Fragmenta Philosophica

Lagomorphic Lunacy

Should you happen to have one of these:

... and be crazy enough to allow it to reside, cageless, in any choice room of your domicile - and leave it home alone ...

Don't be surprised if you return after an absence, eager to go online, and discover that something's amiss with your computer:



Even if you're sorely tempted to try out a new recipe for hasenpfeffer,
a cooler head will soon prevail, and your heart will be gladdened at the spectacle
of beastly concord

(Don't worry, photo-blogging isn't a new obsession - but these are exceptional circumstances!)

Sights of Sites

Click thru for a few images ...

Promised Land

h-ts

- as in, a gap or interruption. That's what this blog, and I, shall be going on.

Here's a hint. Here's another. And why not this, while we're at it?!

Thanks to all - especially the crazies that suffer through this site on a regular basis.

I'll be back at in in a couple of weeks.

Phronesis

Stop the presses - "Fahrenheit 911.5" is imminent (well, immanent).

Describing the rationale for this new endeavor, Michael Moore stated, "Fifty-one percent of the American people lacked information (in this election) and we want to educate and enlighten them. They weren't told the truth. We're communicators and it's up to us to start doing it now."

The vogue notion that education = information is pretty silly. Let's stipulate that, as ever, ignoramuses pulled the levers for both/all sides in the recent election, as well as that persons with advanced levels of schooling did the same. And it may be that misunderstandings over certain matters of (brute) fact - the domain of "information" - led some to vote one way or the other. But the most important, and contentious, matters can't be resolved according to some prosaically empirical procedure. Rather, an "informed" vote - like any advised decision - lies within the purview of prudence, sc., practical wisdom.  (The power of  raw  "information" to educate is pretty weak, anyhow - cp. the warnings on packets of cigarettes).

The argument over the invasion of Iraq provides a good example of a prudential dispute, namely, a matter which requires one to estimate relevance, significance, consequence, etc. Many of the "facts" weren't much at issue - what ought to have been done in light of them was (and still is).  Prudential arguments might not be unresolvable, absolutely speaking, but existentially they are usually indeterminate, betraying an asymptotic aspect. The thought that a "documentary" can somehow "educate" one as to the intricacies of a momentous (and tragic) decision like choosing a president is risible.

The ideal of education - as opposed to indoctrination, it's evil step-sibling - has always been some kind of wisdom - theoretical and practical. I trust it's understandable why Moore and Co. are silent as to that desideratum.

Now they tell us

Heavens to Murgatroid! - there are some pretty ruthless post-mortems being performed on the proverbial corpse of the Kerry campaign over at The New Republic .

On thursday, the Editors wrote, "He's back. Actually, he never even left. John Kerry, according to reports yesterday ... plans to have a prominent role in the Democratic Party ... Our reaction to this is ... how to put it? Well, here goes: No. Please. Stop."

Writing today, the editor-in-chief of the publication, Martin Peretz, refers to "a run-on interview with Kerry's brother, Cameron, who revealed that John just might run for president again and that, in any case, 'he's going to ... be a voice for the 55 million people who voted for him.' Another aide confided that Kerry 'has been working the phones like crazy.' But Kerry is not the voice of 55 million people, or even the 55.9 million people who voted for him. It was these people's slightly hysterical antagonism to Bush that brought them (reluctantly) to Kerry rather than anything intrinsic to Kerry himself."

Peretz's final paragraph is a real zinger: "Today, Democrats are overcome with despair. And I do not doubt that Bush's second term will have its abuses and its nastiness. But they should not delude themselves: John Kerry would not have been a good president; he might even have been a dangerously bad one. Next time, Democrats need to nominate not merely a candidate who they imagine can win but a candidate who deserves to."

In another piece published today, Ryan Lizza concludes with:
"But, for all the staff intrigue and leaking and counter-leaking among Kerry's aides, perhaps the most honest recrimination is that, in the end, it was Kerry's fault. He didn't inspire intense enthusiasm, even among many of his own employees. 'The weird revolving cast of characters at the top was unhelpful,' says a Kerry aide. 'But people, ultimately, weren't that excited about the candidate.' And most of Kerry's gaffes had nothing to do with his staff. It wasn't their fault that he couldn't get his story straight on Iraq or that he wore funny outfits when he went bicycling. 'I don't imagine they recommended to him that he go windsurfing,' says a senior adviser. 'And it wasn't Bob Shrum or Stephanie Cutter or anyone else who said, "I actually did vote for the eighty-seven billion dollars, before I voted against it." It was John Kerry.' "

Okay, this is all consistent with believing that, for all his faults, Kerry's worst would have been better than Bush's best. And it's understandable that previously the magazine would have attempted to emphasize Kerry's strengths, and downplay his weaknesses - such is the way of partisanship. But "The Editors" themselves - in what struck me as quite a weak endorsement of Kerry, rhetorically and in terms of ratiocination - seemed to have run afoul of what Lizza described as perhaps the fatal assumption of Kerry's campaign:

"Another strategic choice now being second-guessed is the decision to make the race simply a referendum on the incumbent. Inside the campaign, it was taken for granted that the voters would ultimately make a decision about Bush's record in office. If that were the case, the all-knowing polls confirmed, Bush wouldn't win. After all, a majority of voters consistently told pollsters the country was on the wrong track."

Here, I think, there's a parallel to the vacuity of calling for "change," as the rallying cry of a campaign - one doesn't just want any old change, but a change that on balance seems to be for the better. Granted that one believes that the country is "on the wrong track" (who couldn't find some senses in which that is true?!) a lamented status quo might seem preferable to the going alternative(s).

Feeling Blue

I know that the election is old hat at this point, but I still continue to marvel at the electoral "blueness" of the San Francisco Bay Area.

Check out the percentiles for three representative counties - Contra Costa (in which I reside), Alameda, and Marin.

There's been a lot of talk - and more than a little condescension - about the apparent anomaly of non-wealthy Red-State-ers voting against "their interests" (sc., pecuniary interests) by casting their
lot with the Republicans. Prescinding from the variety of interests which animate people, I wonder why it's not similarly anomalous that wealthy counties like Contra Costa allegedly vote against their (economic) interests - viz., in favor of higher taxation - when casting a vote for the Dems(?)

Wherever one's true interests lie, I suspect that this peculiar line of attack against the Red State Voters is more than a bit patronizing. (And check out how pink-red CA is, outside of the Bay Area)

Cue to Calumny

I should think that soon we'll be hearing from that adroit social commentator, Professor Richard Dawkins (affectionately known around here as The Blind Calumniator), as to the 'palpably idiotic' verdict delivered by the American electorate. Hey, it's merely a moment in the phylogeny underlying the American Body Politic, right? Or is it an atavism?!

No matter who won, the winner's sympathizers could feel a bit of schadenfreude vis-a-vis some disappointed (and disliked) party on the other side. Out of the the cornucopia of usual suspects, my delectation alights on the good Professor.

Shock

Boy, was I wrong: I fully expected that Kerry would prevail. With the forces - sentimental, social and existential - arrayed against Bush, I just couldn't see how he could pull a rabbit out of the hat.

Like so many, we stayed up late watching the returns. Now I'm just exhausted, and glad it's over.

I feel for Kerry, and many of his supporters; it's got to be terribly disappointing to have invested so much, and have had such high (and seemingly justified) hopes. Although overall his policies never impressed me, I'm actually in the minority who found Kerry kinda likeable, and I certainly respect some aspects of his record. I do find the penchant of many partisans seemingly to hate the opposing candidate - vs. passionately opposing the policies and animating ideas, with a little righteous venom - to be distasteful, and a waste of energy (cue to a commenter to tell me that hatred, and worse, is justified in the case of so-and-so).

Someone asked me if I was "happy" with the result. I said, "No ... but less unhappy than I might have been." I've never been pleased with the choices we have in presidential elections - in my book it's always a choice between bad and worse, reckoned according to a hazy calculus. But, then again, my "personal metaphysics" entails a fairly tragic view of things. So it goes ...

The Real Chicken Hawks

Since it really struck a chord with me, I'll flag this article by Tim Cavanaugh (a libertarian who opposed the invasion of Iraq), even though several others have done so.

The "Liberal Hawks," who advocated toppling Saddam Hussein, but turned against the Bush administration when the occupation didn't go according to plan/fantasy, are the real Chicken Hawks, in my view. In addition to being strangely flappable, their peckish judgment seems deficient in several respects, not least: being unable/unwilling to distinguish between bad luck and mistakes; between innocent and culpable mistakes (and the various shades between); and refusing to juxtapose mistakes with other positive accomplishments to take a balanced overall view.

I've come to respect the view of those who were always deeply skeptical about, or downright opposed, the invasion much more than the modus operandi of the backtracking fair-weather-friends, who squawk at the double-crossing which Bush and team have allegedly visited upon them, and scamper out of the proverbial barnyard in search of a new husbandman.