the unlikely story of how America slipped the surly bonds of earth & came to believe in signs & portents that would make the middle ages blush

via PayPal...

via Amazon...

this site is a labor of love. i.e., if you love me enough, I'll be able to complete it. send proof of love via buttons above. please. if you can. thanks.

SUBSCRIBE

ABOUT

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

BUSINESS CARD

PROLEGOMENA
(prequel)

TABLE OF CONTENTS
(obsolete)

BIBLIOGRAPHY
(not obsolete yet)

Google Book Search

ARCHIVES
July 2005
August 2005
September 2005
October 2005
November 2005
December 2005
January 2006
February 2006
March 2006
April 2006
May 2006
June 2006
July 2006
August 2006
September 2006
October 2006
November 2006
December 2006
January 2007
February 2007
March 2007
April 2007
May 2007
June 2007
August 2007
September 2007
October 2007
November 2007
January 2008
February 2008
March 2008
April 2008
May 2008
June 2008
July 2008
August 2008
September 2008
October 2008
November 2008
December 2008
January 2009
February 2009
March 2009
April 2009
May 2009
November 2009
May 2010
March 2014

FRIENDS
AKMA
Francesco Armando
Tim Boucher
Marc Canter
Michael "OC" Clarke
Hernani Dimantas
Dream's End
Cory Doctorow
Esther Dyson
John Gehl
Dan Gillmor
Mike Golby
Annie Gottlieb
Howard Greenstein
Denise Howell
Joi Ito
Norm Jensen
Hylton Jolliffe
Kombinat!
Dean Landsman
Steve Larsen
Madame Levy
wood s lot
Kevin Marks
Massimo Moruzzi
Tom Matrullo
Brian Millar
Eric Norlin
Rev Sam Norton
Frank Paynter
Chris Pirillo
Shelley Powers
JP Rangaswami
Paul Scheele
Connie Schmidt
Doc Searls
Euan Semple
George Sessum
Jeneane Sessum
Halley Suitt
Gaspar Torriero
Gary Turner
The Happy Tutor
Beat Waydown
David Weinberger
Donna Wentworth
Don Williams
Evan Williams
Wonderchicken
Xanadu Xero

another (maybe easier) way to read the back issues

SWIKI SEARCH

Google
 


mystic bourgeoisie 
web 

Powered by Blogger


YET ANOTHER BIO


YOUR MILEAGE MAY VARY



Enter Book Title or ISBN

New & Used Books - Find the Lowest Price - Compare more than a hundred book stores, 60,000 sellers, in a click.


Locations of visitors to this page

SPECIAL THANKS TO
Blind Boy Apollo
and the All-White Astronauts



New Age "Asiatic" thought ... is establishing itself as the
hegemonic ideology of global capitalism. (Zizek)

Monday, September 11

leo strauss - the neocons - jihad


you say you are a patriot
I think that you're a crock of shit

stones ~ sweet neo con

Several months ago, I mentioned -- in the usual elliptically discursive and maddeningly en passant manner that substitutes for style on this blog (see, even I know it) -- something I'd read in The New York Times Book Review about a book about Leo Strauss. As I recall, the review -- and reportedly the book -- basically said that it was weird that Leo Strauss kept being associated with the neoconservative Bush League in Washington, DC. Since then, I've read a bit more about Leo Strauss, who died 30+ years ago, and have discovered that all the neocons say the same thing about him: They respect him tremendously, he was a hell of a guy, and he really liked Plato a lot, so what could be bad? But none of that has anything to with -- are you kidding? -- politics.

Uh huh.

The only reason I even bothered reading that review was that I'd just read somewhere else that Hannah Arendt refused to go out with lovable ol' Leo because, and I quote, "she didn't date Nazis." As a matter of fact, as I later read in the NY Times ($), she did. The Times review of Hannah Arendt/Martin Heidegger (Yale University Press) notes...

Referring to the death of Husserl in a letter in 1946 to the philosopher Karl Jaspers, Arendt called Heidegger "a potential murderer." But almost from the moment she was reunited with Heidegger in 1950, Professor Ettinger said, Arendt forgave him everything.

Writing a tribute to Heidegger in The New York Review of Books in 1971 on the occasion of Heidegger's 80th birthday, Arendt dismissed his Nazi past humorously by likening him to Thales, the Greek philosopher who while gazing at the stars stumbled into a well.

[NYRB link added]

In other words, your usual tangled web. But as this is the web I've lately been tangling with, that's probably why Leo Strauss and the American Right recently popped up in my Amazon recommendations. It's by Shadia B. Drury, of whom I'd never heard, so I was somewhat amazed (further demonstrating my deep ignorance of these waters) to find she has a page on Wikipedia. My interest might have ended there, had I not read that she "has called Strauss himself 'a Jewish Nazi'" -- especially as some attentive Wikieditor has added the tag "citation needed." Well goodness, I should say so!

So I went haring off to find one. There's a reference to the quote on plastic.com, but as that site is now defunct, the page 404s. However, the Google cache page is still there, and it mentions The Boston Globe. After paying the Globe $2.95 to read "The Philosopher" by one Jeet Heer (May 11, 2003), I kicked myself, because once I had the guy's name it was easy to find his site where the article is available gratis. Here's the relevant bit...

Clifford Orwin, a professor at the University of Toronto strongly influenced by Strauss, describes him as a wise teacher who counseled prudence and moderation. But Shadia Drury, a professor of political science at the University of Calgary and the author of "Leo Strauss and the American Right," completely disagrees. For her, Strauss was nothing less than "a Jewish Nazi" whose pretense of American patriotism and piety hid a cynical and extremist antidemocratic ideology.

Still wondering where she said or wrote that, I emailed Jeet Heer. He responded with blinding speed: "The phrase came from an interview I did with Drury, conducted about a week before the article was published."

So: citation supplied.

For this and other such assessments, professor Drury has been called "the bitch of Calgary" by the neo-con-men -- a label of which she is evidently quite proud (though I forgot now where I read that). Here's an excellent audio interview with her on the subject.

However, you might want to save that one for later, because what follows is a three-hour BBC documentary about Leo Strauss, the American neoconservative movement, and "al Qaeda terrorist networks." These three segments are also available on DVD.

I can't imagine a better way to commemorate the fifth anniversary of 9/11 -- and I can't recommend these films highly enough. You'll see.

The Power of Nightmares

Part I: Baby It's Cold Outside

Part II: The Phantom Victory

Part III: The Shadows in the Cave

Further reading, as suggested by writer, producer and narrator Adam Curtis.



ARCHIVES