From comments to Paul Gottfried:
* I’ve noticed that how influential any given ideas are tends to have a lot to do with how much money is promoting them. There was Big Money behind Jaffa, just as there is Big Money behind the “libertarian movement”, a movement which turns out to promote most of the same ideas Jaffa did. National Review has likewise drifted steadily and inexorably to the left over time under the gravitational pull of Big Money.
* Paul Gottfried: I am a strong advocate of a radically decentralized American government that would allow different regions to govern themselves according to their own principles and predilections. This country has become too large and diverse and too oppressively controlled by leftist social engineers, largely indistinguishable political parties and a sprawling administrative class for Jaffa’s propositional nation or great political experiment to continue in the direction in which it has been going–and is likely to move even faster in the future. Although I am not against powerful states as a matter of principle, I find nothing in the present American ruling class that is worth holding on to.
* This is startling, I know, but I’ve heard it twice in the past week or so, the first time in a speech by Michael Ledeen on Machiavelli and Leadership, and the second, from comments by Rabbi Daniel Lapin in a panel discussion titled Jewish Philosophy and Politics –
The passages will be quoted extensively to provide the full context and flavor. They are the words of Jewish and neoconservative leaders who have enormous influence over US foreign policy and over “mythologies” among the Jewish community.
Here are their words and the sources for them:
Ledeen:
. . . from time to time people would actually say Why [are you writing a book about Machiavelli], and my answer was, Well, he reminds you of all these basic things that we’ve forgotten, like Moses killing all those Jews at Mt Sinai.
And almost universally people would say, What are you talking about? Because this is the stuff that Machiavelli loves that most people have forgotten, having seen the movie instead of reading the book. [laughter]
This is the scene, the golden calf — Most people think this is what happens: Moses comes down from Sinai, he’s got the tablets, this idolatry is going on, he throws a snit, smashes the tablet, they calm him down and after some period of time when he calms down he goes up and gets a new set of tablets and then they move on.
Which is not what happens. What happens is he throws the snit, smashes the tablets and then says Kill them all. And the Levites , and I pay attention to this, being one, and y’know I’m proud of this particular passage, the Levites come and kill them all! All those people who were worshiping the golden calf. Except Aaron who somehow escaped because he had to preserve his DNA for the Lemda tribe in Southern Africa heh heh heh.
So, and this scene of Moses killing Jews recurs several times in the Old Testament and Machiavelli pays close attention to it, producing one of his most favorite lines, which is, “Anybody looking carefully at Moses has to admit that in order to create a new state and a new religion had to kill countless people.” And he insists on this, that in order to create anything truly meaningful destruction is required because people are not inclined to go for that.
I mean, Consider the Exodus, that’s topnotch leadership, Moses and god, hard to imagine better leadership than that, plus proven results every step of the way: plagues, parting of the red sea, lights at night across the desert, manna from the skies when you’re hungry. Everything possible.
And what’s the reaction from the Jews? Always, at the first opportunity they’re ready to go back to Egypt. That happens repeatedly.
when they get, finally, to the boundaries of the promised land — and I like to remind people of this because it’s the model of today: Everybody is very annoyed today that these formerly Communist countries, are taking so— they don’t seem to get it, about capitalism and democracy. why can’t they understand freedom? well that’s what exodus is all about –
What happens – they get to the boundaries of the promised land, they organize an espionage operation, Joshua and Caleb and 38 other people go in and snoop around and come back and report good news and bad news: The good news: it’s even better than god said, milk and honey all around, …fabulous, a dream …. Bad news, these people are bigger than we are, superbly well defended and there is no way that we’re going to beat these people.
And they riot and there’s the usual insurrection against Moses and they demand proper leadership people who will take them back to egypt .
at this point god says to Moses, Well, I can’t take this anymore, I’m going to kill them all. I’ll take you and joshua and couple of the other guys who seem to be all right and we’ll start all over again. because with these people it’s hopeless. . .
And Moses talks god out of it as usual and god says Ok, BUT, but not one of these people is going to set foot in the promised land . We’re going to wait for them all to die.
http://www.c-span.org/video/?123852-1/book-discussion-machiavelli-modern-leadership
Rabbi Lapin is a member of a panel headed by Irving Kristol that is discussing the foolishness of Jewish liberalism and the advisability of Jews joining conservative movements and groups. Lapin’s comments arise as the panel — actually, Irving Kristol — responds to a question from the audience, “So how do we solve the problem of liberalism vs. conservatism?”
Kristol say, “Kill all the liberals. … Kill all the conservatives.”
Kristol speaks in jest, and everybody laughs.
Then the rabbi says:
inasmuch as we are still in the period of post-Passover thinking, I think we can look at Mr. Kristol’s suggestion and vary that just slightly and keep most people happy.
I don’t think we should kill off all the liberals.
However, when the Jewish people exited from Egypt and had to make this transition from slavery, which is essentially the ultimate in socialism, if you think about it: you’re slaves to the state; you work so that almost all your income is taken by the state and in return the state will take care of all your needs and it’s just another word for slavery.
As we moved away from the ultimate of Egyptian based socialism to the freedom of an Israel-based free market economy 3300 years ago it was understood, sadly and tragically but it was understood that we did have to wait for an entire generation to pass away.
and i think that may be what mr kristol was somewhat lightheartedly addressing.
(nb: I take serious issue with Ledeen’s version of Machiavelli. That’s beside the point. What Ledeen is talking about is Moses and methods and mythologies from the Jewish tradition. As Ledeen concedes, in Machiavelli’s time nothing like the Levitic destruction of a massive number of people, nor the extinction of an entire generation, was carried out. According to Ledeen, however, such was carried out by and among Jewish people.)
One of Rutherford’s major theses is that the German leadership acted out of ideology — an ideology of hatred of Jews just because they are Jews. Presumably Jaffa knew that for Aquinas, one of the proofs of god was that he was an uncaused cause. Rutherford asserts that German animus toward Jews was an uncaused cause, but he does not sustain that assertion but merely posits it while eliding and ignoring significant harms that Germans endured either directly as a result of actions of influential Jews; or while Jews among them did not endure the same harms (such as starvation deaths during WWI); or as a consequence of influential Jewish persons pursuing goals of particular and exclusive benefit to Jews at the expense of Germans.
Presumably, based upon Rutherford’s conviction that Germans acted against Jews out of ideological hatred of them, he is able to persuade himself, absent any evidence, that “it is fair to say that Germans killed Jews in Pavlovsk.”
However, Rutherford recounts, “later on in the same year ten people in the town are executed for cutting communications cables.”
Aha. Ten people in Pavlovsk were executed for a reason; a cause, not out of ideological motives.
On the other hand, as Ledeen and Lapin informed us, in the Jewish myth system, “Anybody looking carefully at Moses has to admit that in order to create a new state and a new religion had to kill countless people. . . . in order to create anything truly meaningful destruction is required because people are not inclined to go for that.”
For Ledeen and Lapin, mass killing, or awaiting the extinction of an entire generation, is a key part of a defining Mosaic mythos; an ideological imperative.
* Race is real, biology is real, evolution is real, genetics are real ….see the Minnesota Twin Study which includes identicals separated at birth and raised differently, and turning out just the same , and the same as identicals raised in the same home.
Nations largely are ethnic groups that have been separated from other groups over thousands of years and thus have evolved differently due to long-term environmental factors, foundational factors, and genetic drift.
Finally, the Global North is the home of smart people and the global south is the home of dummies, and all the folks in between are progressively smarter of dumber depending on whether you start from the South or the North.
This is not just about intelligence, but the Global South vs. Global North, like the identical twin studies, show the effects of genetics.
I wonder why so many folks just gobble on as if DNA studies, etc. are showing the race factor as huge, if not everything.
Culture, creeds, abstractions, etc, whether in politics or personal life are just bulldozed by genetics. Anybody who has had children can see this.
Ideas largely are incorrect ideas, fueled by passions of various types. Start with Evolution, race, biology…and you will start to understand the stuff of politics, human relations, psychology, and your own Self.
With regard to the self, as we get older we shed identities that have been culturally programmed by propaganda, various funny ideas of a personal origin, or family origin, and we start listening to our genes. What Feels Right. No Shoulds. No catechisms. Just the long sorting out of myriad stimuli and a consequent arrival at Ripeness, King Lear department.
We are living under Communism Lite, or Liberal Totalitarianism. Equality is a childish game, but also an important support for Global Liiberalism, the international marketplace,etc. and The Great Homogenizers for Capital. We are All The Same, Equal. This is just marketing and the liberals do well by doing good, of course wrecking the planet ultimately.
We are standardized parts, ready to be plugged into any economic unit. This brand of Conservatism is a fraud, and I wonder what Jaffa was up to with his Myth.
Conservatism is race, country, neighborhood, national economy, family, friends and separation of public from private.
When the history of out times is written…historians will be astonished at our madness and especially the Jewish madness. When in college at Cal back in the 60s, I had three great Jewish profs. One of them Sheldon Wolin, and his book Politics and Vision, which I still have and consult from time to time; Wolin made short work of Jewish tradition and simply stated that it was of no account for Western Political theory. A total non-entity.
So the Straussians and this guy Jaffa, just pollute the conservative tradition of Europe with Equality, a sure design of destruction for any polity.
* The SS was a rigorously trained and disciplined corps, composed of volunteers not just from Germany but from numerous (ethnicities) and states throughout Eurpoe and North Africa. The NSDAP notions of “racial purity and Aryan superiority” have been dishonestly misconstrued — “mythologized,” in the Jaffa sense — the SS was the most racially diverse of any army that fought in Europe, in contrast to the segregated US Army. Officers trained as rigorously as soldiers, and officers led their divisions into battle — half of all division commanders were killed in action.
The SS was Germany’s Navy SEALs. Would you characterize Navy SEALs as “bloodthirsty?” Or as highly disciplined trained killers? Does the distinction make a difference?
* The lesson I drew was (and is) that humans create their own value systems based upon a complex set of psychological factors, and the ideology that is most successful is so because of the power of its followers to spread the message. Further, a successful ideology must in some way lead to further successes, otherwise said ideology will collapse, either from within or from pressure without, such as was the case with National Socialism or Soviet “Communism.”
