perfidy

Gentlemen, 

Points of clarification always seem a necessity to me after a post. Let's begin. 

1) Scare quotes. I will respect sensibilities and will refrain from the use of scare quotes. 

2) Frustration. The frustration to which I referred was with the utter uselessness of dissent, not the members of our cyber-panel. Nor was I claiming that I had been attacked, nor was I expecting one. I just didn't want to leave the impression that I intended to be less than civil. Neurotically so, perhaps. As to my frustration with the futility of dissent, like I said, I and anyone else can oppose, oppose, oppose, and decisions have already been made. Objections are irrelevant. It is the way of the world, but it bugs me. On a similar topic, the Bucketman's optimism is duly noted viz-a-viz representative republics. But in my short lifetime I have seen so many governmental abrogations of individual rights and liberties, such as the de facto dismissal of the Fourth Amendment, that my pessimism makes me wonder just how representative the American republic will be in the future, and whether or not it will even be a republic. 

I often used to say that America needs its lunatic fringe, as they are really the protector of individual rights, but they have been increasingly marginalized. The ACLU is often perceived as an aggregate of clowns and fools when they attempt to protect those rights. Given the current outbreak of war, my pessimism forces me to ask, will we be revisited by the Alien and Sedition Acts? Iraqi nationals have already been detained. On the other hand, Daschle really blasted the President, and unlike the Democratic-Republicans of the Federalist era, specifically Matthew Lyon, he has not been imprisoned. So we'll see, but I'm never optimistic. No, I'm not a Libertarian, because I am virulently opposed to laissez faire capitalism, but I am a great-great-step-grandchild of the Enlightenment. Postmodernists would call me a racist and an elitist because of that, and they can stick it up their ass. I think what I think and I don't care so much what side that puts me on. According to academic perceptions, for example, I'm a right-wing extremist. Funny how that happens. 

3) Israel. I'll ask for clarification within my clarification. Is your perspective, Mr. Buckethead, that the Palestinian state or the Palestinian people or both are what you describe? I will respond with the assertion that however you perceive the Israeli state, in contrast, I see them as a occupying force who routinely murder and abuse the subject people they conquered. Granted, that’s what happens to subject people, just ask an American Indian, but that doesn't make it right. Many Israelis, particularly those I've heard interviewed on NPR, state that they are the legitimate authority in Palestine because they fought for and conquered the country. One young lady, I distinctly recall saying in the course of an NPR interview, "This is our country. We fought for it." I found her statements curious considering she had recently arrived there from Brooklyn. But there are other, longer-standing residents who echoed her sentiments. That is a might makes right argument, and under that stipulation, the Palestinians are justified in doing the same thing in attempting to reconquer the country. 

4) Empire. Dictionary definitions are all fine and good, but there are other factors. The historiography of British Imperialism (a topic of my recently passed comprehensive exams) clearly demonstrates a debate on the nuances of formal versus informal empire. I could easily supply a decent bibliography on the subject, but that's probably a story for another time. The United States is on its face a formal empire in that the entirety of it was conquered and seized from the indigenous peoples. It is more loosely a formal empire in that the United States has overseas possessions, such as Puerto Rico and American Samoa. They don't seem to mind too much, and it's a very benign formal empire, but a formal empire nonetheless. The United States possesses an informal empire in terms of the economic control it exercises over many parts of the world. That is much less benign. 

Okay, I'm going to pay more attention to the war show on TV. Plus, I need to write a lecture for tomorrow. Take it easy, gents.