caused by the clash between reason and the irrational (and are totally avoidable, completely impossible between rational beings on their own), and that once all immature or irrational people are made to be rational, they will obey to be law-abiding by nature, which is the same within everyone.

Berlin asks, are any of these assumptions true or even demonstrable? "Not only are they not, he argues, but if you follow the assumptions to their end you can arrive at a chilling conclusion: If I can see and appreciate what is true, then I have the authority to shape and control your life." The French Revolution was said to have "liberated" France and yet "sovereignty of the people" did not lead to more freedom for individuals. Rousseau's "popular rule" was criticized for being "rule of each by the rest" in practice. For Benjamin Constant, the issue wasn't who should be in power, but how much power the government should be allowed to have in the first place. Berlin noted that he was not against efforts to improve humankind, but warned that there was not a single answer out there that could serve as panacea. This false belief, that a single formula could unite us all, has been used by tyrannical regimes and paternalistic states to justify the loss of liberty. As Kant remarked, there is no value higher than the individual that we can pursue, and we must not use individuals as a means to some political end when we are ends in ourselves.

Berlin: "to manipulate men, to propel them towards goals which you - the social reformer - see, but they may not, is to deny their human essence, to treat them as objects without wills of their own, and therefore to degrade them." Going back to Acton: freedom is an end in itself. John Stuart Mill noted that there will be millions of "experiments in living" and that many will fail, but at least those who will fail will learn their own lessons.

Edward Bernays: propaganda as a neutral tool, but we must recognize its techniques if we are to have power in modern society. Propaganda originally meant the promotion of a certain set of ideas, but took on a negative tone in the 20th century as it was used to drum up war to the masses. Bernays was part of the Wilson administration and portrayed the new field of PR as a step up from hucksters or mere advertising. Walter Lippman had a low view of voters' ability to make rational decisions, being distracted by so many other concerns. He argued democracy would only work if we had intelligent people dedicate their time to sifting through the data so they could make decisions. Propaganda was then simply the smart people telling you why they made this choice and then making sure you supported it. Bernays did not agree with some figures who were looking for a way to flip public opinion like a switch. Bernays said propaganda would be an inexact science as it dealt with human beings, who could be led to some extent but not accurately read.

Bernays believed that news was more effective than advertising promotion after his PR efforts for Lucky Strike cigarettes. In the 1920s, it wasn't socially acceptable for women to smoke in public. So he had some models to march in NYC's Easter Parade and light up cigarettes, which they referred to as "torches of freedom" - this made the news and spread the message more effectively. However, he would also write that an effective propagandist would believe in the message he was promoting and, after the health effects of cigarettes began to come out, he dropped doing any work for tobacco companies and lobbied other PR professionals not to do it either. Other controversies in his life included his paid position by United Fruit Company to persuade Eisenhower to overthrow Guatemala's government. Propaganda became a dirty word after books like Falsehood in Wartime (1928, Arthur Ponsonby) came out, and Bernays would be referred to by one journalist as "the Machiavelli of Our Time."

Social media can turn the reputation of an institution very quickly these days, but this does not diminish the use of propaganda, as these groups continue to employ PR workers to address social media criticism. Some would say social media is even a form of expansion for the field as it allows more effective propaganda to get out on the individual level.

Bernstein and Woodward: the free press and its role in preventing government corruption. Woodward had only been at the Post for 9 months and was reluctant to work with Bernstein, who was known for latching onto good stories and claiming them as his own. Bernstein was also a college dropout compared to Woodward the Yale graduate, but Woodward would concede Bernstein was the better writer. A call to a former Nixon administration official yielded surprising results: rather than a no comment or dismissal of the idea that the White House could've been involved in the break-in, he started talking about chief of staff Haldeman and his desire to get dirt on Ted Kennedy. Bernstein was also surprised to hear how the official described Nixon's inner circle: "They couldn't care less about the Republican party. Given the chance, they would wreck it."

Another important source was Hugh Sloan, who had resigned as treasurer of the CRP because he didn't like the tactics that were going on: political sabotage, fake letters on Democrat letterhead, even stuff like messing up Democrat campaign rallies by ordering hundreds of pizzas. Sloan noted that Nixon was trying to pass this off on some renegade private company set up by supporters, when it was actually a top-down operation coming directly from his administration. Ironically Watergate may have stalled this connection getting out to the public, as it was hard to believe the bungled robbery would've been done so sloppily by people supposedly connected to the president. Nixon also didn't have much to fear as he was ahead in the polls, re-elected in 1972. Post stock dropped by almost 50 percent. There had been a grand jury investigation going on for some time, but the records from it were not made public, and they were unwilling to look past the burglary itself and did not ask questions about White House involvement. Nixon might've remained president if not for the tapes, which he held on to citing executive privilege until the courts asked them to be handed over, and even then they were missing 18 minutes.

Edmund Burke: Reflections on the Revolution in France. The French Revolution started off with favorable treatment by British people, partly out of their historic animosity with the French monarchy. Aid groups like the London Revolutionary Society were set up, an even leading figures in Parliament supported the new government. Burke's criticism came only after people started looking for ways to apply revolution to Britain itself. Once seen as progressive, his book triggered criticism that he was reactionary, as Thomas Paine and Mary Wollstonecraft wrote responses as part of the backlash. However, Burke's work would become a bestseller in Britain, lead to ten printings in France, and came to be seen as prophetic. Many of the liberal intelligentsia would change their position as France turned to terror and then a military strongman, as Burke had predicted. Nine years after the revolution, Napoleon launched a major war on Europe.

"Though writing about a particular historical event, Burke's interpretation of what happened in France in 1789 turned out to be a perfect statement of modern conservatism and a warning against the overpowering of any country by godless rationalists."

Burke's writing was in response to a friend in Paris who had just become a member of the French National Assembly, explaining the British form of government to an outsider. But what also touched off his wrath was a sermon by dissenting clergyman Richard Price, who argued Britain should follow America and France into revolution. Burke did not view revolution as "historical inevitability" as some did. Rather, he argued Britain had a long tradition that differed from France, and that its Glorious Revolution had established parliament's sovereignty 100 years prior. It made no sense to throw out this long tradition of progress for an unstable revolution, when Britain was known for expanding liberty since the days of the Magna Carta. The best path forward, Burke argued, was to continue the British model - the current established principles would provide stability, while arbitrary monarchical power was limited over time as liberty increased. Although Britain would remain with its inherited government, this does not mean it couldn't be improved upon over time, as Burke favored. It simply meant that it made no sense to throw out the base that previous generations had given British society, as current and future generations would work to add more freedoms rather than attack the very foundations of society. Burke wrote of the French, "You began ill, because you began by despising everything that belonged to you." All this would bring about was destruction and loss of their previous societal inheritance.

The French revolution has been noted by many as a precursor to the Marxist revolutionary violence, and the French did it on a large scale: total overthrow of everything that existed previously, the seizure and nationalization of property, an end to all rights built up in earlier generations, and the crushing of all nobility and church presence - even disregarding the family unit. Burke saw that this clean slate approach was rooted in an anti-human philosophy, and would inevitably lead to violence. This result was not only successfully predicted by Burke after the French Revolutionary Tribunal slaughtered so many; the same result happened right on through to Stalin and Mao.

Burke said that the British system was not based on equality, and for good reason. The House of Lords existed because it gave weight to those who had existing property, and therefore a vested influence in stability. Burke noted the French intellectuals of the revolution did not have property, so they had nothing to lose and would back violent measures if they thought it would advance their interests. The House of Lords in Britain, who had a stake in societal stability, meant that people would not be making decisions to attack others for their own financial gain.

Burke did not agree the procession of Louis XVI to his death was a "triumph," but rather more like bloodlust and pursuit of human sacrifice. Burke did not like the extreme position that all monarchy was bad. He believed monarchy could be balanced out by laws and hereditary wealth. France's absolutist democracy fell apart in short order, as people looked for an end to all the violence and a return to the stability they had earlier attacked. Burke predicted the rise of a military leader who understood how to placate the soldiers, his rise to lead the army and then the country itself. Sure enough, Napoleon rose to power. Burke pointed out that revolutionaries fail to appreciate that government is there not just to appeal to their current wants, but to put a brake on their personal passions and remind them of societal conventions. Unchecked democracy creates the vacuum for a oligarch or dictator to step in and declare that there is a simple answer and one single great solution. In practice, this leader exploits the public's captivation with this idea for his own gain, at the expense of everyone else as the system becomes corrupted. On the other end, Burke argues, is a successful system like Britain's - it evolved over time organically, it offers no simple solutions from one form of government, but has a place at the table for everyone and over time benefits all people.

The presence of the British monarchy, Burke argues, provides a sense of elegance and beauty that is nowhere to be found in a government run by reason alone - a "barbarous philosophy" that does not end at truth or beauty, but at the hangman's noose. Through wars and upheaval, the French nobility and clergy had provided a continuous anchor of learning and civilized living. Thanks to them, society did not have to constantly implode and start over.

Why did Burke sympathize with America's revolution, but not the revolution in France? One reason lies with religion. The US Constitution went through great lengths to protect religious freedom and liberty. Meanwhile, the French turned to "dechristianization," violent attacks on clergy, property theft, and an imposed atheistic Cult of Reason. Another reason is that Burke had been a critic of British imperialism, particularly in India, for similar reasons to the French revolution. Burke believed that the East India Company, in its pursuit of monopoly domination, had stripped India of many of its worthwhile traditions. This view also had far-reaching applications into the 20th century.

Other positions Burke supported: strong political parties to balance out the king's power and create an effective government opposition, a free market for corn and free trade with Ireland, an end to capital punishment, and Catholic emancipation. As Paymaster of the Forces he would spearhead an Act that abolished many of the royal sinecures and offices that were funded by taxpayers.

Rachel Carson: attacked DDT, which was first used against lice in WWII to prevent the spread of typhus between soldiers, and then expanded into use as a pesticide. DDT was favored by many American farms as instrumental in fighting off fire ants. Carson was facing an uphill battle, but kept moving to make the environment into a political issue. Carson's Silent Spring opens with an imagined desolate world, where animals and plants die off en masse as a result of pesticide use. She even called it chemical warfare in nature and compared it to the effects of nuclear war. In response, Monsanto published a parody of Silent Spring called The Desolate Year, which imagined the starvation that would occur in a world where pesticides were banned. One manufacturer said Carson was being paid by the Soviets to lower our productivity. Even the author of this book admits her evidence is "selective" but it was meant to be polemical. I don't like her, if you couldn't tell already. rachelwaswrong.org/

We're not ending tonight on Rachel freaking Carson.

Winston Churchill: Churchill's talent as a leader came from placing current events in historical context. His six-volume series on The Second World War won him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1953. The subtitle shows us his purpose for writing it: "How the English-Speaking Peoples through Their Unwisdom, Carelessness, and Good Nature Allowed the Wicked to Rearm." His first chapter, "Follies of the Victors," he noted how pretty much everyone desired peace and as a result, simply assumed that nothing as horrendous as the Great War could never happen again. The Treaty of Versailles was meant to stop Germany from ever becoming an aggressor again, but France's Marshal Foch was overheard during the signing ceremony saying "This is not Peace. It is an Armistice for twenty years." The terms on Germany were considered harsh and yet a few years later the US started loaning huge sums to Germany so that it could rebuild and pay its reparations. Many Versailles terms were simply never enforced. Germany's borders remained intact, and its population (already 1/3rd larger than France) continued to grow rapidly. Locarno set Britain up as a power balance, with a bold ambition to end the "thousand-year strife" and a vow that Britain would come to the aid of Germany or France depending on who attacked first. Germany was also joining the League of Nations.

But even at the same time it was signing these deals, Germany was already secretly rearming and hiding these efforts from the Allied Commission. American loans that built new German factories were quickly converted to war production. Existing German arsenals were not destroyed, despite treaty obligations. Britain and America were simply too focused on domestic issues in this era, and many assumed that there was not going to be another major war on the horizon. Even Churchill admits he was lulled into a false sense of security early on. "the middle course adopted from desires for safety and a quiet life may be found to lead direct to the bull's-eye of disaster." Even though Germany now had a democratic constitution, the people continued to believe that this was a government imposed upon them by the enemy armies. In came Hitler.

Hitler stirred up envy against the Jews by comparing the failures of Germany to the success of wealthy European Jews, who in his mind exploited the people for monetary gain. He was convinced the Bolshevik revolution was a Jewish conspiracy, and that Germany had been undermined by Jewish war profiteers. The collapse of the German mark and hyperinflation only made things worse. Hitler would take control of the German Workers' Party and failed in his putsch, writing Mein Kampf. Despite his ideology being laid out openly, Germany's traditional military caste (who opposed the rise of Hitler's upstart Brownshirts) decided to cut a deal and compromise with him as he gained power. And despite his murderous intentions being made clear, when Germany demanded during a 1932 Disarmament Conference that it had the right to rearm, British press and intelligentsia largely supported Germany on the grounds of "the equality of states." The complacent west bowed to Germany, deciding that it would be France who had to cut its army down from 500,000 to 200,000 - while Germany could grow its army by the same amount. Churchill thought this was madness, and blamed both Labour and Conservative leaders for going along with it. Hitler's 1934 "Night of the Long Knives" when 7,000 were "liquidated," combined with anti-Semitic pogroms, only disturbed Churchill further.

Churchill urged Parliament to increase its air power, as Germany's air force would soon outnumber theirs. Yet at this time Churchill lacked any real influence, so he dedicated his time to increasing his technical military knowledge. Even after the Conservative leader Stanley Baldwin admitted Britain had been misled about the size of Germany's air force, the west was still in the grip of disarmament and League of Nations peace. In 1935 it got out that Germany was building 26,000 ton battle cruisers, when the largest size vessel they had agreed to under earlier limits was only supposed to be 6,000. Churchill hoped to be First Lord of the Admiralty in Britain's new government that year (Baldwin was prime minister), but Baldwin turned him down and didn't give him any post at all because he didn't want to be criticized by the pacifists. "Baldwin was still asserting that Britain must keep peace at any price, but in the same year, Mussolini invaded Ethiopia and joined up with Hitler, marking the end of the illusion of 'collective security.' Britain's diplomats were learning of the German hierarchy's contempt for Britain, portrayed in the German press as preferring a comfortable life over war glory." Even when Hitler invaded the Rhineland and the British/French could've stopped him, the British PM said the country could not risk going to war. Hitler rode this as a PR victory, snatched up the land and gained more power.

Churchill, meanwhile, continued writing his History of the English-Speaking Peoples. His message was that the British people throughout history had always fought against the bigger, dominating power and won. Philip II of Spain, Louis XIV, Napoleon...surely they could do the same against Hitler. Churchill had some hope that Chamberlain would have a better grip on foreign affairs after Baldwin's retirement, but Chamberlain quickly set about on the same path, rejecting an American offer to help resolve the situation. Hitler moved on to take over Austria, then Czechoslovakia, still no response from the complacent west. Churchill responded: "It is not Czechoslovakia alone which is menaced, but also the freedom and democracy of all nations. The belief that security can be obtained by throwing a small state to the wolves is a fatal delusion." Chamberlain's response? He met with Hitler and simply took him at his word that this would be the last time Germany invaded another country. 1938's Munich agreement allowed Hitler to annex the Sudetenland, Britain promised to have good relations with Nazi Germany, and that the two nations would not go to war. Chamberlain would later wave the agreement out of his window at 10 Downing Street to a crowd of cheering pacifists, calling it "peace in our time." Churchill called it "defeat without a war." We continued to sit around and by the time Hitler invaded Poland, Germany's western front would be solidified, and the war that followed was won at a much higher cost.

But for the time being, even Russia started to get in on the fun. Originally offering a tripartite alliance with Britain and France, Britain hesitated and the deal fell apart. Because of this additional failure, Molotov came in as Stalin's foreign affairs man and concluded that the west could not be relied on. Instead, Russia must look after itself and join up with Hitler. Finally, by 1939 the British public came around with the message "Churchill Must Come Back." Churchill got his admiralty spot and set about building up Britain's defense. Britain's deployment during the "phony war" was nearly all naval, but a crucial element to later victory. Hitler invaded Norway the next year, catching its naive politicians off-guard because they had expected him to respect their neutrality. British ships saved Norway's captured port cities and, despite being a costly effort for Britain, took out much of the German navy. Churchill's wisdom here meant Germany would not be able to invade Britain with ships, and could only attack via air power. Chamberlain was now being relentlessly attacked in parliament with calls to form a better wartime government that could lead the fight above partisan politics. When Chamberlain failed to bring this about, he resigned and Churchill would go on to win the war as PM.

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Houses of the Founding Fathers by Hugh Howard. Quite a few nice pictures, here's some interesting stuff form the text.

SPOILER: Click to show

George Wythe: Declaration signer who served in the Continental Congress and speaker to the forerunner to the Virginia House of Burgesses. Worked with Jefferson and Pendleton to overhaul Virginia law from its old colonial/monarchy ties. Jefferson had read law under Wythe's guidance when he was 19-21, and Jefferson's respect for him was seen when the College of William and Mary set him up as the first law chair of an American college. He would take part in the Constitutional Convention and later start a small law school of his own. James Monroe and John Marshall were also among his students. Henry Clay was also heavily influenced by him in the next generation - Wythe and Clay shared a "strong antipathy" to slavery. While Wythe was born into a slaveholding society, he freed some in his lifetime, taught some to read and freed the rest in his will.

Wythe's death was under strange circumstances. One day in 1806, his morning coffee was laced with yellow arsenic (a poison available for agricultural use). Two former slaves fell to its effects as well, but Wythe held on for several days despite his age. His mind continued to function and he told those around his bed "I am murdered." Later on it turned out that Wythe's grandnephew, George Wythe Sweeney, was spotted with the coffeepot the morning of the poisoning. Other details emerged: Sweeney had already been accused of forgery and stealing Wythe's law books. Wythe's will also stated that a substantial legacy would go to Michael Brown, a former slave who also died of the poisoning, but if he were to die the money would revert to Sweeney. Sweeney got out of a conviction for the poisoning, but was convicted of counterfeiting his uncle's name on checks. His acquittal was because the jury did not hear the testimony of the former slave who saw Sweeney with the coffeepot - Negroes were not allowed to testify against white men. But Wythe had figured out the guilty party before his death - and added a section to his will writing Sweeney out. Sweeney "sought refuge in the west" while his forgery charge was in appeal.

John Dickinson: farmer, London-trained lawyer, served in the Delaware and Pennsylvania assemblies (before Delaware was its own state). When Parliament passed the Quartering Act along with the Stamp Act in 1765, colonists in NY objected to the cost of housing and supplies for the soldiers. Parliament in turn passed the New York Restraining Act as part of the Townshend Acts, which abolished New York's assembly. Dickinson's first letter objecting to these measures was picked up by 19 out of the 23 colonial newspapers at the time, and was soon expanded into a pamphlet - Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania, with an introduction from Ben Franklin. Dickonson's Letters would become the most well-known document of the early revolutionary movement.

Dickinson would free his slaves in 1777, acting on a long-held desire. Some of the former slaves were kept on as indentured servants due to legal reasons requiring security be provided to freed blacks, and within ten years he had freed them unconditionally. Dickinson moved on to pressure his brother, Delaware legislators, and members of the Constitutional Convention to free their slaves too, since he believed slavery was inconsistent with the Declaration's principles. He played an important role in the constitutional compromise that permitted the slave trade to continue only until 1808.

James Iredell: came from England, became a North Carolina customs officer. While known as sympathetic to the Patriots, he hoped that differences could be resolved peacefully. Iredell's reputation was made through his anonymous letters, that disputed the claim of the king's rights over Americans, anticipating the Declaration. "government being only the means of securing freedom and happiness to the people, whenever it deviates from this end, and their freedom and happiness are in great danger of being irrevocably lost, the government is no longer entitled to their allegiance." He would be an influential Federalist who was recognized by Washington as having a deep knowledge of the constitution, and Iredell was one of the first placed on the Supreme Court.

The Edenton Tea Party is seen by historians as the first organized political activity of American women. A few months after the Boston Tea Party, 51 women from North Carolina gathered to sign a petition to boycott British tea and cloth. The news crossed the Atlantic and drew attention in London, including a satirical cartoon where the women at the Tea Party were swapped out with notable London figures wearing dresses. Lord North's government chose to ignore many of the petitions from the colonies, but this tea party touched off quite a bit of commentary.

Stephen Hopkins: elder statesman in the Continental Congresses, speaker of the Rhode Island assembly and its ten-term governor. He would also be chief justice of the state's supreme court, despite lacking formal training as a lawyer. Hopkins was 69 at the time of the signing of the Declaration, and with shaking palsy. He used one hand to steady the other for his signature. In 1774 he would publicly call for abolition, free his slaves, and led the Rhode Island assembly to ban the import of slaves to the state.

Thomas Heyward Jr: South Carolina delegate to the Continental Congress, signer of the Declaration, served as an artillery captain in the South Carolina militia. When Charleston was captured by the British, there were too many prisoners for them to keep in a practical way. Some were confined to prison ships in the harbor, while others were allowed to slip back into civilian life. But many officers, including Heyward, were shipped off to the Castillo de San Marcos prison in Saint Augustine, Florida. Oral history has it that Heyward's wife remained in the city with her sister, whose husband had also been exiled to Florida. Before the city's surrender, Americans had celebrated news of victories with candles in the windows. The British now demanded that they do the same to celebrate the British victory over them. When the sisters refused, a Tory mob pelted their home with rocks and mud. The stress apparently led to a miscarriage for the sister, which led to her subsequent death. Heyward's wife would soon die as well. Thomas Heyward would be released in 1781 during a prisoner exchange.

Ona Marie Judge: Washington slave who became aware of the first abolitionist society while in Philadelphia. Pennsylvania state law said that slaves residing in the state for 6 consecutive months would become free. Washington would send them back to Mount Vernon to avoid hitting this time limit. One night she simply walked away, found refuge in the city's underground, and later left on a ship to Portsmouth. News of her whereabouts reached the Washingtons after the daughter of a senator saw her and started a conversation, naturally asking where her mistress was. Oney then confessed that she wanted to be free, to learn to read and write. Martha was mad at her disloyalty, but George saw the situation as more nuanced. The Fugitive Slave Act of 1790 would allow owners to reclaim escaped slaves, but they had to present evidence of ownership to a magistrate before moving the slave across state lines. Washington knew that if the president showed up in court to take back a slave girl it would damage his reputation. He also did not make the matter public, avoiding a posted advertisement or reward for her capture. But Martha's pressure remained and George asked the secretary of the treasury to take care privately that the slave was returned.

Joseph Whipple: Portsmouth's collector and the New Hampshire figure charged with the above task. But while he found Oney easily, he began to have second thoughts. He wrote to the Washingtons on Oney's behalf, asking if they would free her upon their deaths. But the Washingtons, while eager to resolve the matter, did not want it to be believed that they caved to blackmail from a slave, so the request was denied and Oney stayed put. The issue was dropped for a time, until a nephew of Martha's was sent to Portsmouth in 1799 with the intention of getting Oney back by force. At some point word of this got out, apparently through a conversation with senator John Langdon, and Langdon sent a warning message out to Oney. She fled Portsmouth to the town of Greenland, where she lived with a free black family. Her life was probably harder on the farm, rather than as a valued house slave for the Washingtons, but she was free. Within weeks, Washington wrote up his final will that declared the slaves that he owned would go free. Controversial at the time, it comes down to us as one of his most admirable decisions in this whole thing. Whipple and Langdon are recognized today for acting with restraint and honor, even in the face of pressure from our first president.

George Mason: a rather private guy, partly from health. He declined to serve in the Virginia House of Delegates, saying it would be an invasion of his personal liberty. He also thought the constitution went too far, at one point saying "I would rather cut off (my) right hand than put it to the Constitution as it now stands." A huge influence on Jefferson's Declaration, which used very similar language from passages of Mason's Virginia Declaration of Rights. Mason, like Jefferson, became an enemy of Hamilton and his consolidation of power into moneyed rather than landed interests, and city merchants' talk of slavery - an institution that he correctly warned was "slow poison."

Susan Livingston: wife of New Jersey's Governor Livingston. The British gained false intelligence that he was unprotected at home during the year of Valley Forge, in the no-mans land between American and British armies. Only Susan and her daughters were at home, however. Susan tricked the British out of seizing important documents by asking that they should not look through her papers, which she claimed were her personal letters. Taking advantage of the soldiers' chivalry, she was allowed to have her papers exempted from the search. The British left only with a bunch of irrelevant documents, while the governor's papers remained in her box.

Lucy and Harry Knox: Lucy married at 17 over the objections of her Loyalist parents, who would leave for England in 1776 and not see her again. She stayed by Harry's side as much as possible during the war, often with the kids. Knox, a bookkeeper who witnessed the Boston Massacre and joined the Boston militia, was not the ideal soldier. He was overweight and had lost two fingers in a hunting accident. But Washington was impressed by his knowledge of guns and made him his chief of artillery, which paid off during the plan to haul guns from Fort Ticonderoga to the Dorchester Heights, forcing the British to evacuate the city. Lucy had 13 children but only 3 survived into adulthood.

Washington kept Mount Vernon open to visitors, as was the custom among landed gentry. He wrote from his military quarters that charity was to continue while he was out: "Let the hospitality of the House...be kept up. Let no one go hungry away." The marble chimneypiece in Washington's New Room was a gift from an English merchant and admirer, which Washington was reluctant to accept because it was "too elegant and costly by far...for my own room and republican style of living."

From 1798-1800, property values were taken across the nation as a baseline for the first direct federal tax. The average value of a house was $262. Three thousand houses were valued at $1.00 or less, and only three were above $30,000. 1/3rd of the properties assessed were between $100-500. Elias Hasket Derby was America's first millionaire. A Salem merchant, his house was $37,500 and his estate at the time of his death was estimated to be roughly one million dollars. This would've been worth $16 billion in modern dollars. As a general rule of thumb, the value of one's home was about equal to their annual income.

Thomas Jefferson upon leaving Washington at the end of his presidency: "Never did a prisoner, released from his chains, feel such a relief as I (have) on shaking off the shackles of power."

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50 Politics Classics, continued

SPOILER: Click to show

Carl von Clausewitz: On War. German general and military theorist who not only covered tactics in his work, but also the psychology and political aspects of war. "Fog of war" is a coin termed here. War defined as "an act of force to compel an enemy to do our will." He argued it was a "logical absurdity" to hold back in war, since it gives the enemy the upper hand. War as a policy (albeit an extreme one) means pursuing an ideal, looking for total victory at minimal cost. His warning is that if you are surprised when war breaks out, you haven't been paying attention to the reality of the situation and were viewing the enemy in terms of our own expectations, not what they actually are. We can be sizing up a leader and thinking he should do this or that in accordance with international law, while on the ground he's invading a sovereign nation's territory. "War is never an isolated act." Clausewitz also wrote "In war the result is never final." War is one policy option, and our policies continue before and after the war. War is not simply an act of violence brought about by emotion. It involves our policy directed at an outcome, and intelligence to mobilize and use our troops effectively.

Clausewitz's observation of war as policy is backed up with the experience that when motives to go to war are clear and strong, the military will be closely joined with the political objectives behind them. But when the motives are unclear, warfare is more likely to last longer and have an uncertain outcome. Soldiers are aware when a nation isn't behind them, and their actions/morale will be half-hearted in this case. This is why politicians and generals need to know the reasons why they are going to war, and how they will achieve their goals through war. War has 3 elements: 1) the concern of the people - a combination of "primordial violence, hatred and enmity" 2) probability and chance (aspects for the generals planning their moves to consider), and 3) an instrument of policy subject to reason (the realm of politicians). Without the power of each element behind it, war will be problematic. There needs to be a balance among these three factors, "like an object suspended between three magnets" for war to be the most effective. War is not a science or art, but rather the social dimension of human life, a way to resolve conflicts of interests through use of force.

Clausewitz believed great generals were born, not made, and would make good decisions on instinct. However, they also needed to know how to convince others to follow these decisions, which is where strategy becomes important. Often reasserting that defense is more powerful in war than offense, particularly when smaller powers are up against a bigger enemy and test whether that enemy is willing to continue the conflict. Does it have the heart or the will to continue a costly war of attrition? But the main and continual starting point of a war is to pursue the total destruction of the enemy's armed forces. To be in the right place at the right time to annihilate the enemy. This is true even if no actual fighting occurs, because decisions will be made based on the perception of the opposition's strength to actually do it. War is considered a matter of good calculation, but will always be a gamble due to human psychology. Even generals can be swayed by vanity, ambition, and vindictiveness. Many factors can cause strategy to be forgotten, and the cause of certain entanglements unclear. So while Clausewitz takes a scientific approach here, he does not say war is a scientific exercise. Generals must always be looking at reports, conflicting intelligence, decide what developments are important and what to pursue. Disobedience, laziness, ill will, and accidents are all possible and will happen. A good general will look for the best point where he can concentrate his forces in a single effective blow. This point is always risky, but also what's most likely to lead to victory.

Clausewitz also wrote that war is good for the character of a people and for society. He claims at one point that only war can instill boldness in people, to counteract "softness and the desire for ease which debase people in times of growing prosperity and increasing trade." Angell (see above) would later directly attack the view that war is the main way to gain national wealth.

Francis Fukuyama: The End of History, and The Last Man. The idea that liberal democracy will be the only viable way of political organization, because it's based on the universal desire for freedom and recognition. As time went on past the optimism at the end of the Cold War, critics belittled this idea. But Fukuyama said they misunderstood his argument. He was not saying there would be an end to major global events. His argument was, rather, that the flow of history (as Hegel and Marx saw it) had reached its end point. While Marx of course would say communism is the end, Fukuyama argued liberal democracy and economic liberalism was the end point, and would be the only viable political system in the long term. The "flaws" of a liberal democratic society were only such that liberty and equality were incomplete - the system itself cannot be improved on, only its full implementation. Fukuyama said the idea that history goes in one direction has been abused by dictators from Hitler to Pol Pot, and many people see it as absurd, but if we look at history we have to conclude that we definitely have been moving in one direction: toward greater freedom and enfranchisement.

This idea of progress had largely been shattered by WWI. In the 1910-11 Encyclopedia Brittanica, under the heading Torture was written "the whole subject is one of only historical interest as far as Europe is concerned." Then there was Angell's belief right on the eve of WWI that greater trade would make war irrational and obsolete. After the horrors of the 20th century, could today's democracy be a fleeting phenomenon as well? Yet on the other end, lead diplomats like Kissinger and practically everyone in the 70s believed we would be in a persistent state of Cold War with the Soviets, and that the permanence, stability and even legitimacy of the regimes were not in question. There was the belief that democracy was a western thing, that other peoples historically lacked democratic traditions and therefore weren't interested in it. Besides, if the regimes said they were improving things like health and education, wouldn't the lack of political freedom be a fair price to pay? Yet Fukuyama observed later that democracy continues to expand past its traditional home in Europe and North America, and it is a homegrown phenomenon that doesn't have to be enforced through imperialism. People want it on its own, and any time an authoritarian system pops up it ends up imploding over time.

Fukuyama's "Last Man" stands in contrast to Hegel's "First Man." The First Man wanted to be recognized by other humans, and would thus take actions for glory (not just for resources), even if it endangered his own life. The Last Man, on the other hand, is someone who has a life that's so good - at least, in the material sense - that he's unwilling to risk anything. But Fukuyama notes that people continue to be driven by what Hegel would call the "struggle for recognition" - and people are willing to die to advance the cause of freedom. Fukuyama criticized communism not only because it couldn't generate wealth the way capitalism does, but because communism did not give full recognition to the uniqueness of the individual. We continue to see movements that aren't influenced by economics (e.g. Scottish independence, and now Brexit) where people want to leave a larger political grouping so that their cultural and social differences will be recognized.

Fukuyama also notes that democracy alone doesn't lead to economic development: when special interest groups seek certain protections, which increase inefficiencies; when voters demand a welfare state that leads to large deficits and debt. So today's authoritarian regimes like China can still have a good economy with limited political freedom. Still, many apparently rock-hard regimes have fallen, and the leaders of such governments often have to at least pay lip service to democracy (fake elections, having some kind of parliament for show, etc). "Most autocrats, including Putin and Chavez, still feel that they have to conform to the outward rituals of democracy even as they gut its substance." China remains an obvious fly in the ointment to Fukuyama's theory, or does it? Will the Chinese begin to demand more democratic rights as they become more prosperous, following previous historical trends elsewhere? Fukuyama also looked at the rise of Islamic fundamentalism and its challenge to democracy as a system that claimed to be above nation or ethnicity, but he said this would fail because those arguments are in theory but not in practice. The Muslim world at large is divided by sectarianism and nationality, and Fukuyama believes it's more likely that liberal ideas will expand into Muslim countries. Part of fundamentalism's vocal opposition is the fact that liberal ideas are spreading into its territory, and they're angry that it can't be stopped.

Mohandas Gandhi: "Those who say that religion has nothing to do with politics do not know what religion means."

"Remember that all through history, there have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they seem invincible. But in the end, they always fall. Always."

MLK would be influenced by Gandhi's nonviolent resistance, as he found it matched with the principle of turning the other cheek. "true pacifism is not unrealistic submission to evil power," but rather "a courageous confrontation of evil by the power of love." It is better to be a recipient of violence than the person who inflicts it, since this will create a sense of shame in one's enemy and lead to a change in thinking.

Gandhi began with sexual and dietary restrictions, believing this would free him of base/animal desires. This helps provide you with a sense of moral force and strength of purpose. Gandhi would take a vow of celibacy. A violent reaction to one's opponents would be inflamed by emotion, rather than nonviolent actions which would provide you with a sort of detached strength gained from the quality of one's principles. Gandhi had everyone in the community clean the latrines, a practice that had previously been reserved only for the "untouchables," helping break down class lines. Gandhi also took a low view of possessions, which provided a false illusion of security (which in reality can only be found through God). In conflicts where power was pitted against love, Gandhi placed his bet on love. Less desirable aspects of his views today would involve his dislike of western consumerism, which has been increasingly embraced in India. Our author notes that Gandhi's views on community "would have kept India in the economic dark ages."

Emma Goldman: Anarchism and other essays. Lithuanian immigrant who came to the US and became radical during the Haymarket bombing. Anarchism as the idea that the state ran on violence, making it harmful and unnecessary. Throughout the ages, she stated that people have been told the only way to progress is to give up some power to society and state. However, she argued that this was the wrong way around and progress occurred when individual sovereignty was respected. The individual must be given prominence because he is "the heart of society." (Like Rand, she hated religion. Unlike Rand, she also hated property, which is why leftists like her). Today's leftists would be less enthusiastic to see that she saw a big state as an obstacle to individual progress. States only exist for human bondage. They do not help people on the individual level, as evidenced by the everyday life of many poor people even as the nation state claims great national wealth. A nation-state, "like the religious altar...is maintained for the purpose of human sacrifice."

Goldman addressed criticism that only the state can bring order and prevent crime, by saying that the state's taxes are a form of stealing and that the worst crimes are done by the state (war, capital punishment). She compares people who are pleased with government to animals who are pleased to live in a zoo - it is the only life they know, they are complacent being submissive, and they live narrow lives. She regarded all politics as theater for the ambitious - and therefore opposed women suffrage, saying it wouldn't mean anything. She was fine with violence because she considered the criminality of anarchists to be a drop in the ocean compared to the state's crimes. President McKinley would be assassinated by an anarchist who had been inspired by Goldman. In fact the assassin had actually tried to join Goldman's Chicago anarchists, but they were so paranoid they rejected him as a potential government spy. This action ironically prevented her becoming an accomplice, and kept her out of prison. However, she had already served time for inciting a riot, in a previous financial panic when she urged people in NYC to loot stores for food if they needed it. In 1906 she started a radical magazine whose editor was a guy who had failed to assassinate the industrialist Henry Clay Frick. She would be jailed again under the Comstock laws and deported to Russia during the first Red Scare. She quickly became disillusioned, and convinced she was right about opposing all forms of government, when Lenin argued that free speech had to be sacrificed in time of revolution. She then moved to Riga, Berlin, then London. There she was met by big lib names like Bertrand Russell, Rebecca West, and H.G. Wells, but even they rejected her once she started condemning the Soviet experiment. The US let her return from the deportation, but only if she avoided current events. Eventually she ended up in Canada writing articles.

Goldman herself never actually laid out how anarchism would work, just that the state was corrupt. Whether America or Russia, the rulers wasted money on state events like military parades while the proles starved. She therefore opposed patriotism in any form. Her opposition to America was based on their hypocrisy, jailing her over free speech. She returned to the US as a body, to be buried alongside the Haymarket anarchists in Chicago.

Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison: The Federalist Papers. An argument for federalism, when states like New York were afraid of losing their self-determination. Our Founders began a concerted effort to convince the public that the constitution would be the best course of action, writing under the name Publius to the papers. 85 essays were published, and Hamilton wrote 51 of them. The quality of these writings, over such a short time frame, is noted as a remarkable achievement by our author. They made a convincing argument that the constitution would not substitute the king of England for another ruler at home. The adoption of the Federalist title was a smart move by Hamilton and Madison, as it cast opponents as "anti-Federalist" even though both sides believed in federalism and the question was over its degree. They argued that the anti-Federalists were too weak to prevent demagoguery, and that a disconnected government would invite despotism. The Federalists noted the example of ancient Greece, which was a loose connection of republics that fought with each other. It was not a true union, and the more powerful republics at the moment took turns dominating the others. Although equal in theory, the other republics became satellites. Eventually the Peloponnesian War would lead to ruin for Athens, the state that initiated it. A constitution would prevent the same mistake and let smaller states know that their rights would be protected, that they would truly be equal.

Among smaller republics, demagogues and faction (the interests of a few) would be likely to rule their own localities. Better to have a larger, republican central government, they argued, as it would prevent one faction from dominating. An energetic central government was also needed as defense against external attack (another mistake for a fragmented Greece might I add, because their division allowed Philip/Alexander to conquer them). Hamilton pointed out that the constitution did not add any new powers to the federal government that weren't already there under the Articles of Confederation, save for the regulation of commerce between states (which few were opposed to anyway). The constitution would instead serve to "reinvigorate" those existing powers. An executive was needed, but he would be limited to 4 years, unlike the unaccountable monarchs. While a king claimed "sacred and inviolable" right to rule, a president could be impeached. The president would be commander-in-chief for wars declared by Congress, as opposed to the king's right to declare and wage war. Finally, the president would have no claim over (or against) the religious rights of others, unlike the English king who saw himself as supreme defender of the faith. The documents continue to be relevant today in the debate between state/federal power, and serve as a warning to today's separatist movements.

F.A. Hayek: The Road to Serfdom. Arriving in England to take up a post at the London School of Economics in 1931, Hayek had worked for economist Ludwig von Mises and considered himself a child of Austria-Hungary despite its faults. He was horrified when Hitler annexed Austria, and quickly became dismayed at the "progressive" outlook of many English intellectuals, who did not see the true nature of Hitler's National Socialism and were even being taken in by Communist propaganda points. Fearing that England would follow the dictators and pursue anti-freedom ideas that led to such regimes, he set out to expose the connection between planned economies and political repression. His argument in the Road to Serfdom was that the US and Britain could slide into totalitarianism, not through revolution, but through well-intentioned steps to organize the economy under more and more government control. Reagan, Thatcher, Friedman, and the leaders of post-Soviet central Europe were all influenced by Hayek's writings. Hayek would become the first free market economist to win the Nobel prize in economics, in 1974.

Hayek looked at history from medieval Italian city-states to industrial Britain, and determined it was the growth of commerce that allowed people to break free from the hierarchical society where one's birth alone determined their spot in life. The west's story was one of economic liberty leading to greater political freedom. Yet the central planners, notably socialists, came to challenge this model in Europe during the 19th and early 20th century. The desire for central planning was based off a completely rational motive: the desire to plan ahead instead of leaving everything up to fate. Yet the left wanted to do this through central planners instead of individual and entrepreneurs. The right instead argues that the forces of competition within a free market accomplish the same ends, with the least amount of coercion. Societies flourish when people are able to make their own choices.

The author: "Advocates of central planning often claim that it is 'necessary' because an economy is so complex that it needs guidance by the state (by this logic Germany developed corporatist 'monopoly capitalism'). Yet Hayek says precisely the opposite is true: The greater the complexity, the more impossible it is to get an overview of what is happening. Development is best achieved through decentralization; that is, market forces responding to price signals." This complexity is actually why it's a bad idea for central planners to assume they know better...a small board of planners can't possibly keep up with market innovation and other developments. "The wish to organize all of society's resources for a definite social end sounds good, but in one stroke it ends personal freedom, and demonstrates a lack of faith in individuals' ability to achieve the 'social ends' for which socialists call, even assuming we could agree what they are. Hayek notes that as early as 1928 the German government controlled almost half of national income. In practice, this meant that 'scarcely an individual end...is not dependent for its achievement on the action of the state' - surely a worrying thought."

Hayek notes that laws "are intended for such long periods that it is impossible to know whether they will assist particular people more than others." Rule of law is meant to provide a standard for everybody, safeguarding equality - but socialist planners want to use the government to pick winners and losers. The difference is that one sets the rules of the road, while the other tells people where to travel. The great thing about the rule of law is that it sets up equality for everyone. It assumes that no one will get special treatment based on their status or connections. Hayek admits the law does nothing to address economic inequality, but neither is it designed to benefit certain people economically. Socialists despise the rule of law for this reason. As soon as laws are rewritten for "redistributive justice," some people are places above others. Even if this is done with good intentions, it spells an end to the rule of law. For the rule of law does not simply mean society runs by a certain equal standard, but that the government's very power is circumscribed in a constitution or laws that were set well in advance of the government coming to power. When governments seek to change the ground rules and foundation of society, they are not running by the rule of law but by a sham.

Sometimes central planners say they just want to direct the economy and leave other stuff alone. But so much of our lives are tied in with the economy that this is not a secondary concern, and central planning would curtail not only our decisions but the pursuit of happiness. For example, if you save up for years under a planned economy for a certain product, you may find the government decides to ban it, or simply makes it unavailable by directing production to other priorities. The illusion of choice has been exposed as a fraud, since the state is making decisions about what you should get, not you. Planners also argue you will be free to pursue the work you want, but this is another falsehood. Once they decide what priorities they will focus on within the economy, access to certain fields will be restricted and offer little opportunity. Instead, one will be judged based on their "fitness" to do certain work the state wants, much like within the military. By definition you will not be able to pursue your own work interests within this state, for the above reasons and also because you are already seen by the central planners as a means of achieving "the good of all." There's also the argument that when work depends on the state's judgment, rather than your skills or imagination, there will be no incentive for you to work harder or better since it doesn't lead to any gain for you. Multiply this effect by millions and you have a lackluster society. Arguments of "economic security" are arrangements where the state can employ you in a useless ditch digger/refiller job, actual job quality or efficiency doesn't matter. In a competitive economy there is the risk you can be fired or lose your job to automation or other factors, but there is also an incentive for you to get training and study to make yourself more employable. The society as a whole is more productive, and you get to improve yourself, realizing your full potential.

A competitive economy, at worst, means bankruptcy. In a planned economy, you could end up facing the hangman. Under socialism your job is secure (in theory), but try leaving it or buck the will of your superiors, and according to the planners you have committed a "crime against the community." Hayek points out a 1937 quote from Trotsky, critical of what happened in Russia: "In a country where the sole employer is the State, opposition means death by slow starvation. The old principle: who does not work shall not eat, has been replaced by a new one: who does not obey shall not eat." A society that places job security above freedom will come to mock freedom. Hayek was not opposed to a welfare system, but warned us not to place economic security as more important than freedom itself.

Thomas Hobbes: Leviathan. Hobbes is known for political writings today but, like many enlightened men in his era, he wrote about several other topics including mathematics, philosophy, optics, ballistics, and psychology. The Hobbes state of nature as nasty, brutish and short, no rules, leads people to pursue a ruler or state to gain some sense of security and order. He believed that authority prevented conflict, and that the best form of government was a monarch/sole ruler. He said this not because he had total faith in a monarch's decisions, but because he believed people could only prosper if there was an unquestionably powerful umpire who could bring about justice. In all contracts, there has to be an ultimate enforcer for them to mean anything. Liberal commentators like Fukuyama and others argue that Hobbes still made an important step towards liberal democratic values, because Hobbes broke with the concept of divine right of kings. Hobbes influenced social contract theory in arguing that monarchs had no right to rule by nature, but rule by the tacit consent of the people who gain order and security in return for recognizing the monarch's power. Writing in a time of civil war in England, democracy to Hobbes meant constant conflict and instability. The only option was to recognize the dominance of a king again, and so Hobbes viewed his ideal state as a Leviathan: the great subduer of war and bringer of stability, peace under a unifying monarch. But in his pursuit of physical security, Hobbes appeared to have forgotten the importance of freedom of religion and speech, despite his advance of the social contract theory. It would be up to Locke and later writers to expand upon Hobbes' idea of rule by popular consent, to a logical conclusion that there should be a more powerful parliament as direct representatives of the people.

Samuel P. Huntington: The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. "In fundamental ways, the world is becoming more modern and less western." Argument that future conflicts will be cultural and religious, not economic. Huntington the Harvard professor looked at old cultural differences that began to re-emerge in the aftermath of the Cold War's old east-west division. Taking up the opposite view of Fukuyama, Huntington believed other cultures would gladly accept modernization but not western values, which were two different things. He predicted that in the 21st century the west will try to enforce universal values on other nations, and become increasingly unsuccessful doing so..."what is universal to the West is imperialism to the rest." Huntington argued that upon winning the Cold War, we in the west falsely believed we had won the argument that everyone wanted liberal democracy, that it was the better system and the rest of the world agreed. He also said "the Wests' victory in the Cold War...produced not triumph but exhaustion." As western states face slower growth, stagnating populations, huge government debt, and low savings rates. In 1900 the west ruled half the world, by the end of the century they ruled only themselves. It is only a matter of time before other nations grow militarily as well and, as they become richer and more powerful, they will see little need to adopt or even admire western democratic values. Indeed, the revival of fundamentalist Islam and other religions is evidence that the rest of the world is already countering the consumerism, relativism and secularism that they see in the "degenerate" west.

Huntington sees China as a hegemon that will come to dominate in Asia, with everyone (including Japan) eventually bowing to them instead of America. He also writes that Islam will be a big cultural point of conflict with the west. Western leaders like to insist only radical Islam is a problem, but Huntington writes that this is simply untrue. Historically, the conflict between liberal democracy and Marxism was a blip. The conflict between Christianity and Islam has been going on for centuries. The real sticking point is that the west's separation of church and state is a fundamental divide from Muslim society, which wants everything including the state to be subservient to Allah. Before the 9/11 attacks, Huntington writes "Somewhere in the Middle East, a half-dozen young men could well be dressed in jeans, drinking Coke, listening to rap, and, between their bows to Mecca, putting together a bomb to blow up an American airliner...only naive ignorance can lead Westerners to assume that non-Westerners will become 'Westernized' by acquiring Western goods." Add demographic growth/stress including a bunch of angry unemployed guys who can easily be persuaded to attack non-Muslims as a scapegoat, and you only have additional problems. But thankfully, Huntington notes that a Muslim demographic boom will not last forever, and if the economy booms at some point it will blunt much of the instability.

Australia is one example of cultural tensions. In the 90s some of its politicians talked about Australia being an Asian nation, despite its Western traditions. Attempts to make Australia as a republic without the queen as head of state, multiple attempts to take the Union Jack off the flag, have all failed. The people will have none of it. Meanwhile, Asian countries themselves would not recognize Australia as an Asian nation. Huntington warns that there is no global interest, that conflict will arise if "western arrogance" or some other nation tries to pursue one, and there will only be peace if the powers of a multipolar world recognize each others' sphere of influence.

Criticism of Huntington: the world is more complex than he lets on, and division among his civilizations is too simplistic. Huntington underestimates the power of a state to shape the world and their own destinies. Islam vs the West is too simplistic as well, since the Muslim world is divided among itself notably between Sunni and Shia. Others accused him of being one step short of racism, as he had also been an adviser to apartheid South Africa. But Huntington would not be surprised that countries have split along cultural or religious lines (Sudan, Ukraine), the rise of China, Russia's rejection of the west, the attempted Islamization of secular Muslim nations (Turkey, Egypt), and the rise of Islamic fundamentalism. Or the rise of Marine Le Pen, Nigel Farage, Geert Wilders views that we are under attack from foreign cultural forces. The idea of globalization as a panacea, to Huntington, was pure idealism not backed by historical experience. The west cannot encourage global adoption of its values, or peace, through trade. According to Huntington, its best chance is to recognize the spheres of influence of other cultures, avoid taking a missionary stance, and at best work to preserve its institutions only within its own borders. It may not surprise you to know Huntington was a lifelong Democrat who worked with Humphrey and Carter.

[Tails82]

Trend and Tradition, the Colonial Willamsburg magazine. Summer 2016.

SPOILER: Click to show

Book review of Founding Feuds, which contains a lot of stuff about partisan disputes.

"The law is nothing more than an ambiguous text to be explained by his sophistry into any meaning which may subserve his personal malices." -Jefferson on John Marshall

The lost language in the Declaration on slavery, which angered Jefferson when it was not included:

The King "has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of distant people who never offended him, captivating and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation hither. this piratical warfare, the oppobrium of infidel powers, is the warfare of the Christian king of Great Britain. he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this execrable commerce (determining to keep open a market where MEN can be bought and sold): and that this assemblage of horrors might want no fact of distinguished die, he is now exciting those very people to rise in arms among us, and to purchase that liberty of which he had deprived them, by murdering the people upon whom he also obtruded them: thus paying off former crimes committed against the liberties of one people, with crimes which he urges them to commit against the lives of another."

When younger, Jefferson had also copied an anti-slavery poem by William Shenstone into his almanac.

A 1955 Dick Tracy comic about Colonial Williamsburg.

Some blurbs on 13 of the Declaration signatories. Roger Sherman, who delivered several speeches defending the rights of smaller states at the constitutional convention. Jefferson called him "a man who never said a foolish thing in his life." Caesar Rodney rode overnight from Delaware to Philadelphia to support the resolution for independence, riding overnight through a rainstorm to break the tie between two other Delaware delegates. Button Gwinnett was made president and commander in chief of Georgia in 1777, leading an unsuccessful invasion of British-controlled East Florida. Georgia's commander of the continental battalion would denounce Gwinnett and this led to a duel. Both men were shot and Gwinnett died. Samuel Chase would be a Supreme Court justice and outspoken Federalist, who continued his rhetoric after Jefferson's re-election. After pressure from Jefferson, one Virginia senator began impeachment proceedings on the accusation Chase was pushing his political agenda from the bench. Chase would be acquitted. Elbridge Gerry would be known for gerrymandering when his last name was merged with the word salamander, the shape of his district. Matthew Thornton would draft the first adopted state constitution after independence, in New Hampshire. Rev. John Witherspoon, 6th president of the College of New Jersey, was forced to evacuate the school as the British advanced. He would rebuild what would become Princeton. Francis Lewis had supplied uniforms for the British during the French and Indian War, and was captured by the French at Fort Oswego, NY. After spending several years as a prisoner in France, he was rewarded 5,000 acres of land as compensation upon his return to the colonies. John Penn was a lawyer taken to court in 1774 on charges that he made disrespectful comments about King George. He was fined one penny, and refused to pay it. Robert Morris would keep the continental army going financially, and later declined Washington's offer to head the Treasury. The position went to Hamilton.

An article on John Wilkes that starts off implying he's like Trump, without mentioning him by name. Vagaries about nativism, you know.

Wilkes was a Whig who supported the supremacy of parliament, standing against corruption and arbitrary power among the ruling class. He was elected to the House of Commons in 1757, and would rise to fame in the coming years. George III was installed on the throne in 1760. A few years later he made John Stuart, Lord Bute his prime minister. Bute was a Scottish nobleman who had been George III's tutor, and he negotiated the peace after the Seven Years War. Critics, including Wilkes, complained that Bute had conceded too much to the defeated French and Spanish, endangering British security.

When Bute began publishing a pro-government paper called The Briton, Wilkes became co-publisher of The North Briton, which he used to attack Bute. Wilkes argued "The principal parts of the Scottish nobility are tyrants and the whole of the common people are slaves." Some historians have referred to this as Scottophobia, that the Scots couldn't be true Englishmen. Wilkes used to his advantage the recent memory of Scottish uprisings - 1745 was the Jacobite rebellion of the Highland clans that sought to overthrow George II. The Borth Briton accused Bute of being a Jacobite and having an affair with the queen mother. "Bute became a national villain and was forced to resign as prime minister." Wilkes continued to warn of Scottish/Jacobite corruption within the government, and got into trouble for directly criticizing the king (he skirted this by saying the king's speech was so heavily influenced by Bute it was considered to be, rather, the recently resigned prime minister's speech). The speech praised the 1763 peace settlement as an achievement, but Wilkes saw it as sacrificing national security.

The king was furious and soon enough, the government issued general warrants to arrest all those involved in the publication of The North Briton on charges of sedition and libel. These "writs of assistance" were the sort of arbitrary power that Whigs opposed. It was especially hated by the colonists, because Britain could declare them in customs offices to seize large amounts of private property, citing a need to stop smuggled goods. Wilkes was arrested, and through the following trials, acquittals, additional publications, more arrests, exile, and imprisonment, Wilkes became famous.

Englishmen supported Wilkes because he attacked institutions that they agreed needed to be reformed - he found support among those who wanted an end to general warrants, to extend the franchise, for annual parliaments, and for the repeal of measures that were alienating Americans. Americans also supported him for advancing the cause of liberty. There were other reasons at play too. Land speculators wanted to access western lands and purchase land from the crown for settlement. But after Pontiac's Rebellion in 1763, King George restricted any settlement past the Alleghenies. Angry Americans wondered why, after winning the French and Indian War, they were the ones who had to make concessions to the defeated enemy. Americans cheered when Wilkes supported ending the Stamp Act and Townshend Duties, and said the king was "responsible to his people." Virginian planters also approved when Wilkes attacked the Scots, because a growing number of Scottish merchants were undercutting their influence by trading directly with small tobacco farmers. These Virginians were angry that the Scots were stealing their market share, accusing them of fraud or smuggling.

On September 1765, Virginia's Westmoreland County courthouse saw a protest against the Stamp Act, a procession led by two of the organizer's slaves who carried clubs with John Wilkes' image on them. Behind them was a mob pushing a cart that held two effigies, one of George Grenville and another of George Mercer, the collector of stamp taxes on Virginia. Mercer carried a sign in each hand, reading "Money is my God" and "Slavery I love." Other slaves participated in the protest, surrounding the effigies and serving as the sheriffs, jailers, and hangmen for the effigies. Issue Number 45 of the North Briton was well-known in the colonies, and simply mentioning the number 45 was a reference to liberty. One 1774 political cartoon showed Lord North holding a torch labeled "America," standing on two blocks labeled "tyranny" and "venality" as a stream of parliamentarians flowed out under him. Wilkes was placed at the end of the stream with a broom, offering to "stem the stream."

[little j ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ ✔]

The Shadow Out of Time is largely a repeat of At the Mountains of Madness.

[Tails82]

Sad Animal Facts by Brooke Barker. Featuring little drawings of sad aminals. For example the cover: "Cats can't taste sweet things" followed by a sad cat who can't experience ice cream. Some of them aren't really that sad, just weird.

SPOILER: Click to show

An alligator's brain weighs less than an oreo.
Turtles breathe out their butts - "if that pizza's too hot I can blow on it for you"
Fire salamanders eat their siblings - "being an only child has a terrible aftertaste"
Hippos attract mates by peeing - "another great reason to be single"
Zebras can't sleep alone.
If a wolf is kicked out of its pack it never howls again.
Prairie dogs have different calls to communicate different human heights and human shirt colors, but can't differentiate between circles and squares.
If a female ferret goes into heat and doesn't mate she will die - "why isn't Tinder loading?!!"
Groundhog Day was Hedgehog Day until the 1800s - "no one cares about my shadow anymore"
Pregnant polar bears gain 500 pounds
Guacamole is extremely poisonous to hamsters
Cows produce the most milk when they listen to R.E.M.'s "Everybody Hurts"
Dwarf lemurs line their homes with feces - "are you sure you don't want to come over? You never come over."
If a chinchilla gets wet, it might never get dry
Giraffe babies fall six feet to the ground when they're born - "this is off to a terrible start"
Whales that sing in the wrong key get lost and are alone in the ocean
Harp seal pups are abandoned on beaches at birth, and 30% don't survive
Koi fish can live 200 years - "72,500 more days of exploring this decorative pond"
Birds can't go to space because they need gravity to swallow
Bald eagles save everything they can find until their nests fall to the ground because the trees can't support their weight
Adelie penguins push each other off ledges to check if the water's safe
Anything a duckling meets within 10 minutes of being born becomes its parent - "my mom might be a sandwich but she loves me in her own way"
Black eagles watch their children fight to the death without interfering
Kiwis can remember a bad memory for five years
An albatross can pick up smells 12 miles away - "there's someone in New Zealand who could really use a shower"
Male white front parrots vomit on females they want to mate with
Roadrunners make themselves cry to get rid of excess salt
The average mayfly lives less than a day - "I'll never see a sunset"
If bees earned minimum wage a jar of honey would cost $182,000
Scorpions are nocturnal hunters but they glow in the dark
Ants don't sleep but they take 8-minute naps twice a day
Cicadas stay underground for 17 years - "I'm up! Now I can check on my Blockbuster video stock"
It takes a banana slug 24 hours to get somewhere a block away

*The average alligator weighs 400 pounds but its brain weighs only 8 or 9 grams. The average Oreo weighs 12 grams. And that's only the original cookie -- a Double Stuf Oreo weighs as much as three alligator brains. A Double Stuf Oreo is way too complex an idea for an alligator to process.
*Scientists aren't sure if ants really sleep at all, but they definitely do take naps...a 2009 study of a fire ant colony found that the ants took 250 one-minute naps in a 24-hour period. All the ants continued to work as they were asleep, no matter how long the nap was, so they're not getting too much rest.
Giant anteaters have to visit up to 200 anthills a day to get enough calories.
Here are other foods hamsters can't eat: apple seeds, eggplant, elderberries, mushrooms, peppers, garlic, onions, beans, raisins, potatoes, tomatoes, almonds, peanuts, all citrus fruits, chocolate, and high-fat meat.
Harp seal parents give birth to one pup a year...care for the seal for a little over a week, until they lose interest and abandon it on the ice forever. Unlike other animals left on beaches at birth, harp seals cannot walk or swim or fend for themselves until they are 8 weeks old, which gives them 45 terrifying days to starve to death or be eaten by wandering polar bears...Baby seals that survive lose 50 percent of their body weight during this period.

[little j ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ ✔]

Indeed. Unless you're planning on becoming a breeder, always get your ferrets spayed.

[Mastery]

sourcegaming.info/2015/12/23/sakuraifastpace/

I agree with him so hard